4 ms·

I'm getting more disappointed with the front page as well. It's not necessarily the quality of the content, but the fact that too many posts stay on the front p

I'm getting more disappointed with the front page as well. It's not necessarily the quality of the content, but the fact that too many posts stay on the front page for too long. Something about reading the same piece of "news" for 2 or more days really irritates me. If I was at least on the same computer it wouldn't be too bad, as visited links would get marked. But I read this site on my desktop, laptop, phone and work computer. I've mentioned this earlier and requested the ability to dismiss items for view (archive), but pg didn't seem to think it was a good idea and/or worthwhile to implement. Every time time I see the same story on the front page 2 days in a row I get this sudden urge to add 127.0.0.1 news.ycombinator.com to /etc/hosts. Sooner or later I'll go ahead and do it, and not return until HN gets archiving and keyboard shortcuts.

timr 19y ago
I have a somewhat related request -- it would be nice if weekend/weeknight submissions weren't instantly relegated to obscurity by their auto-rotation off of the front page. Perhaps a random selection of stories for the front page, with probability of selection weighted by their score? That would diversify the news, and give off-hours posts a fighting chance for views....
pg 19y ago
Stuff doesn't stay on the frontpage any longer than it has in the past. If anything the frontpage changes faster.
- edu 19y ago
  I also have the feeling that some news stay on the frontpage for a longer time than before. My hypothesis is that it happens because nowadays stories get more points. Paul, can you check this? The average points of news that reached the frontpage, the points of the max. scored piece of news, etcetera?
- iamwil 19y ago
  that depends on how many votes an article gets, doesn't it? I don't remember the formula you posted before, but doesn't an article that gets more votes stave off the decay longer? In addition, I think that the perceived amount of stay is longer. While the front page as a whole changes faster, there are certain articles that stay for quite a while. It's less noticible if it's an article you liked, but if it was something that you hold contempt for, you'll tend to notice it every time you login.
comatose_kid 19y ago
If I understand your idea correctly, a side-effect would be that it would be harder to go back and comment on articles you have already read. So if everyone did this, the amount of discussion for each post would decrease. I'd be happy with a less drastic measure: Why store the previously read info in a cookie? Perhaps it could be stored with my account instead. This way the highlighting of previously-read articles would be consistent regardless of which PC I happened to be using. The number of articles stored could be limited to a reasonable number (say 3x length of the # of items on the front page).
- BrandonM 19y ago
  I don't think it's stored in a cookie... I'm pretty sure it's just your browser's history keeping track for you.

timr 19y ago

I have a somewhat related request -- it would be nice if weekend/weeknight submissions weren't instantly relegated to obscurity by their auto-rotation off of the front page. Perhaps a random selection of stories for the front page, with probability of selection weighted by their score? That would diversify the news, and give off-hours posts a fighting chance for views....

pg 19y ago

Stuff doesn't stay on the frontpage any longer than it has in the past. If anything the frontpage changes faster.

edu 19y ago
I also have the feeling that some news stay on the frontpage for a longer time than before. My hypothesis is that it happens because nowadays stories get more points. Paul, can you check this? The average points of news that reached the frontpage, the points of the max. scored piece of news, etcetera?
iamwil 19y ago
that depends on how many votes an article gets, doesn't it? I don't remember the formula you posted before, but doesn't an article that gets more votes stave off the decay longer? In addition, I think that the perceived amount of stay is longer. While the front page as a whole changes faster, there are certain articles that stay for quite a while. It's less noticible if it's an article you liked, but if it was something that you hold contempt for, you'll tend to notice it every time you login.

comatose_kid 19y ago

If I understand your idea correctly, a side-effect would be that it would be harder to go back and comment on articles you have already read. So if everyone did this, the amount of discussion for each post would decrease. I'd be happy with a less drastic measure: Why store the previously read info in a cookie? Perhaps it could be stored with my account instead. This way the highlighting of previously-read articles would be consistent regardless of which PC I happened to be using. The number of articles stored could be limited to a reasonable number (say 3x length of the # of items on the front page).

BrandonM 19y ago
I don't think it's stored in a cookie... I'm pretty sure it's just your browser's history keeping track for you.