4 ms·

I guess Hacker News is the "new Slashdot", but Slashdot really was much better in its peak years. It's not unreasonable to mark the downhill decline to beginni

by dublin 8y ago

I guess Hacker News is the "new Slashdot", but Slashdot really was much better in its peak years. It's not unreasonable to mark the downhill decline to beginning shortly after Roblimo's departure. I never met him, but I feel as if I've lost a compatriot. He will definitely be missed.

jacobush 8y ago
Do you mean Slashdot was better, in its peak, than HN is now? Maybe! In my rose-tinted glasses, I'd say, yes, definitely.
- rnd0 8y ago
  I joined /. in 2000; a lot of folks argue about when the peak was but 2000 either was it or was shortly thereafter. I think that HN now is far better than /. was then. Like /. of old you have knowledgeable people contributing to conversations (a great example is Walter Bright contributing to the Digital Mars D and C++ conversations) but unlike those days HN has better curated discussions so we don't have to sift through as much noise and disruptions. (I'm sure someone is nostolgic for the page-widening antics of old. That wouldn't be me, however.) I would swap HN with the /. of old any day of the week, personally speaking. And I was there!
  - jacobush 8y ago
    I think I had a lot more tolerance for antics back then, thinking about it.
  - sophacles 8y ago
    I think of HN as: slashdot meets kur5hin - its got the story volume and focus that reminds me of old slashdot, with the more thoughtful comment section of kuro5hin. Having seen/participated in slashdot in the late 90s, kuro5hin in the early 2000s and HN for most of it, I agree that HN today is better.
_wmd 8y ago
I'm not sure I ever observed Slashdot at any particular peak, but I've been reading it weekly (if not daily) for something like the past 15 years, and it still serves a role that HN, due to its bubble-like nature, can never fill. Slashdot is more general interest, and it sports a much healthier cross-section of the tech industry than HN at least presently does. Slashdot comments though, definitely not worth reading any more, if they ever were
- majos 8y ago
  How would you say the Slashdot and HN cross-sections differ?
  - _wmd 8y ago
    HN tends more towards software and startups, everyone is an armchair CTO, Slashdot tends more towards tech, space and science. They both cover each other's topics, but there is a definite tendency on both sides. You're unlikely to read about some venture capital gossip on the Slashdot side, while you're unlikely to read e.g. "Giant Predatory Worms Are Invading France" on the HN side. The great thing about HN comments is that everyone is a smart ass, the bad thing about HN comments is that everyone is a smart ass. Slashdot comments are generally just toxic noise, dumb jokes and horrifically amateur analysis.
    - mistersquid 8y ago
      I'll add that Slashdot's user comment toxicity is a product of its founders' commitment to non-censorship and free speech. Back in the day (what some here have referred to as Slashdot's "peak"), Slashdot commentary and trolling could be side-achingly hilarious, irreverent, profane, thought-provoking, insightful, silly, and humbling. Slashdot's editorially permissive policy coupled with algorithmically assigned moderator points allowed "representative" Slashdot users to choose which trolls and provocateurs would be buried and which boosted. As a result, Slashdot was renowned and reviled for its sometimes predictable and frequently appropriate inside jokes (e.g. "Had Netcraft confirmed it?", "Only old people ______", "IN SOVIET RUSSIA $NOUN $VERBs YOU", etc.) as well as for its sometimes intractable and iconoclastic user base. The user base was in fact so intractable that a site-wide redesign was deployed and then retracted due to extraordinary complaints from the user base. Dice ended up throwing a lot of invested time and resources away to appease a user base determined to voice its displeasure with a Web 2.0 redesign. Roblimo, CmdrTaco, and CowboyNeal were the ones who forged Slashdot's editorial policy and, by so doing, indelibly shaped the character of Slashdot at its peak. Today, thoughtless shitposting and unoriginal trolling of anonymous (and some pseudonymous) Slashdot users has driven away all but the most hardy (or desperate) of Slashdot readers. Slashdot today seems to be an endlessly burning tire fire. I'm grateful the current /. thread for Roblimo is so far civil. [0] But there was a time when its moderation policies and commitment to anonymity generated insight and humor. Even now, Slashdot has a hackerish mean streak that can yield endlessly entertaining threads full of puns, jokes, and in-jokes and if there is anything I wish HN had more of it is an understanding that iconoclastic juvenile humor can play an important discursive role in conversations of technology, society, and culture. I only rarely visit Slashdot these days due to the toxicity of its users' comments (I can't bring myself to hide comments moderated to -1 for the same reasons that I "showdead" here on HN). I am forever indebted to the original Slashdot team, the Slashdot community and, on this occasion, especially Robin Miller for providing a platform where I could learn from others, express my opinions, and keep abreast of geek culture. Roblimo, you will be missed. [0] https://linux.slashdot.org/story/18/05/24/1750210/robin-roblimo-miller-a-long-time-voice-of-the-linux-community-has-passed-away#comments https://linux.slashdot.org/story/18/05/24/1750210/robin-robl... EDIT: typos and small changes here and there
computator 8y ago
Y Combinator used to ask for your Slashdot handle as part of your application for startup funding. Slashdot was assumed to be the place where technies chatted, taking over from Usenet before it. Interestingly, by 2010, Y Combinator had switched to asking for Facebook and Twitter IDs. I don't know what they ask for today.

by dublin 8y ago

jacobush 8y ago

Do you mean Slashdot was better, in its peak, than HN is now? Maybe! In my rose-tinted glasses, I'd say, yes, definitely.

rnd0 8y ago
I joined /. in 2000; a lot of folks argue about when the peak was but 2000 either was it or was shortly thereafter. I think that HN now is far better than /. was then. Like /. of old you have knowledgeable people contributing to conversations (a great example is Walter Bright contributing to the Digital Mars D and C++ conversations) but unlike those days HN has better curated discussions so we don't have to sift through as much noise and disruptions. (I'm sure someone is nostolgic for the page-widening antics of old. That wouldn't be me, however.) I would swap HN with the /. of old any day of the week, personally speaking. And I was there!
- jacobush 8y ago
  I think I had a lot more tolerance for antics back then, thinking about it.
- sophacles 8y ago
  I think of HN as: slashdot meets kur5hin - its got the story volume and focus that reminds me of old slashdot, with the more thoughtful comment section of kuro5hin. Having seen/participated in slashdot in the late 90s, kuro5hin in the early 2000s and HN for most of it, I agree that HN today is better.

_wmd 8y ago

I'm not sure I ever observed Slashdot at any particular peak, but I've been reading it weekly (if not daily) for something like the past 15 years, and it still serves a role that HN, due to its bubble-like nature, can never fill. Slashdot is more general interest, and it sports a much healthier cross-section of the tech industry than HN at least presently does. Slashdot comments though, definitely not worth reading any more, if they ever were

majos 8y ago
How would you say the Slashdot and HN cross-sections differ?
- _wmd 8y ago
  HN tends more towards software and startups, everyone is an armchair CTO, Slashdot tends more towards tech, space and science. They both cover each other's topics, but there is a definite tendency on both sides. You're unlikely to read about some venture capital gossip on the Slashdot side, while you're unlikely to read e.g. "Giant Predatory Worms Are Invading France" on the HN side. The great thing about HN comments is that everyone is a smart ass, the bad thing about HN comments is that everyone is a smart ass. Slashdot comments are generally just toxic noise, dumb jokes and horrifically amateur analysis.
  - mistersquid 8y ago
    I'll add that Slashdot's user comment toxicity is a product of its founders' commitment to non-censorship and free speech. Back in the day (what some here have referred to as Slashdot's "peak"), Slashdot commentary and trolling could be side-achingly hilarious, irreverent, profane, thought-provoking, insightful, silly, and humbling. Slashdot's editorially permissive policy coupled with algorithmically assigned moderator points allowed "representative" Slashdot users to choose which trolls and provocateurs would be buried and which boosted. As a result, Slashdot was renowned and reviled for its sometimes predictable and frequently appropriate inside jokes (e.g. "Had Netcraft confirmed it?", "Only old people ______", "IN SOVIET RUSSIA $NOUN $VERBs YOU", etc.) as well as for its sometimes intractable and iconoclastic user base. The user base was in fact so intractable that a site-wide redesign was deployed and then retracted due to extraordinary complaints from the user base. Dice ended up throwing a lot of invested time and resources away to appease a user base determined to voice its displeasure with a Web 2.0 redesign. Roblimo, CmdrTaco, and CowboyNeal were the ones who forged Slashdot's editorial policy and, by so doing, indelibly shaped the character of Slashdot at its peak. Today, thoughtless shitposting and unoriginal trolling of anonymous (and some pseudonymous) Slashdot users has driven away all but the most hardy (or desperate) of Slashdot readers. Slashdot today seems to be an endlessly burning tire fire. I'm grateful the current /. thread for Roblimo is so far civil. [0] But there was a time when its moderation policies and commitment to anonymity generated insight and humor. Even now, Slashdot has a hackerish mean streak that can yield endlessly entertaining threads full of puns, jokes, and in-jokes and if there is anything I wish HN had more of it is an understanding that iconoclastic juvenile humor can play an important discursive role in conversations of technology, society, and culture. I only rarely visit Slashdot these days due to the toxicity of its users' comments (I can't bring myself to hide comments moderated to -1 for the same reasons that I "showdead" here on HN). I am forever indebted to the original Slashdot team, the Slashdot community and, on this occasion, especially Robin Miller for providing a platform where I could learn from others, express my opinions, and keep abreast of geek culture. Roblimo, you will be missed. [0] https://linux.slashdot.org/story/18/05/24/1750210/robin-roblimo-miller-a-long-time-voice-of-the-linux-community-has-passed-away#comments https://linux.slashdot.org/story/18/05/24/1750210/robin-robl... EDIT: typos and small changes here and there

computator 8y ago

Y Combinator used to ask for your Slashdot handle as part of your application for startup funding. Slashdot was assumed to be the place where technies chatted, taking over from Usenet before it. Interestingly, by 2010, Y Combinator had switched to asking for Facebook and Twitter IDs. I don't know what they ask for today.