2 ms·

To be honest, Twitter has been pretty eye opening about the value of "expert opinions" on a lot of stuff. It has become the perfect platform for self-owns (gran

by rtpg 8y ago

To be honest, Twitter has been pretty eye opening about the value of "expert opinions" on a lot of stuff. It has become the perfect platform for self-owns (granted, the format doesn't help) I've found that HN tends to upvote "good" comments, so most threads end up bringing the important stuff on top. Usually the insightful stuff comes from experts, since being an expert helps! And people like patio11 end up consistently on the top of comment threads because it's Good Content(TM). But sometimes someone relatively unknown will simply be making a good point. That's what I'm here for, the good information. And at least in our industry, either the experts are on here, or they're not but their followers will post a link to their blog/G+ and the information shows up on here anyways. If we had Twitter-style "voice proportional to follower count/retweet potential" stuff, then a lot of things would fall through the cracks. Sometime's I'm curious about what person X thinks about a thing, but I've found it's a feeling too similar to wanting to hear gossip/validation of my own thoughts, rather than the Quest For Knowledge.

westoncb 8y ago
That's an interesting (and valid, imo) point. My guess is that on Twitter the prominent experts are less interesting because: 1. They're already speaking from a position of superiority in a certain sense, whereas on HN you're just in a conversation with everybody. You might be pretty important, but then maybe Alan Kay will jump in or something. 2. There isn't the same kind of prompting on Twitter that we get from the stories here which commenters are replying to. Instead, it's just the expert talking about whatever they want: maybe interesting to them, but not so much to everybody else. 3. The Twitter format doesn't encourage the same depth of discussion as HN, stemming from the initial character limit, but perhaps now just a vestigial consequence. It could be interesting to have a site somewhere between HN and Twitter though—something that filters out more newbs/trolls, but doesn't exclude capable unknowns. Maybe you need an invite from someone involved in order to join, or maybe there are some questions you'd be required to answer which might establish you're on the right side of some threshold of intelligence, creativity, decentness, ability to communicate, etc. Then again, I also agree HN is doing a pretty good job of ensuring good comments become visible.

by rtpg 8y ago

westoncb 8y ago

That's an interesting (and valid, imo) point. My guess is that on Twitter the prominent experts are less interesting because: 1. They're already speaking from a position of superiority in a certain sense, whereas on HN you're just in a conversation with everybody. You might be pretty important, but then maybe Alan Kay will jump in or something. 2. There isn't the same kind of prompting on Twitter that we get from the stories here which commenters are replying to. Instead, it's just the expert talking about whatever they want: maybe interesting to them, but not so much to everybody else. 3. The Twitter format doesn't encourage the same depth of discussion as HN, stemming from the initial character limit, but perhaps now just a vestigial consequence. It could be interesting to have a site somewhere between HN and Twitter though—something that filters out more newbs/trolls, but doesn't exclude capable unknowns. Maybe you need an invite from someone involved in order to join, or maybe there are some questions you'd be required to answer which might establish you're on the right side of some threshold of intelligence, creativity, decentness, ability to communicate, etc. Then again, I also agree HN is doing a pretty good job of ensuring good comments become visible.