I could not agree more, I know from past experience that being part of a group of peers whom you feel value your input can be a very rewarding experience, to say that it is meaningless would be to say that he didn't care at all. They have a meaning, both to him, as what he then felt was a valued individual in the community; and also to me.
It's very easy for people to say that Reddit karma is pointless and has no value to people, but when I look at myself I see myself making comments on another website (http://hackerne.ws) where by, if the other users feel I have made a contribution which added something to the discussion, they reward me by clicking on an up arrow next to my name, it's like they're giving me a virtual thumbs up.
So yes, it made him feel good and it's important to feel appreciated by the audience to whom you perform. Feel free to take away my hard earned karma if you disagree, but bear in mind that it will probably make me die a little inside, at least, for a few minutes, before the rush of internet-adrenaline wears off.
news.ycombinator.com is too slow for me, I don't know why but I get a lot of latency trying to connect and it can take several minutes to load a single page.
hackerne.ws is the only way I can reliably connect to this website unfortunately
It's very easy for people to say that Reddit karma is pointless and has no value to people, but when I look at myself I see myself making comments on another website (http://hackerne.ws) where by, if the other users feel I have made a contribution which added something to the discussion, they reward me by clicking on an up arrow next to my name, it's like they're giving me a virtual thumbs up.
So yes, it made him feel good and it's important to feel appreciated by the audience to whom you perform. Feel free to take away my hard earned karma if you disagree, but bear in mind that it will probably make me die a little inside, at least, for a few minutes, before the rush of internet-adrenaline wears off.