4 ms·

I would add that there's a list of flags as well, that trigger on creation and happen within a minute. I've ran across a few of those, including Thalmic Myo, D

by kefka 10y ago

I would add that there's a list of flags as well, that trigger on creation and happen within a minute. I've ran across a few of those, including Thalmic Myo, Double Robotics, and some early Uber posts (which the blocks now seem to have been removed). Usually, on news sites (like... Hacker News), there is a disclosure when there's fiduciary connections to the news at large. Like "This object was provided gratis by company", or "News company is a subsidiary of parent company"... things like that. It's responsible reporting and news. But yes, things can get user-flag killed. And things can get system-flag killed. And we have no clue which happened. Seems rather slimy and questionably ethical.

bryanlarsen 10y ago
Hacker News definitely weights submissions based on URL, submissions from sites such as hypothetically buzzfeed fall faster than sites from better sources. But I don't think HN also flags based on URL. Do you have evidence to the contrary?
- kefka 10y ago
  Indeed. I get weights upon quality of domain. But the evidence I have, is when I've posted things about (later find out) as YC funded companies, are killed on the spot. I confirmed my beliefs by posting, and then going to my VPS and checking the page there. The title, content, and everything was stripped out like a sort of inverse hellban (on article, not user). The only cite I can find any sort of corroboration is this https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Which states "Similarly, please don't use HN posts to ask YC-funded companies questions that you could ask by emailing them."
  - dang 10y ago
    What you're saying is completely false. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12567245 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12567245. That sentence in the HN guidelines got put there because at one point people were using HN as a kind of customer support, which got irritating. Since that's not really common anymore, we can probably just take it out. We're about to add a bunch more guidelines so it would be nice to remove a few anyhow. Actually I wonder if "Please don't make claims about HN moderation without links to the specific threads you're talking about" should be one of the new guidelines. We're happy to answer specific questions—and if we've done something bad, apologize and fix it—but the dark sinister stuff is always too vague to address directly. Edit: btw we get that people sometimes arrive at the wrong conclusion in a completely well-intentioned way. In most cases it really is easy to clear up.
sctb 10y ago
> But yes, things can get user-flag killed. And things can get system-flag killed. And we have no clue which happened. You do: if a story is dead and says [flagged], it's because users flagged it enough to kill it. If you see such a story and think it deserves discussion on HN, you can vouch for it. If a story isn't DOA because it was submitted from a banned site or user, then it won't turn up dead unless by user flags because moderators don't kill stories and neither does the software at that point. This story (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12563192 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12563192), as of now, is dead because of user flags.

by kefka 10y ago

bryanlarsen 10y ago

Hacker News definitely weights submissions based on URL, submissions from sites such as hypothetically buzzfeed fall faster than sites from better sources. But I don't think HN also flags based on URL. Do you have evidence to the contrary?

kefka 10y ago
Indeed. I get weights upon quality of domain. But the evidence I have, is when I've posted things about (later find out) as YC funded companies, are killed on the spot. I confirmed my beliefs by posting, and then going to my VPS and checking the page there. The title, content, and everything was stripped out like a sort of inverse hellban (on article, not user). The only cite I can find any sort of corroboration is this https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Which states "Similarly, please don't use HN posts to ask YC-funded companies questions that you could ask by emailing them."
- dang 10y ago
  What you're saying is completely false. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12567245 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12567245. That sentence in the HN guidelines got put there because at one point people were using HN as a kind of customer support, which got irritating. Since that's not really common anymore, we can probably just take it out. We're about to add a bunch more guidelines so it would be nice to remove a few anyhow. Actually I wonder if "Please don't make claims about HN moderation without links to the specific threads you're talking about" should be one of the new guidelines. We're happy to answer specific questions—and if we've done something bad, apologize and fix it—but the dark sinister stuff is always too vague to address directly. Edit: btw we get that people sometimes arrive at the wrong conclusion in a completely well-intentioned way. In most cases it really is easy to clear up.

sctb 10y ago

> But yes, things can get user-flag killed. And things can get system-flag killed. And we have no clue which happened. You do: if a story is dead and says [flagged], it's because users flagged it enough to kill it. If you see such a story and think it deserves discussion on HN, you can vouch for it. If a story isn't DOA because it was submitted from a banned site or user, then it won't turn up dead unless by user flags because moderators don't kill stories and neither does the software at that point. This story (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12563192 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12563192), as of now, is dead because of user flags.