I think it's just a matter of numbers. HN links have, on average, always had relatively few comments, so growth is more obvious, even if there were no other difference but numbers. The comment counts number in the dozens to the low hundreds - reading a typical full comment thread doesn't take long.
So if HN doubled in users over the last N months, then even if 95% of the comments are non-abusive, that means the story that used to get 20 comments and have 1 abusive comments now gets 40 comments and 2 abusive comments. And when it comes to mean, shitty stuff like this, 2 seems like a lot more than 1. And that's with 95% good-guys. When a bigger story happens and gets 240 comments, at 95% positive comments, that's 12 worthless or mean or needlessly sarcastic comments. Ugh.
Comments
I think it's just a matter of numbers. HN links have, on average, always had relatively few comments, so growth is more obvious, even if there were no other difference but numbers. The comment counts number in the dozens to the low hundreds - reading a typical full comment thread doesn't take long.
So if HN doubled in users over the last N months, then even if 95% of the comments are non-abusive, that means the story that used to get 20 comments and have 1 abusive comments now gets 40 comments and 2 abusive comments. And when it comes to mean, shitty stuff like this, 2 seems like a lot more than 1. And that's with 95% good-guys. When a bigger story happens and gets 240 comments, at 95% positive comments, that's 12 worthless or mean or needlessly sarcastic comments. Ugh.