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I think it's because HN has a single theme. Like you said there are many annoying cases on HN too. Let's say your chance of coming across one is 1%. On Reddit y

I think it's because HN has a single theme. Like you said there are many annoying cases on HN too. Let's say your chance of coming across one is 1%. On Reddit you have many of these communities, so the chance of coming across annoying posts become N% (depending on how many subreddits you read)

dang 10y ago
HN doesn't have a single theme, and if people think it does, we're doing something wrong. On the front page right now are posts about elephant brains, Nazi propaganda, and aphantasia, for example. That seems like thematic pluralism to me.
- galistoca 10y ago
  It's interesting comment coming from the moderator. I know what you mean, but it is "Hacker News" after all. That's why when sometimes people see irrelevant posts they say "why the hell is this on the front page of HN?". The reason I said "Theme" instead of "Topic" is exactly for the same reason. I think the theme of this site is something that would interest people with curiosity (which comes from the "Hacker" theme).
  - dang 10y ago
    Ok, if intellectual curiosity counts as a theme, then I agree. This goes back to the beginning of the site btw: https://news.ycombinator.com/hackernews.html https://news.ycombinator.com/hackernews.html
- enraged_camel 10y ago
  The single theme is that of intellectual stimulation, which attracts a certain crowd. We don't see any content in the entertainment space, or the politics space, for example, unless said content is stuff that hacker types find intellectually stimulating.
  - nickpsecurity 10y ago
    I like that categorization. The concept that it's all intellectually stimulating to at least a few types of "hackers" does capture most of what I see.
  - krapp 10y ago
    And yet people often complain that this site is becoming too mainstream, too inundated with content of low intellectual value, and that there are few actual "hacker types" here. To the point that accusing the site of turning into Reddit is specifically pointed out in the guidelines as something not to do. Does a "hacker type" correlate strongly with a certain race, gender or nationality? Is one political point of view more valid for "hacker types" than another? The guidelines of the actual site uses the qualifier "a good hacker," implying one should not only be a hacker, but "good" Good at what? Programming, startups, or conforming to an archetype of a "hacker" personality? Even "intellectual stimulation" tends to lead to the belief that only intellects of a certain type should be considered valid. Dang has to constantly correct people who assume that content which is intellectually stimulating, but not explicitly about startups or technology, is off topic or detrimental. Hacker News is not what some people assume it is. The "good hacker" archetype itself is the problem, as people differ wildly as to their interpretations of it, and by extension, in their belief in what the true theme and purpose of Hacker News is. Yet what really separates the average Hacker News user from the average Reddit user? I don't know how many users HN has, but Reddit has tens if not hundreds of millions, so one can assume the average Reddit user is not necessarily less intelligent than HN. Reddit also has a number of high quality subreddits which are heavily moderated and used by experts in their field, so I'm not certain HN possesses more technical acumen than Reddit, either. Quality of articles? Many things posted here also appear on Reddit. Why, then, do Hacker News users seem to detest Reddit so much? Because among the few commonalities in the various interpretations of the hacker archetype are elitism and a distaste for mainstream culture, and new users want to appear to be "good hackers" and hating the mainstream is what people think "good hackers" do. Yet read the comments here, especially in controversial, non-technical threads where posturing as a "good hacker" has less value. Most are no better than, or even worse than, comments in similar subthreads on Reddit.

dang 10y ago

HN doesn't have a single theme, and if people think it does, we're doing something wrong. On the front page right now are posts about elephant brains, Nazi propaganda, and aphantasia, for example. That seems like thematic pluralism to me.

galistoca 10y ago
It's interesting comment coming from the moderator. I know what you mean, but it is "Hacker News" after all. That's why when sometimes people see irrelevant posts they say "why the hell is this on the front page of HN?". The reason I said "Theme" instead of "Topic" is exactly for the same reason. I think the theme of this site is something that would interest people with curiosity (which comes from the "Hacker" theme).
- dang 10y ago
  Ok, if intellectual curiosity counts as a theme, then I agree. This goes back to the beginning of the site btw: https://news.ycombinator.com/hackernews.html https://news.ycombinator.com/hackernews.html
enraged_camel 10y ago
The single theme is that of intellectual stimulation, which attracts a certain crowd. We don't see any content in the entertainment space, or the politics space, for example, unless said content is stuff that hacker types find intellectually stimulating.
- nickpsecurity 10y ago
  I like that categorization. The concept that it's all intellectually stimulating to at least a few types of "hackers" does capture most of what I see.
- krapp 10y ago
  And yet people often complain that this site is becoming too mainstream, too inundated with content of low intellectual value, and that there are few actual "hacker types" here. To the point that accusing the site of turning into Reddit is specifically pointed out in the guidelines as something not to do. Does a "hacker type" correlate strongly with a certain race, gender or nationality? Is one political point of view more valid for "hacker types" than another? The guidelines of the actual site uses the qualifier "a good hacker," implying one should not only be a hacker, but "good" Good at what? Programming, startups, or conforming to an archetype of a "hacker" personality? Even "intellectual stimulation" tends to lead to the belief that only intellects of a certain type should be considered valid. Dang has to constantly correct people who assume that content which is intellectually stimulating, but not explicitly about startups or technology, is off topic or detrimental. Hacker News is not what some people assume it is. The "good hacker" archetype itself is the problem, as people differ wildly as to their interpretations of it, and by extension, in their belief in what the true theme and purpose of Hacker News is. Yet what really separates the average Hacker News user from the average Reddit user? I don't know how many users HN has, but Reddit has tens if not hundreds of millions, so one can assume the average Reddit user is not necessarily less intelligent than HN. Reddit also has a number of high quality subreddits which are heavily moderated and used by experts in their field, so I'm not certain HN possesses more technical acumen than Reddit, either. Quality of articles? Many things posted here also appear on Reddit. Why, then, do Hacker News users seem to detest Reddit so much? Because among the few commonalities in the various interpretations of the hacker archetype are elitism and a distaste for mainstream culture, and new users want to appear to be "good hackers" and hating the mainstream is what people think "good hackers" do. Yet read the comments here, especially in controversial, non-technical threads where posturing as a "good hacker" has less value. Most are no better than, or even worse than, comments in similar subthreads on Reddit.