I like to upvote things that I think add value to HackerNews. However, since upvotes are no longer displayed, it's impossible for my agreement or endorsement to have any visible manifestation unless I add a comment. I'd be tempted to use this emerging new idiom, except I think it looks and sounds stupid.
However, pretty much all dialectic and idiomatic shifts look stupid to those entrenched in the existing "standards" and not part of the current "in-crowd." Language changes, and as it does so it leaves behind the previous generation. Perhaps this will flourish briefly and then die out. Perhaps it will return every 10 years or so, possibly even become mundane rather than regarded by some as "cool" and others as, well, juvenile.
Personally, I think that saying "This" looks stupid, but it succinctly expresses the sentiment of the one who writes it. I certainly think it's less stupid than saying "I could care less" when one means that one doesn't care at all. Even saying "meh" would be more acceptable than that illogical expletive.
But in the end this is unhelpful. The language used here will reflect the norms of the population. You can try a King Canute and stand against the tide, but you can't win.
I don't know if "this" usage has spread to the general population as a whole but it seems like it at least started with sites frequented by programmers / hackers and I don't think its hard to see why something like "this" would become commonly used among this population as people who write code have a tendency toward trying to express things concisely when possible
However, pretty much all dialectic and idiomatic shifts look stupid to those entrenched in the existing "standards" and not part of the current "in-crowd." Language changes, and as it does so it leaves behind the previous generation. Perhaps this will flourish briefly and then die out. Perhaps it will return every 10 years or so, possibly even become mundane rather than regarded by some as "cool" and others as, well, juvenile.
Personally, I think that saying "This" looks stupid, but it succinctly expresses the sentiment of the one who writes it. I certainly think it's less stupid than saying "I could care less" when one means that one doesn't care at all. Even saying "meh" would be more acceptable than that illogical expletive.
But in the end this is unhelpful. The language used here will reflect the norms of the population. You can try a King Canute and stand against the tide, but you can't win.