That style of comment does bother me though. It implies some kind of authority or consensus. "It is important to note" should just be read as "I (and people as enlightened/ informed as myself) think".

Just tell me your opinion, and I'll evaluate it based on it's content. You telling me that it's Important only puts me on alert for some kind of bias.

EDIT: to clarify, if I'm doing my job correctly as a critical reader, I can't trust a commenter to be speaking for anyone but themselves. Phrasing like "it's important to note" serves to divert from that, because it implies that it's not the commenter's opinion, they're just spreading the gospel.

Their assertion may be correct, but I'm doing it wrong if I take their word on it just because "it's important to note." Which is why I would prefer they leave it out, because I still need to do the work whether they tell me to or not, and telling me not to makes me suspicious.

I like the affectations. It shows other users that noting something of relevance is good user behavior. "Is your comment actually worth noting??" is a good consideration to keep HN high quality. Some users will misuse it but that's very transparent so I believe it's worth mentioning when you believe something is worth mentioning (haha)

perhaps it is affections which give language its character

it's worth noting that the simplification of language was ostensibly the goal of newspeak in the book, 1984