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Why is this article on hacker news? What does it have to do with this community? I am just wondering how it fits in to the vision of what HN is supposed to be.

Why is this article on hacker news? What does it have to do with this community? I am just wondering how it fits in to the vision of what HN is supposed to be. Or do I not understand what it is?

DanBC 11y ago
What do you think should be here? Why, specifically, do you think this doesn't fit?
- ethanpil 11y ago
  I come here for news on cutting edge technology and startup culture, not social issues.
  - DanBC 11y ago
    Searching for the word "gay", then ordering the results by time, then going to the earliest entries, shows many results for articles about homosexual experiences. These articles were being posted to HN seven years ago.
  - jccc 11y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. There are gay people in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, and there are gay people in these forums. I would guess that there might be a higher percentage of gay people on HN than in the general U.S. population. Issues like this one are deeply important to them, and people who know them (which is a growing demographic). In any case, HN is filled with submissions and comments on languages, platforms, and businesses that I really don't care much about, but their presence does not bother me.
    - ethanpil 11y ago
      I just didn't think it fit the profile. I didn't downvote nor complain, just asked what the justification was. Wasn't hostile, but my inquiry has produced some downvotes. Go figure.
      - jccc 11y ago
        For what it's worth, you didn't get a downvote from me. I would just point out however that questioning a topic's presence on a forum could easily be perceived to be hostility toward that topic. You might or might not know that on HN gay-related and other not-strictly-tech topics have come up on occasion that inevitably trigger queries like yours (some overtly hostile), and most likely the opposition you are experiencing comes from readers who have become tired of the routine.
    - eric_h 11y ago
      I've gotten so tired of the "Why is this on HN" and then someone posts that guidelines link (note that this is not a criticism of your comment). I wish we had a canonical discussion thread that's led with an instance of "Why is this on HN", followed by someone's post of the guidelines link, followed by an "evergreen" discussion forum where folks can debate why non-tech related things are featured on HN - anytime someone posts that "why" comment, someone can link to that. Let alone the fact that the basic mechanism of the site is not a mystery. Someone posts a link, and folks looking at the "new" tab upvote it, hence - it makes it to the front page. It's on the front page because people found it interesting! Who the fuck cares if it's not a technical article. Furthermore, this article in particular is an example of a successful, noble "hack" of the legal system and as such deserves a mention on hacker news.

Why is this article on hacker news? What does it have to do with this community? I am just wondering how it fits in to the vision of what HN is supposed to be. Or do I not understand what it is?

DanBC 11y ago

What do you think should be here? Why, specifically, do you think this doesn't fit?

ethanpil 11y ago
I come here for news on cutting edge technology and startup culture, not social issues.
- DanBC 11y ago
  Searching for the word "gay", then ordering the results by time, then going to the earliest entries, shows many results for articles about homosexual experiences. These articles were being posted to HN seven years ago.
- jccc 11y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. There are gay people in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, and there are gay people in these forums. I would guess that there might be a higher percentage of gay people on HN than in the general U.S. population. Issues like this one are deeply important to them, and people who know them (which is a growing demographic). In any case, HN is filled with submissions and comments on languages, platforms, and businesses that I really don't care much about, but their presence does not bother me.
  - ethanpil 11y ago
    I just didn't think it fit the profile. I didn't downvote nor complain, just asked what the justification was. Wasn't hostile, but my inquiry has produced some downvotes. Go figure.
    - jccc 11y ago
      For what it's worth, you didn't get a downvote from me. I would just point out however that questioning a topic's presence on a forum could easily be perceived to be hostility toward that topic. You might or might not know that on HN gay-related and other not-strictly-tech topics have come up on occasion that inevitably trigger queries like yours (some overtly hostile), and most likely the opposition you are experiencing comes from readers who have become tired of the routine.
  - eric_h 11y ago
    I've gotten so tired of the "Why is this on HN" and then someone posts that guidelines link (note that this is not a criticism of your comment). I wish we had a canonical discussion thread that's led with an instance of "Why is this on HN", followed by someone's post of the guidelines link, followed by an "evergreen" discussion forum where folks can debate why non-tech related things are featured on HN - anytime someone posts that "why" comment, someone can link to that. Let alone the fact that the basic mechanism of the site is not a mystery. Someone posts a link, and folks looking at the "new" tab upvote it, hence - it makes it to the front page. It's on the front page because people found it interesting! Who the fuck cares if it's not a technical article. Furthermore, this article in particular is an example of a successful, noble "hack" of the legal system and as such deserves a mention on hacker news.