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Okay maybe I have missed your point. Let me ask you a question then, to clarify. You think there's a reason they have an RSS feed of the top stories but do no

Okay maybe I have missed your point. Let me ask you a question then, to clarify. You think there's a reason they have an RSS feed of the top stories but do not have a feed of all the stories as they come in? Help me, an admitted newbie, understand. Why have one and not the other?

tptacek 16y ago
I've always assumed it was because the feed of all stories as they come in contains a huge amount of junk, and also because RSS on Hacker News is an afterthought. I use RSS as my primary interface to HN, but I also recognize that it's inferior to the site itself.
- ronnier 16y ago
  Have you tried this? This is something else I'm working on... http://viewtext.org/article?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinator.com%2Frss http://viewtext.org/article?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinato... It will populate the RSS feed with the full content.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    I'm generally disinclined to replace HN's existing RSS with someone else's RSS feed that might at any moment stop working. HN RSS sucks, but I never have to think about it. As someone else pointed out, I also depend on SearchYC, which is an external application. The difference is the SearchYC is extraordinarily well known. HN can't cut off SearchYC without alienating a sizeable group of site veterans. That's more than you probably wanted to know, but, hey, you asked.
    - PakG1 16y ago
      I think that's an unfair and inconsistent application of logic. I like reading HN and recently contributing tiny bits to HN because I think the community here is top-notch, friendly, and knows its stuff. HN never struck me as elitist; rather, it's more like a really friendly meritocracy. About the most elitist it gets is requiring a karma threshold to be able to downvote, but that's really just part of being a good meritocracy. But to be accepting of one add-on application simply because of heavy site veteran patronage, while rejecting all others... THAT would strike me as heavy elitism and not in line with what seems to make HN so great. If add-on apps MUST be rejected, the criteria should be for other more respectable reasons, no? And mind you, it's all pg's call anyway.
      - tptacek 16y ago
        That would be elitist. If it was what I was saying.

tptacek 16y ago

I've always assumed it was because the feed of all stories as they come in contains a huge amount of junk, and also because RSS on Hacker News is an afterthought. I use RSS as my primary interface to HN, but I also recognize that it's inferior to the site itself.

ronnier 16y ago
Have you tried this? This is something else I'm working on... http://viewtext.org/article?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinator.com%2Frss http://viewtext.org/article?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinato... It will populate the RSS feed with the full content.
- tptacek 16y ago
  I'm generally disinclined to replace HN's existing RSS with someone else's RSS feed that might at any moment stop working. HN RSS sucks, but I never have to think about it. As someone else pointed out, I also depend on SearchYC, which is an external application. The difference is the SearchYC is extraordinarily well known. HN can't cut off SearchYC without alienating a sizeable group of site veterans. That's more than you probably wanted to know, but, hey, you asked.
  - PakG1 16y ago
    I think that's an unfair and inconsistent application of logic. I like reading HN and recently contributing tiny bits to HN because I think the community here is top-notch, friendly, and knows its stuff. HN never struck me as elitist; rather, it's more like a really friendly meritocracy. About the most elitist it gets is requiring a karma threshold to be able to downvote, but that's really just part of being a good meritocracy. But to be accepting of one add-on application simply because of heavy site veteran patronage, while rejecting all others... THAT would strike me as heavy elitism and not in line with what seems to make HN so great. If add-on apps MUST be rejected, the criteria should be for other more respectable reasons, no? And mind you, it's all pg's call anyway.
    - tptacek 16y ago
      That would be elitist. If it was what I was saying.