7 ms·

Ask HN: What are your Hobbies?

27 points by lainon 9y ago

guilhas 9y ago
Meetup philosophy groups; gym yoga class; read; travel, history, science (space, biology, tec history) documentaries; politics stuff; Twit, hacker news, coursera; Machine learning tutorials;
dasmoth 9y ago
* Gardening (vegetables especially, with a slight eye on moving towards self-sufficiency over time -- although ideally we need a little more land) * Cycling * Brewing The combination of parenthood and my current job seems to have cut into hobby programming a lot, but haven't given up completely.
stevekemp 9y ago
* Learning Finnish. * Taking pictures. * Spending time learning about hardware, via ESP8266 chips. * Auditing software for security problems. * Reading. Constantly. * Indoor rock-climbing & general gym-going.
ekr 9y ago
Cycling, mountain-biking, XC mostly. I just love being out in nature on a beautiful trail. But if hobbies includes academic interests, then computer science, mathematics, (programming is a given in this community I suppose), rationality and many other fields of science. Also, competitive programming is something i do occasionally, the short feedback cycle gives makes it quite addictive.
Kevin_S 9y ago
Watches and watchmaking Hiphop/R&B music Baseball/Basketball statistics Beer Reading about Philosophy and Religion Weightlifting
- kqr2 9y ago
  Can you give some more details on your watchmaking hobby? What's a good way to get started?
  - Kevin_S 9y ago
    I wish I could, but I am practically brand new to it. The interest in watchmaking is coming second to an interest in watch collecting. The advice I got was to get Watchmaking by George Daniels and read that to get a strong overview. It's unfortunately currently sitting on my bookshelf, I am forcing myself to complete the GMAT before I dive into it.
    - fosco 9y ago
      I am very interested in watch making and saved these two [0][1] items to come back to when I have time. I would love to see what resources you have to share if any at all! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14610110 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14610110 [1] http://watchesbysjx.com/2017/05/portrait-masahiro-kikuno-japanese-watchmaker.html http://watchesbysjx.com/2017/05/portrait-masahiro-kikuno-jap...
      - tostitos1979 9y ago
        At maker faire SF there was a $10-$15 kids plastic watching making kit some association was selling. Search for Horology, AWCI (http://www.awci.com/ http://www.awci.com/). I have been obsessed with lego-based pendulum clocks for a while as well as how cuckoo clocks work. This is the kit I saw btw (not sure about this particular seller): https://www.happypuzzle.co.uk/products/the-amazing-clock-kit.aspx https://www.happypuzzle.co.uk/products/the-amazing-clock-kit... I will pick one up for my kid when she grows up :)
jakebasile 9y ago
Gaming. It’s by far my largest expenditure of time and discretionary income. Despite that I still have quite a backlog. I’m working my way through the original The Witcher right now.
soulnothing 9y ago
Weightlifting, Dancing, Learning to DJ, Writing, Improv, Cooking,(Story|Poetry) Slams, Meditation, Video Game Modding, Wood work, Mixology, Programming, Pro Wrestling, Travel, Learning, etc.
- abhinavkulkarni 9y ago
  @soulnothing: WL total?
thorin 9y ago
Whitewater kayaking, climbing and walking in the countryside. Playing guitar and reading. Used to enjoy mountain biking but almost given up since having children.
niccl 9y ago
lighting for bands
nategri 9y ago
Collecting and writing code for Apple II computers. More recently: 3D printing, and I'm just starting my first robotics project.
caspercrf 9y ago
Motocross, Street bike riding, Desert Racing, Riding in Baja, throwing a wrench on my bike/truck/RV. Looking at starting a company motorcycle related...hope it doesn't kill my hobbies :-/
autotune 9y ago
Guitar, singing, reading (science fiction + interesting non-fiction), running. The amount of time and effort it takes to become reasonably good enough to sound "talented" at the first two items alone is long enough to take a decade or so, maybe half that if you are good at practicing.
david-cako 9y ago
Music, photography, video games, coffee, hiking. I spend ludicrous amounts of time reading wikipedia (technology, psychology, philosophy, science, design). I wish there were more single player video games that I found interesting. The only stuff I can enjoy are competitive multiplayer games. Antichamber and Soma are the only two single player games that come to mind that were incredibly good experiences. I think and read about software/computers about 12 hours a day too if that counts.
- chadgeidel 9y ago
  I've toyed with reading "A Wikipedia article a day" with the intent of broadening my knowledge. I'm just clicking articles (reading through the US Presidents right now) and gathering articles for later. Do you use any tools to streamline reading Wikipedia or are you just using the site and following interesting links? Thanks!
  - david-cako 9y ago
    No tools, generally just starts off as a tangent on a particular topic and spirals out from there. I always have a tab-backlog of wikipedia and HN articles.
mpfundstein 9y ago
my daughter and wife
norea-armozel 9y ago
DIY Electronics, mostly in shortwave radio listening (amps, antennas, and the like). And video games (perhaps too much even).
benmowa 9y ago
Family, Flying and Fixing things around the house and gardening
apolymath 9y ago
* Skyrim modding * Cyclocross * Music production * Player Unknown's Battlegrounds * Developing a drag & drop CMS * Smoking Weed * Boxing * Texas Hold'em * CrunchyRoll (anime) * Aggressive Inline Rollerblading * Mobile app development using React Native * .NET Core
mindcrime 9y ago
It varies from time to time and I haven't been spending a lot of time on hobby stuff lately, but some things I drift in and out of time permitting: Bicycle riding: Road, MTB and BMX Powerlifting Trail running Brazilian Jiu-jitsu / submission wrestling Tinkering with old cars. Hobby electronics / hanging out at the hackerspace messing with random projects. I started an effort to build a Z80 based 8-bit "retrocomputer" a while back. Lately I've been picking at learning to play keyboard / piano. I've also been dabbling in trying to learn to draw. I also like to read a lot, both fiction and non-fiction. And last but not least, going to heavy-metal concerts.
- sadlion 9y ago
  Interesting combination. You have hobbies for physical health, creativity, technical knowledge, and mental health. Do you combine them in any specific way when you have time for your hobbies?
  - mindcrime 9y ago
    Do you combine them in any specific way when you have time for your hobbies? Not really. Mostly I just have too many interests and not enough time to pursue them all. And I try not to over-think this stuff, but I did make kind of a pointed effort to take up some more artistic / creative things with the interests in drawing and playing keyboard. For most of my life I had no hobbies that really had that artistic aspect to them, so that was something of a conscious decision. That said, I love music and learning to play an instrument was always one of those "I'll get around to it one day" things, and I just finally bit the bullet.
- King-Aaron 9y ago
  What's your flavour of cars? Personally I'm into older japanese makes, currently playing with circuit racing in an early model mx5 (miata).. But also a big fan of Australian and American muscle. I find it really good having a physical/mechanical hobby outside of the on-screen work I do during the day. It's like sorbet for your brain.
  - 9y ago
duckkg5 9y ago
Woodworking, electronics, 3D printing
Charlie_26 9y ago
Acting. It's my retirement plan.
Taylor_OD 9y ago
Reading, gaming, performance art, comedy, seeing movies.
fsiefken 9y ago
theology, monofin swimming in open water, board gaming, reading sf books
julian55 9y ago
Cycling, change ringing, gardening, music.
- julian55 9y ago
  I forgot photography.
chrisdbaldwin 9y ago
Killer Queen, the world's only 10 player 5 vs 5 arcade game! I travel the United States and play this stupid bee game.
khedoros1 9y ago
Posting in a Raspberry Pi Facebook group. Mostly information on how things work, some Linux education, etc. Reading (mostly SF) I've been teaching myself reverse-engineering of DOS games, and I've had one project in particular going on for a couple years, with numerous branchings, experiments, side-investigations, etc. Learning languages, on and off. German, Japanese, Spanish, Mandarin Chinese, and Arabic, in rough order of how much time/work I've put into each. Collecting (computer and video) games. I only play a couple hours a week these days, but I can still rarely resist if something interesting-looking comes up for a nice price on GoG, or somewhere. Or a sudden yen for a childhood console game. I suppose I've made a hobby or a game of coming up with novel ways of making my son laugh, and to (mildly) embarrass his mother.
pyrex 9y ago
Beer Brewing Rock Climbing Radio
patch_cable 9y ago
Flying, Hiking, Yoga, Reading, Gardening
gvurrdon 9y ago
The ones that seem to take up most time and effort are: Historical fencing (inc. teaching, wrote a book as well), target shooting, living history. These require some reading of sources, language study, and so on.
amirouche 9y ago
sleeping.
whymsicalburito 9y ago
-Coming up with date ideas -Coming up with small talk on dating apps -Going on first dates -Wishing there was an app for arranged marriage...
- Cerium 9y ago
  A few years ago, back in 2013, I was traveling in China and joined a tour group for a few days to go see the high elevation mountains in Yunnan. There was an interesting couple on the group who told their story of their arraigned marriage. Up to that point I thought the whole idea was bad and antiquated. They talked about how they enjoyed both approaching the idea of marriage as a journey and learning experience, something that I feel has been lost for many western couples. I thought there was something beautiful about how two people, who barely know each other, but have been selected by their parents and match maker both agree to make the best of it together. They explained that of course they have differences, but by both putting in effort have made a happy relationship. They seemed very sweet together and had a nice positive energy.
mrlyc 9y ago
Photography and weightlifting. Back in the old days of film with two camera bodies, a motor drive, tripod and five lenses, I could combine the two. Now that I have a more sensitive digital camera with one zoom lens, I have to go to the gym.
mosaiclifestyle 9y ago
Music and concerts Maintaining my aging (13 y/o) German car Watching basketball / F1 Weightlifting Reading psychology books Trying to get into guitar
- andyjsong 9y ago
  When you say: >trying to get into the guitar just curious, have you been able to play your first song? How long have you been at it?
oxplot 9y ago
- Hacking in general: tinkering with things and modifying them to better suit my needs from software to electronics to woodwork to sewing and more. - Rockclimbing = purposeful exercise with some problem solving for my busy mind - Movies - Lot of science/space documentaries and talks on YT
sheharyarn 9y ago
- Programming - Programming Hackathons / Conferences - Music (Alternative / Indie) - TV Shows and Anime (I waste too much time on them) - Yoga - Cooking - Learning other languages - Non-Fiction Books
SirLJ 9y ago
Stock market trading and fishing - not sure why, but I feel they are related somehow. Also I read a lot - few hours a day, mainly fiction.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
debrisapron 9y ago
- Programming, obv. - Coding electronic music / sound design - Songwriting - Singing - Pen-and-paper RPGs (mainly D&D, as a player & DM) - Cooking, baking in particular - Reading, mainly weird fiction & philosophy - Rambling (hiking to Americans, but generally involves more pubs) - Real ale / craft beer - Trying to read the entire internet Something I just realised: I am an utterly stereotypical, central-casting nerd :/
AntonyBrown 9y ago
Birdwatching is my biggest hobby. It's also a wonderful way to relax and take my mind off things. I've recently bought a cute device to enjoy this passtime more. Take a look https://www.atncorp.com/smart-hd-binocular https://www.atncorp.com/smart-hd-binocular .

27 points by lainon 9y ago

Meetup philosophy groups; gym yoga class; read; travel, history, science (space, biology, tec history) documentaries; politics stuff; Twit, hacker news, coursera; Machine learning tutorials;

dasmoth 9y ago

* Gardening (vegetables especially, with a slight eye on moving towards self-sufficiency over time -- although ideally we need a little more land) * Cycling * Brewing The combination of parenthood and my current job seems to have cut into hobby programming a lot, but haven't given up completely.

stevekemp 9y ago

* Learning Finnish. * Taking pictures. * Spending time learning about hardware, via ESP8266 chips. * Auditing software for security problems. * Reading. Constantly. * Indoor rock-climbing & general gym-going.

ekr 9y ago

Cycling, mountain-biking, XC mostly. I just love being out in nature on a beautiful trail. But if hobbies includes academic interests, then computer science, mathematics, (programming is a given in this community I suppose), rationality and many other fields of science. Also, competitive programming is something i do occasionally, the short feedback cycle gives makes it quite addictive.

Kevin_S 9y ago

Watches and watchmaking Hiphop/R&B music Baseball/Basketball statistics Beer Reading about Philosophy and Religion Weightlifting

kqr2 9y ago
Can you give some more details on your watchmaking hobby? What's a good way to get started?
- Kevin_S 9y ago
  I wish I could, but I am practically brand new to it. The interest in watchmaking is coming second to an interest in watch collecting. The advice I got was to get Watchmaking by George Daniels and read that to get a strong overview. It's unfortunately currently sitting on my bookshelf, I am forcing myself to complete the GMAT before I dive into it.
  - fosco 9y ago
    I am very interested in watch making and saved these two [0][1] items to come back to when I have time. I would love to see what resources you have to share if any at all! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14610110 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14610110 [1] http://watchesbysjx.com/2017/05/portrait-masahiro-kikuno-japanese-watchmaker.html http://watchesbysjx.com/2017/05/portrait-masahiro-kikuno-jap...
    - tostitos1979 9y ago
      At maker faire SF there was a $10-$15 kids plastic watching making kit some association was selling. Search for Horology, AWCI (http://www.awci.com/ http://www.awci.com/). I have been obsessed with lego-based pendulum clocks for a while as well as how cuckoo clocks work. This is the kit I saw btw (not sure about this particular seller): https://www.happypuzzle.co.uk/products/the-amazing-clock-kit.aspx https://www.happypuzzle.co.uk/products/the-amazing-clock-kit... I will pick one up for my kid when she grows up :)

jakebasile 9y ago

Gaming. It’s by far my largest expenditure of time and discretionary income. Despite that I still have quite a backlog. I’m working my way through the original The Witcher right now.

soulnothing 9y ago

Weightlifting, Dancing, Learning to DJ, Writing, Improv, Cooking,(Story|Poetry) Slams, Meditation, Video Game Modding, Wood work, Mixology, Programming, Pro Wrestling, Travel, Learning, etc.

abhinavkulkarni 9y ago
@soulnothing: WL total?

thorin 9y ago

Whitewater kayaking, climbing and walking in the countryside. Playing guitar and reading. Used to enjoy mountain biking but almost given up since having children.

niccl 9y ago

lighting for bands

nategri 9y ago

Collecting and writing code for Apple II computers. More recently: 3D printing, and I'm just starting my first robotics project.

caspercrf 9y ago

Motocross, Street bike riding, Desert Racing, Riding in Baja, throwing a wrench on my bike/truck/RV. Looking at starting a company motorcycle related...hope it doesn't kill my hobbies :-/

autotune 9y ago

Guitar, singing, reading (science fiction + interesting non-fiction), running. The amount of time and effort it takes to become reasonably good enough to sound "talented" at the first two items alone is long enough to take a decade or so, maybe half that if you are good at practicing.

david-cako 9y ago

Music, photography, video games, coffee, hiking. I spend ludicrous amounts of time reading wikipedia (technology, psychology, philosophy, science, design). I wish there were more single player video games that I found interesting. The only stuff I can enjoy are competitive multiplayer games. Antichamber and Soma are the only two single player games that come to mind that were incredibly good experiences. I think and read about software/computers about 12 hours a day too if that counts.

chadgeidel 9y ago
I've toyed with reading "A Wikipedia article a day" with the intent of broadening my knowledge. I'm just clicking articles (reading through the US Presidents right now) and gathering articles for later. Do you use any tools to streamline reading Wikipedia or are you just using the site and following interesting links? Thanks!
- david-cako 9y ago
  No tools, generally just starts off as a tangent on a particular topic and spirals out from there. I always have a tab-backlog of wikipedia and HN articles.

mpfundstein 9y ago

my daughter and wife

norea-armozel 9y ago

DIY Electronics, mostly in shortwave radio listening (amps, antennas, and the like). And video games (perhaps too much even).

benmowa 9y ago

Family, Flying and Fixing things around the house and gardening

apolymath 9y ago

* Skyrim modding * Cyclocross * Music production * Player Unknown's Battlegrounds * Developing a drag & drop CMS * Smoking Weed * Boxing * Texas Hold'em * CrunchyRoll (anime) * Aggressive Inline Rollerblading * Mobile app development using React Native * .NET Core

mindcrime 9y ago

It varies from time to time and I haven't been spending a lot of time on hobby stuff lately, but some things I drift in and out of time permitting: Bicycle riding: Road, MTB and BMX Powerlifting Trail running Brazilian Jiu-jitsu / submission wrestling Tinkering with old cars. Hobby electronics / hanging out at the hackerspace messing with random projects. I started an effort to build a Z80 based 8-bit "retrocomputer" a while back. Lately I've been picking at learning to play keyboard / piano. I've also been dabbling in trying to learn to draw. I also like to read a lot, both fiction and non-fiction. And last but not least, going to heavy-metal concerts.

sadlion 9y ago
Interesting combination. You have hobbies for physical health, creativity, technical knowledge, and mental health. Do you combine them in any specific way when you have time for your hobbies?
- mindcrime 9y ago
  Do you combine them in any specific way when you have time for your hobbies? Not really. Mostly I just have too many interests and not enough time to pursue them all. And I try not to over-think this stuff, but I did make kind of a pointed effort to take up some more artistic / creative things with the interests in drawing and playing keyboard. For most of my life I had no hobbies that really had that artistic aspect to them, so that was something of a conscious decision. That said, I love music and learning to play an instrument was always one of those "I'll get around to it one day" things, and I just finally bit the bullet.
King-Aaron 9y ago
What's your flavour of cars? Personally I'm into older japanese makes, currently playing with circuit racing in an early model mx5 (miata).. But also a big fan of Australian and American muscle. I find it really good having a physical/mechanical hobby outside of the on-screen work I do during the day. It's like sorbet for your brain.
- 9y ago

duckkg5 9y ago

Woodworking, electronics, 3D printing

Charlie_26 9y ago

Acting. It's my retirement plan.

Taylor_OD 9y ago

Reading, gaming, performance art, comedy, seeing movies.

fsiefken 9y ago

theology, monofin swimming in open water, board gaming, reading sf books

julian55 9y ago

Cycling, change ringing, gardening, music.

julian55 9y ago
I forgot photography.

chrisdbaldwin 9y ago

Killer Queen, the world's only 10 player 5 vs 5 arcade game! I travel the United States and play this stupid bee game.

khedoros1 9y ago

Posting in a Raspberry Pi Facebook group. Mostly information on how things work, some Linux education, etc. Reading (mostly SF) I've been teaching myself reverse-engineering of DOS games, and I've had one project in particular going on for a couple years, with numerous branchings, experiments, side-investigations, etc. Learning languages, on and off. German, Japanese, Spanish, Mandarin Chinese, and Arabic, in rough order of how much time/work I've put into each. Collecting (computer and video) games. I only play a couple hours a week these days, but I can still rarely resist if something interesting-looking comes up for a nice price on GoG, or somewhere. Or a sudden yen for a childhood console game. I suppose I've made a hobby or a game of coming up with novel ways of making my son laugh, and to (mildly) embarrass his mother.

pyrex 9y ago

Beer Brewing Rock Climbing Radio

patch_cable 9y ago

Flying, Hiking, Yoga, Reading, Gardening

gvurrdon 9y ago

The ones that seem to take up most time and effort are: Historical fencing (inc. teaching, wrote a book as well), target shooting, living history. These require some reading of sources, language study, and so on.

amirouche 9y ago

sleeping.

whymsicalburito 9y ago

-Coming up with date ideas -Coming up with small talk on dating apps -Going on first dates -Wishing there was an app for arranged marriage...

Cerium 9y ago
A few years ago, back in 2013, I was traveling in China and joined a tour group for a few days to go see the high elevation mountains in Yunnan. There was an interesting couple on the group who told their story of their arraigned marriage. Up to that point I thought the whole idea was bad and antiquated. They talked about how they enjoyed both approaching the idea of marriage as a journey and learning experience, something that I feel has been lost for many western couples. I thought there was something beautiful about how two people, who barely know each other, but have been selected by their parents and match maker both agree to make the best of it together. They explained that of course they have differences, but by both putting in effort have made a happy relationship. They seemed very sweet together and had a nice positive energy.

mrlyc 9y ago

Photography and weightlifting. Back in the old days of film with two camera bodies, a motor drive, tripod and five lenses, I could combine the two. Now that I have a more sensitive digital camera with one zoom lens, I have to go to the gym.

mosaiclifestyle 9y ago

Music and concerts Maintaining my aging (13 y/o) German car Watching basketball / F1 Weightlifting Reading psychology books Trying to get into guitar

andyjsong 9y ago
When you say: >trying to get into the guitar just curious, have you been able to play your first song? How long have you been at it?

oxplot 9y ago

- Hacking in general: tinkering with things and modifying them to better suit my needs from software to electronics to woodwork to sewing and more. - Rockclimbing = purposeful exercise with some problem solving for my busy mind - Movies - Lot of science/space documentaries and talks on YT

sheharyarn 9y ago

- Programming - Programming Hackathons / Conferences - Music (Alternative / Indie) - TV Shows and Anime (I waste too much time on them) - Yoga - Cooking - Learning other languages - Non-Fiction Books

SirLJ 9y ago

Stock market trading and fishing - not sure why, but I feel they are related somehow. Also I read a lot - few hours a day, mainly fiction.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

debrisapron 9y ago

- Programming, obv. - Coding electronic music / sound design - Songwriting - Singing - Pen-and-paper RPGs (mainly D&D, as a player & DM) - Cooking, baking in particular - Reading, mainly weird fiction & philosophy - Rambling (hiking to Americans, but generally involves more pubs) - Real ale / craft beer - Trying to read the entire internet Something I just realised: I am an utterly stereotypical, central-casting nerd :/

AntonyBrown 9y ago

Birdwatching is my biggest hobby. It's also a wonderful way to relax and take my mind off things. I've recently bought a cute device to enjoy this passtime more. Take a look https://www.atncorp.com/smart-hd-binocular https://www.atncorp.com/smart-hd-binocular .