Well, let's see. If you're a hot chick, drunk as hell, staggering around in the dark alleys of a big city in the bad part of town, you should at least be less surprised that it is rape-o-clock.
So, in other words, it's really important? Like, pays our bills, heats our homes, puts food on the table? If you want to apply reductionist arguments, then ancient money is just piles of metal. Not like it had any "value" beyond what they collectively gave it, either.
Do we have to revisit the barter system where value is traded for value to once again realize the reason money was invented? Fish for tools works, until you want apples.
It doesn't matter whether something "intrinsically" has value (wood as fuel, apple as food) if you can trade it for something that does. As long as that remains true, karma remains an int and bank accounts remain buying power. Fin.
People who bitch about trolling might as well bitch about cold weather or inconsiderate drivers. Yeah, it's not always fun, but it is just the way things are and will be. You can't remove the human factor.
I hope your bank account isn't stored as just an int(!)
But seriously, it is a representation of something physical. Money. Money which can in turn be used for other physical things. Reputation "karma" isn't. It /is/ meaningless in this context, because you can never log into HN again and your life will go on.
I don't think the argument was "anything digital is pointless."