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There's no doubt that I spent a lot of time on HN, but there have been at least a few times that I've learned of things that directly impact my work first here.

There's no doubt that I spent a lot of time on HN, but there have been at least a few times that I've learned of things that directly impact my work first here. Off the top of my head, I knew that Sentry had rolled out hosted instance that were HIPAA-compliant when my team was about to install it and host it internally. That knowledge let us outsource it to them and ultimately save a good deal of time and money. More often, I'll come across a problem and remember something that I've read that's applicable well enough to at least find it later when I need it. I consider my time on HN and similar outlets at least partially "professional development."

Raphmedia 8y ago
Same. I would be ashamed to browse FB of Twitter at work. But HN? I browse it full-screen without any guilt. Edit: That being said, I use this bookmarklet to shift through content faster and waste less time. https://smmry.com/bookmark https://smmry.com/bookmark I also "Pocket" everything that is too long to read right now.
breck 8y ago
Agreed. I haven't quantified it but I would ballpark I come across 25+ things per year that directly save me significant hours of work, lead me to much better solutions to a problem, provide a lead that would help me with investing/employment/helping a friend/etc. That in addition to the intellectual stimulation and enjoyment from the other articles is why I don't feel bad about spending ~30 minutes a day here everyday. Warren Buffett supposedly has read the WSJ for decades every morning. I think to many of us here this is our WSJ. Finally, for years I've used HN as the fastest way to check my internet connection. :)
- throwaway413 8y ago
  I’m glad I’m not the only one who tests internet connectivity via HN!
  - dberg 8y ago
    Used to be ping yahoo.com in the 90s :-)
  - your-nanny 8y ago
    me too, and just today! like right now. ha!
  - kurthr 8y ago
    It even works through the GreatFirewall! A great tool :)
- etrautmann 8y ago
  I use this as my default connectivity check as well!
- tim333 8y ago
  And more: >"I still probably spend five or six hours a day reading," Buffett says ... >Buffett typically reads six newspapers each day: The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, The New York Times, The USA Today, The Omaha World-Herald and American Banker.
wmccullough 8y ago
I consider it professional development too. Something I like about HN is that the comments are typically fact based or coming from a constructive place. Very little have I received the Reddit or Twitter discussion responses of expletives followed by insults (though I’ve probably called one or two people some bad things). This place has gotten me interested in so much more than the tech ecosystem I live in.
abtinf 8y ago
Agreed, the things I've learned on HN have helped me professionally in numerous ways. One thing I find concerning about HN is I think there is an increasing prevalence of political and social commentary on the front-page. Those kinds of posts are worse than useless, because they displace potentially really good content.
- skybrian 8y ago
  A workaround is to hide the posts you don't care about and reload.
  - abtinf 8y ago
    Right, but thats a manual process. The thing is, I care about a lot of the issues that come up here, and sometimes they end up really distracting me. I wish there was a feature to auto-hide everything from certain domains. That would go a really long way to make the site better (for me, anyway).
    - Philipp__ 8y ago
      Then check out lobste.rs, I use it as much more concise, more smaller scale version of HN.
      - abtinf 8y ago
        Hadn't heard of it but it looks interesting. Send me an invite?
- dang 8y ago
  It isn't an increasing prevalence; it just seems that way (and always has). I wrote a thing about this a few months ago, with the intent of reusing it the next time this concern came up. Take a look if interested: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869.
justonepost 8y ago
Yes, though I do wish there was a better way to read HN in a focused manner. Here's a little experiment: Set aside a scheduled chunk of time each day to specifically read HN. You'll find it's a lot harder to do this in a focused manner.
ma2rten 8y ago
I'm on Hacker News since eight years. My life would not be the same without it. A lot of what I know I know through Hacker News. HN has shaped my world view. Over the years I learned about starting a business, databases, programming languages, meditation, web development, interpersonal relationships and many things more. Writing HN comments and getting immediate feedback through comment score has improved my writing skills. Even more significantly, I found my previous job which was amazing through Hacker News. I moved halfway across the globe to California for it. But over the years, I feel like HN becoming less and less valuable for me. I feel like I am wasting a lot of time here these days. Maybe HN has changed. Maybe I have changed. Maybe I just know a lot more about startups and webdev so there are diminishing returns. It's becoming more and more like addiction. I'm wondering what the solution is. I tried blocking HN in my host file, but I found worse ways to waste my time on the internet. Maybe a reading later app is it, but I doubt it.
- qznc 8y ago
  Me too. Now that I'm in an corporate embedded architect role, HN is less relevant to me. I'm looking for other communities but have not found anything yet.
- rwnspace 8y ago
  > But over the years, I feel like HN becoming less and less valuable for me. I feel like I am wasting a lot of time here these days. Maybe HN has changed. Maybe I have changed. Maybe I just know a lot more about startups and webdev so there are diminishing returns. It's becoming more and more like addiction. A good rule of thumb -- if you feel like you might be addicted, you probably are. > I'm wondering what the solution is. I tried blocking HN in my host file, but I found worse ways to waste my time on the internet. Maybe a reading later app is it, but I doubt it. I've struggled with this an extreme amount over the years (on Reddit and here and so on). The most successful strategy so far is to partition my hard drive and install several different Linux distributions, each with different purposes (currently NixOS: work, Deepin: casual browsing, OpenELEC: watching stuff). I've different emails, firefox signins and so on. It can be irritating, but sometimes you just want that. Getting pissed off - I mean really, really pissed off - about being influenced by websites which optimise for stealing neurons can be very useful.
QuelqueChose 8y ago
HN is likely the only outlet I could even remotely consider falling under that category of "professional development", aseven time spent on TechCrunch, ProductHunt, Gizmodo, Motherboard etc. is usually just more of the same stuff I look at on Reddit but without the guilt of actually _being_ on Reddit. Consequently, those are the sites I've caught myself spending way too much time on without noticing that most of my intake of articles and videos is just fluff. Any chance you could share some of those outlets you personally consider similar to HN?

Raphmedia 8y ago

Same. I would be ashamed to browse FB of Twitter at work. But HN? I browse it full-screen without any guilt. Edit: That being said, I use this bookmarklet to shift through content faster and waste less time. https://smmry.com/bookmark https://smmry.com/bookmark I also "Pocket" everything that is too long to read right now.

breck 8y ago

Agreed. I haven't quantified it but I would ballpark I come across 25+ things per year that directly save me significant hours of work, lead me to much better solutions to a problem, provide a lead that would help me with investing/employment/helping a friend/etc. That in addition to the intellectual stimulation and enjoyment from the other articles is why I don't feel bad about spending ~30 minutes a day here everyday. Warren Buffett supposedly has read the WSJ for decades every morning. I think to many of us here this is our WSJ. Finally, for years I've used HN as the fastest way to check my internet connection. :)

throwaway413 8y ago
I’m glad I’m not the only one who tests internet connectivity via HN!
- dberg 8y ago
  Used to be ping yahoo.com in the 90s :-)
- your-nanny 8y ago
  me too, and just today! like right now. ha!
- kurthr 8y ago
  It even works through the GreatFirewall! A great tool :)
etrautmann 8y ago
I use this as my default connectivity check as well!
tim333 8y ago
And more: >"I still probably spend five or six hours a day reading," Buffett says ... >Buffett typically reads six newspapers each day: The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, The New York Times, The USA Today, The Omaha World-Herald and American Banker.

wmccullough 8y ago

I consider it professional development too. Something I like about HN is that the comments are typically fact based or coming from a constructive place. Very little have I received the Reddit or Twitter discussion responses of expletives followed by insults (though I’ve probably called one or two people some bad things). This place has gotten me interested in so much more than the tech ecosystem I live in.

abtinf 8y ago

Agreed, the things I've learned on HN have helped me professionally in numerous ways. One thing I find concerning about HN is I think there is an increasing prevalence of political and social commentary on the front-page. Those kinds of posts are worse than useless, because they displace potentially really good content.

skybrian 8y ago
A workaround is to hide the posts you don't care about and reload.
- abtinf 8y ago
  Right, but thats a manual process. The thing is, I care about a lot of the issues that come up here, and sometimes they end up really distracting me. I wish there was a feature to auto-hide everything from certain domains. That would go a really long way to make the site better (for me, anyway).
  - Philipp__ 8y ago
    Then check out lobste.rs, I use it as much more concise, more smaller scale version of HN.
    - abtinf 8y ago
      Hadn't heard of it but it looks interesting. Send me an invite?
dang 8y ago
It isn't an increasing prevalence; it just seems that way (and always has). I wrote a thing about this a few months ago, with the intent of reusing it the next time this concern came up. Take a look if interested: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869.

justonepost 8y ago

Yes, though I do wish there was a better way to read HN in a focused manner. Here's a little experiment: Set aside a scheduled chunk of time each day to specifically read HN. You'll find it's a lot harder to do this in a focused manner.

ma2rten 8y ago

I'm on Hacker News since eight years. My life would not be the same without it. A lot of what I know I know through Hacker News. HN has shaped my world view. Over the years I learned about starting a business, databases, programming languages, meditation, web development, interpersonal relationships and many things more. Writing HN comments and getting immediate feedback through comment score has improved my writing skills. Even more significantly, I found my previous job which was amazing through Hacker News. I moved halfway across the globe to California for it. But over the years, I feel like HN becoming less and less valuable for me. I feel like I am wasting a lot of time here these days. Maybe HN has changed. Maybe I have changed. Maybe I just know a lot more about startups and webdev so there are diminishing returns. It's becoming more and more like addiction. I'm wondering what the solution is. I tried blocking HN in my host file, but I found worse ways to waste my time on the internet. Maybe a reading later app is it, but I doubt it.

qznc 8y ago
Me too. Now that I'm in an corporate embedded architect role, HN is less relevant to me. I'm looking for other communities but have not found anything yet.
rwnspace 8y ago
> But over the years, I feel like HN becoming less and less valuable for me. I feel like I am wasting a lot of time here these days. Maybe HN has changed. Maybe I have changed. Maybe I just know a lot more about startups and webdev so there are diminishing returns. It's becoming more and more like addiction. A good rule of thumb -- if you feel like you might be addicted, you probably are. > I'm wondering what the solution is. I tried blocking HN in my host file, but I found worse ways to waste my time on the internet. Maybe a reading later app is it, but I doubt it. I've struggled with this an extreme amount over the years (on Reddit and here and so on). The most successful strategy so far is to partition my hard drive and install several different Linux distributions, each with different purposes (currently NixOS: work, Deepin: casual browsing, OpenELEC: watching stuff). I've different emails, firefox signins and so on. It can be irritating, but sometimes you just want that. Getting pissed off - I mean really, really pissed off - about being influenced by websites which optimise for stealing neurons can be very useful.

QuelqueChose 8y ago

HN is likely the only outlet I could even remotely consider falling under that category of "professional development", aseven time spent on TechCrunch, ProductHunt, Gizmodo, Motherboard etc. is usually just more of the same stuff I look at on Reddit but without the guilt of actually _being_ on Reddit. Consequently, those are the sites I've caught myself spending way too much time on without noticing that most of my intake of articles and videos is just fluff. Any chance you could share some of those outlets you personally consider similar to HN?