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I don't get the hn algo, but how did I click this, presumably on the front page, now to find it in the very very last place (entry 441) of hn? srceenshot of pa

I don't get the hn algo, but how did I click this, presumably on the front page, now to find it in the very very last place (entry 441) of hn? srceenshot of page 15, showing older dupes with less votes above: https://i.imgur.com/ibnV65s.png https://i.imgur.com/ibnV65s.png edit: now it's gone from p15 edit2: if this would have been transparently flagged as off-topic for HN I'd understand. But given the content of the article this is sadly ironic, I really hope there is a "mechanical" explanation for this.

andor 8y ago
Somebody might have flagged it, or it was a moderator. That's why I generally read HN through http://hckrnews.com/ http://hckrnews.com/, they show all frontpage items sorted chronologically.
- anotheryou 8y ago
  oh sweet, thanks! If it was flagged I'd still see it, no? (I have that enabled) edit: now it shows as [flagged] [dead] edit2: and back on the front-page again, thanks for undoing this mods edit3: now vanished (even from "new"). weird mechanics or a mod-battle :) ? edit4: I'll take the down-votes with pride
  - angry_octet 8y ago
    There is a significant cohort of users who flag this type of article. As there is no way for them to say why they dislike it, I doubt we will ever be certain. Obviously it isn't technical or scientific, it is anecdotal, perhaps valid reasons for not upvoting, but surely not flagging? I've only flagged obvious spam and a dangerous pseudoscience article. And after that, I couldn't flag anymore, so I guess I'm not in sync with the powers that be. I think it is just necessary to accept that HN is imperfect, only one venue, and reflects the biases of its users to a significant degree. It is a shame those biases are not more transparently revealed. If you want to see things that people you respect recommend, go to twitter and curate your feed. Although the constant reordering and sometimes-showing and so on is even worse on twitter.
    - sctb 8y ago
      I don't see why you couldn't flag! Are you sure? If we speak of biases that way, then I'm not sure there's anything outside of bias. This site has a bias towards a particular kind of discourse. It's not that Twitter doesn't have discourse, but it's a different style. Topics like this one can be quite controversial and flamewar-style, and Hacker News readers have a bias against flamewars. It's not that flamewars aren't discourse, but it's not our preference here. Yes, it's only one venue, and it does reflect its users (and its history and its conventions and its table-based layout, etc.). How could it be any other way? Something that's a detriment to thoughtfulness and civility is when we project our own opinions onto the canvas of “bias” constituting the mechanisms of discussion which are invariably present. It's never what we think, and always a projection. This is supported by the fact that everyone perceives moderation, flagging, etc. to be in support of the opposite side. Has anyone ever complained, “Boy, this really confirms my existing view without adequately representing what I disagree with. How biased!”. Sorry for the rant! I'm of course generalizing and addressing more than you've actually said.
      - angry_octet 8y ago
        I can flag articles, but not comments. I'm not sure if this is just me of course, but given comments appeared marked as [flagged] it seems so. Inflation in kerma required for flagging? The rules are rather opaque. I'm fine with bias, it is as you point out, expected and unavoidable. It is more obvious who likes/dislikes what on twitter, though they keep making that harder to determine analytically. I guess the problem boils down to there being no sense of who is voting one way or the other, and would you respect those people? Like, I'm not going to care if Jacob Wohl downvotes something, or if a bunch of Wohlites (or Chomskyists for that matter) are angry, but how can you tell? As to articles specifically related to gender and women, I would say HN has a problem. It is up to HN owners to decide whether to damp down the jerk responses, the flagging, etc. I prefer HN posts because they don't have to be absurdley short, and there are no memes. How I hate memes. Though the lack of respect for humour and wit really diminishes discourse.
    - anotheryou 8y ago
      It moved before it was marked as flagged and than it disappeared further. Either this was glitchy behavior or more than just flagging.
DoreenMichele 8y ago
Articles about sexism seem to be particularly hard to do well. The ways in which they go wrong tend to not fare well on HN, sometimes for good reasons and sometimes not so good.
- anotheryou 8y ago
  Well I'm more critical of the lack of transparency, which makes discussion of the mechanics impossible. As said, I'd understand a flagging because of "off-topic" or something. And while I strongly oppose a "no-politics" policy, even that would be fair game if enforced transparently.
  - DoreenMichele 8y ago
    With roughly 5 million visitors a month and member actions, such as upvotes, comments and flags, being part of the formula, even the mods won't have all the answers as to why a thing went the way it did. I replied in part because I post as openly female and have gone through periods where I paid a lot of attention to what happened to articles on sexism or from a woman's point of view etc. Quality of writing matters a great deal on sensitive topics and good titles matter a whole lot. This title is actually fairly click bait and technically a violation of HN policy.
    - anotheryou 8y ago
      I think it can certainly be made transparent. A small tag for a reason like the [flagged] wouldn't be that hard to do for moderator nerfs. btw: I just noticed I don't read the names when reading comments.
  - vidarh 8y ago
    As I understand it people flag politics more often, but it's not explicitly off-topic, but it also takes very little for discussion on posts like this to result in the type of comments that will result in moderation and/or further flagging. I think the best response is basically that HN is not Reddit, and that's how most people here want it, though many of us (including me) are frequent Reddit users too. Different sites for different purposes.

andor 8y ago

Somebody might have flagged it, or it was a moderator. That's why I generally read HN through http://hckrnews.com/ http://hckrnews.com/, they show all frontpage items sorted chronologically.

anotheryou 8y ago
oh sweet, thanks! If it was flagged I'd still see it, no? (I have that enabled) edit: now it shows as [flagged] [dead] edit2: and back on the front-page again, thanks for undoing this mods edit3: now vanished (even from "new"). weird mechanics or a mod-battle :) ? edit4: I'll take the down-votes with pride
- angry_octet 8y ago
  There is a significant cohort of users who flag this type of article. As there is no way for them to say why they dislike it, I doubt we will ever be certain. Obviously it isn't technical or scientific, it is anecdotal, perhaps valid reasons for not upvoting, but surely not flagging? I've only flagged obvious spam and a dangerous pseudoscience article. And after that, I couldn't flag anymore, so I guess I'm not in sync with the powers that be. I think it is just necessary to accept that HN is imperfect, only one venue, and reflects the biases of its users to a significant degree. It is a shame those biases are not more transparently revealed. If you want to see things that people you respect recommend, go to twitter and curate your feed. Although the constant reordering and sometimes-showing and so on is even worse on twitter.
  - sctb 8y ago
    I don't see why you couldn't flag! Are you sure? If we speak of biases that way, then I'm not sure there's anything outside of bias. This site has a bias towards a particular kind of discourse. It's not that Twitter doesn't have discourse, but it's a different style. Topics like this one can be quite controversial and flamewar-style, and Hacker News readers have a bias against flamewars. It's not that flamewars aren't discourse, but it's not our preference here. Yes, it's only one venue, and it does reflect its users (and its history and its conventions and its table-based layout, etc.). How could it be any other way? Something that's a detriment to thoughtfulness and civility is when we project our own opinions onto the canvas of “bias” constituting the mechanisms of discussion which are invariably present. It's never what we think, and always a projection. This is supported by the fact that everyone perceives moderation, flagging, etc. to be in support of the opposite side. Has anyone ever complained, “Boy, this really confirms my existing view without adequately representing what I disagree with. How biased!”. Sorry for the rant! I'm of course generalizing and addressing more than you've actually said.
    - angry_octet 8y ago
      I can flag articles, but not comments. I'm not sure if this is just me of course, but given comments appeared marked as [flagged] it seems so. Inflation in kerma required for flagging? The rules are rather opaque. I'm fine with bias, it is as you point out, expected and unavoidable. It is more obvious who likes/dislikes what on twitter, though they keep making that harder to determine analytically. I guess the problem boils down to there being no sense of who is voting one way or the other, and would you respect those people? Like, I'm not going to care if Jacob Wohl downvotes something, or if a bunch of Wohlites (or Chomskyists for that matter) are angry, but how can you tell? As to articles specifically related to gender and women, I would say HN has a problem. It is up to HN owners to decide whether to damp down the jerk responses, the flagging, etc. I prefer HN posts because they don't have to be absurdley short, and there are no memes. How I hate memes. Though the lack of respect for humour and wit really diminishes discourse.
  - anotheryou 8y ago
    It moved before it was marked as flagged and than it disappeared further. Either this was glitchy behavior or more than just flagging.

DoreenMichele 8y ago

Articles about sexism seem to be particularly hard to do well. The ways in which they go wrong tend to not fare well on HN, sometimes for good reasons and sometimes not so good.

anotheryou 8y ago
Well I'm more critical of the lack of transparency, which makes discussion of the mechanics impossible. As said, I'd understand a flagging because of "off-topic" or something. And while I strongly oppose a "no-politics" policy, even that would be fair game if enforced transparently.
- DoreenMichele 8y ago
  With roughly 5 million visitors a month and member actions, such as upvotes, comments and flags, being part of the formula, even the mods won't have all the answers as to why a thing went the way it did. I replied in part because I post as openly female and have gone through periods where I paid a lot of attention to what happened to articles on sexism or from a woman's point of view etc. Quality of writing matters a great deal on sensitive topics and good titles matter a whole lot. This title is actually fairly click bait and technically a violation of HN policy.
  - anotheryou 8y ago
    I think it can certainly be made transparent. A small tag for a reason like the [flagged] wouldn't be that hard to do for moderator nerfs. btw: I just noticed I don't read the names when reading comments.
- vidarh 8y ago
  As I understand it people flag politics more often, but it's not explicitly off-topic, but it also takes very little for discussion on posts like this to result in the type of comments that will result in moderation and/or further flagging. I think the best response is basically that HN is not Reddit, and that's how most people here want it, though many of us (including me) are frequent Reddit users too. Different sites for different purposes.