We're looking for a discussion, not a knee jerk reaction to down vote things just because you disagree. But opinions get buried yet not a single person talks. What the point of a forum if no one comments?
Chermorg2 votesSo, the issue with this is that for the first part this would require quite a bit of development which may be out of scope of the development currently going on. Not to say it's impossible, just that it is a different change than what's currently being worked on.
The other issue is that many times, especially once a thread gains traction, someone's already said everything you need to say. You would have many spam comments of "same" where they could've just voted in the current system. If someone thinks a post is well written and deserves an upvote, they should not need to comment just to do so.
adjoth1 votesSo, the issue with this is that for the first part this would require quite a bit of development which may be out of scope of the development currently going on. Not to say it's impossible, just that it is a different change than what's currently being worked on.
The other issue is that many times, especially once a thread gains traction, someone's already said everything you need to say. You would have many spam comments of "same" where they could've just voted in the current system. If someone thinks a post is well written and deserves an upvote, they should not need to comment just to do so.
If things where so peaceful and agreeable then I wouldn't be bring it up, people vote as a way to show agreement or disagreement. But it doesn't address anything nor does it provide new ideas. If fact I often see light forms of harassment has "popular". No discussion. You mentioned "spamming comments", they exist either way. Even on the same post. If you wanted to prevent it you'd needs some sort of voting system which isn't reliant on the chat. And even amongst similar even identical content it can be difficult to find. I've had difficulties finding even my own post. And of course if a post is downvoted or just has a low number of votes it can be difficult to even find. It might be worth making a method to merge identical post, but that's another discussion. As for the overall difficulty or developments scope, I cannot say much, as I'm not part of it, I don't know how it's currently done, nor how or what is prioritized. But I can say from a CS perceptive as well as a user, it needs some work. Personally I'd like view count to mean more than just whether or not is agreeable.
Chermorg1 votesI really don't disagree on most of your complaints about the boards. I just don't think requiring comments to allow voting is a viable solution to the problem that wouldn't create more problems :/
Sona Ping1 votesIf we want to make discussion the most important thing and remove the knee-jerk reactionary nature, the thing that should be done is remove the voting. That way opinions are not buried by being one that just simply causes reaction against positions.