Part of having a productive conversation is using context clues and social norms to help your understanding of what someone means when they say something. Derailing the conversation by taking a comment literally when everyone understands the intent behind the comment is not helpful.
But one of the interesting parts of the paradigm of hierarchically-threaded online discussion, is that only one subthread/reply to a given thread has to be a "productive conversation" (i.e. to continue the thread in the "obvious" way); the other subthreads can be tangents, and tangents do not "derail" in the same way they do in a flat-linear-threaded forum.
I would disagree, because they're still visible and still structurally part of the same conversation, meaning people reading the conversation will read those tangents, or at the very least be distracted by them.
And this is why subthreads in all hierarchical discussion systems are sorted by vote-rank: the subthread that most effectively serves as the continuation of the "canonical" conversation will (almost) always appear first. The only time that doesn't happen is when that subthread doesn't exist—as has happened here. More often than not, when this is seen in a "played out" archived discussion thread, this doesn't suggest that people are "getting distracted by" the tangent, but rather just suggests that nobody is all that interested in continuing the original conversation.
(Unless the tangent leads toward a mind-killing subject like politics. I'm 100% behind you on applying careful consideration before making a tangent from a technical topic to an emotionally-charged one; people see that kind of subthread and never even make it to the rest of the subthreads in the same conversation.)
Another part of having a productive conversation is learning not to make blanket statements, and knowing that most of what you say will be taken literally, and being generous and charitable in your interpretation of others.
For me, the best part of having interesting conversations on HN is reading all the alternative points of view by smart people. Not much "productive" happens, from my point of view, by criticizing someone's show HN project, not much "productive" happens when you make blanket statements about what all people want. And not much "productive" happens by only agreeing with others.
So there might be another hidden motive behind what @jasonkostempski said. The comment he replied to literally insults the Poxi project, and perhaps @jasonkostempski was merely defending a Show HN project that's in a very early stage.
In my view, you may be defending the wrong person here. I want to see more show HN projects, and I want people to feel comfortable sharing their projects without fear of getting ripped to shreds, called a joke, and questioned why anyone would ever want to do such a thing. Let's be supportive.
>Another part of having a productive conversation is learning not to make blanket statements, and knowing that most of what you say will be taken literally, and being generous and charitable in your interpretation of others.
So the point was to teach the commenter a lesson by responding unhelpfully?
>In my view, you may be defending the wrong person here.
So, because I was pointing out someone not responding constructively I am by necessity "defending" all points the other person makes? I think that is faulty reasoning.
