Neither post is arguing that there aren't still some substantive comments on HN. There are. But I've noticed a lot of posts that aren't trolls but that don't add anything valuable. Those, in some ways, are the worst kind: not quite bad enough to ban / delete, but not good enough to add real content.
Possibly. I posted some examples here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2012/01/15/commenting-communit... and here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2012/08/04/comment-when-you-ha... , with the latter discussing how I try not to comment unless I have something substantive to say or ask.
Neither post is arguing that there aren't still some substantive comments on HN. There are. But I've noticed a lot of posts that aren't trolls but that don't add anything valuable. Those, in some ways, are the worst kind: not quite bad enough to ban / delete, but not good enough to add real content.