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I'm starting to lose faith in the concept of online voting. You get Pinboard, Boaty McBoatface and white house petitions about the Death Star. Maybe it's how ea

I'm starting to lose faith in the concept of online voting. You get Pinboard, Boaty McBoatface and white house petitions about the Death Star. Maybe it's how easily links can be shared to reach a wider audience. Or just something about the nature of using the internet to vote. For some reason, nonsense seems to be more likely when people make decisions over http. There's a fine line between "wisdom of the crowds" and "American Idol for startups". I'm not sure exactly where Apply HN falls. It doesn't seem like any individual investment will make or break YC, and this is an interesting idea for an experiment. But I don't come away from this feeling upbeat about the democratic process.

grey-area 10y ago
I too was disappointed to see the mob forming and stayed away from the original discussion poisoned by it - a crowd baying for blood and entertainment is the worst side of HN and online crowds, so it's disappointing to see people behave that way here. As a suggestion for doing things better: Make it clear what outcome YC wants (serious candidates for YCF) and what they won't accept. Don't tolerate crass trolling like boaty mcboatface or 'I want my $20k', stamp it out early with a polite decline, if someone is clearly subverting the contest. Make the reward explicitly be not participation and $20k, but an interview with HN, then starty mcstartupface who has no interest in the program can be gracefully declined, and others who are actually interested can participate as was intended. Have categories defined by HN as well as an overall popularity contest, to encourage people to look at all the options, not just those which are popular.
zeemonkee3 10y ago
Perhaps the way to go is representative democracy - vote for a committee from a pool of HN users, who then get to choose applications. The committee is re-elected every year, or whenever a member steps down.

grey-area 10y ago

I too was disappointed to see the mob forming and stayed away from the original discussion poisoned by it - a crowd baying for blood and entertainment is the worst side of HN and online crowds, so it's disappointing to see people behave that way here. As a suggestion for doing things better: Make it clear what outcome YC wants (serious candidates for YCF) and what they won't accept. Don't tolerate crass trolling like boaty mcboatface or 'I want my $20k', stamp it out early with a polite decline, if someone is clearly subverting the contest. Make the reward explicitly be not participation and $20k, but an interview with HN, then starty mcstartupface who has no interest in the program can be gracefully declined, and others who are actually interested can participate as was intended. Have categories defined by HN as well as an overall popularity contest, to encourage people to look at all the options, not just those which are popular.

zeemonkee3 10y ago

Perhaps the way to go is representative democracy - vote for a committee from a pool of HN users, who then get to choose applications. The committee is re-elected every year, or whenever a member steps down.