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I’m hooked on HN even though the conversations here don’t give me any pleasure and I’m wasting valuable time. I’m clearly addicted, but does HN have any sort o

I’m hooked on HN even though the conversations here don’t give me any pleasure and I’m wasting valuable time. I’m clearly addicted, but does HN have any sort of algorithm designed to maximize my time on it? I’m sure these companies do everything in their power to make their services more addictive, however we have to consider that this is just looking for a scapegoat.

rjf72 8y ago
Yip! See those little triangles by this comment? Go look at something such as a phpbb site where topic ordering is driven solely by 'bumps' - the most recent topic to have a comment gets bumped to the top of the page listing. You'll find they rarely have any worse ordering of content than voting systems provide. In my opinion it tends to be simply superior. It also avoids the huge problem in point based systems of requiring some 'parallel universe' /new stream that only a tiny and biased minority ever view. But voting systems drive "engagement." One intuitively surprising discovery is that downvoting users tends to drive them to comment more, frequently with lower quality posts following. I say 'intuitively surprising' because it seems counter intuitive, yet if you've spent any time on point driven message boards, including here, you see the constant stream of little tit-for-tats as a downvoted user (or two) engage in an ever lower quality of 'debate' in some isolated thread. As for upvotes it goes without saying that that little micro-shot of dopamine is what's built, and arguably sustaining, the social platforms of today.
- ams6110 8y ago
  Bump driven systems suffer from the problem that half the posts are simply people posting the word "bump" in order to drive the parent post higher up on the list.
- mulmen 8y ago
  In my experience on forums posting bumps is frowned upon. The ordering is then based on activity and presumably interest.
- kibwen 8y ago
  To its credit, HN actually has systems in place to deliberately discourage tit-for-tat commenting. First, it deliberately has no inbox to notify you of replies to your own comments, so you're much more likely to neglect to discover that someone has replied to your comment. Secondly, it disables the inline "reply" button for comments whose age is below a certain threshold, so that only power users who understand the workaround can actually reply to young comments. Thirdly, it has no support for navigating deep comments into dedicated subthreads like Reddit has, so instead successive comments will become narrower and narrower until eventually becoming literally unreadable (not actually sure if this one is deliberate, it could also be laziness, but the effect is the same). As for bump-ordering, I lost most of my youth to phpbb-like forums, and I'd say they foster a mindset of even more obsessive interaction because not only do non-nested threads become impossible to follow if you're away for long enough, but keeping your preferred topics on the front page requires frequent monitoring and carefully-timed comments.
  - sobani 8y ago
    > Thirdly, it has no support for navigating deep comments into dedicated subthreads like Reddit has You mean like this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129671 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129671 which directly links to the 'parent' of your comment and is formatted almost exactly like a 'Ask HN' post?
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
anonred 8y ago
>does HN have any sort of algorithm designed to maximize my time on it? HN, like reddit, optimizes for engagement using the post ranking algorithm.
chiefalchemist 8y ago
I believe you raise a fair point. That is, plenty of humans have plenty of habits. We are, as they say, creatures of habit. The difference now, is the online habit is easy to identify, as well as self perpetual when we interact with others. Even email can be habitual. Stop sending them and - sans spam and newletters - you stop getting emails.
- chrisco255 8y ago
  Yeah, people were addicted to cable television too and some spent inordinate amount of hours in front of the boob tube. Is YouTube fundamentally different? Because it's able to serve more specific content to users? Maybe. Maybe some are prone to addiction regardless.
  - setr 8y ago
    The big threat is that if ML/AI works out, they’ll become far more efficient at it than ever before. That is, we’re following a trend/path that as a society we probably shouldn’t
    - chiefalchemist 8y ago
      If ML / AI works out The Matrix will be soon to follow. It's going to be a lot easier to keep the masses happy (and passive) is they're immersed in VR.
  - chiefalchemist 8y ago
    I think the difference is the primary device of content consumption. There were TV addicts who never left the house. Now there are internet addicts and they walk - and drive - and work among us. It's too easy to be addict today.
freewilly1040 8y ago
The lack of explicit intent doesn’t absolve these companies from responsibility. They are culpable for their externalities.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
kibwen 8y ago
Just so you're aware, HN has configurable settings to help force you off the site after a certain amount of time: "Like email, social news sites can be dangerously addictive. So the latest version of Hacker News has a feature to let you limit your use of the site. There are three new fields in your profile, noprocrast, maxvisit, and minaway. (You can edit your profile by clicking on your username.) Noprocrast is turned off by default. If you turn it on by setting it to "yes," you'll only be allowed to visit the site for maxvisit minutes at a time, with gaps of minaway minutes in between. The defaults are 20 and 180, which would let you view the site for 20 minutes at a time, and then not allow you back in for 3 hours. You can override noprocrast if you want, in which case your visit clock starts over at zero."
- antonkm 8y ago
  Wow, HN is awesome. Activating now, thanks for letting me know.
- trhway 8y ago
  That should have been part of GDPR.
- jlillesand 8y ago
  Facebook actally has this too, at least in their mobile app.
Barrin92 8y ago
>I’m clearly addicted, but does HN have any sort of algorithm designed to maximize my time on it? that upvotes are visible to the user is a big one. Hackernews (or reddit for that matter, which employs a similar mechanism), would work just as well for the purpose of conversation if your score was hidden. But seeing that number next to your name climb up is something that drives a lot of engagement on the platform. I don't think this is intentional on HN's part, but on Reddit for example I have no doubt that the activity generated by the 'karma' mechanism is left in place precisely because it generates so much (meaningless) content.
- astazangasta 8y ago
  I think I would engage in a much healthier fashion with this site if that number was hidden (along with comment upvotes, clearly invented by Old Scratch himself). But since it is prominently displayed in the header I assume it is intentional.

rjf72 8y ago

Yip! See those little triangles by this comment? Go look at something such as a phpbb site where topic ordering is driven solely by 'bumps' - the most recent topic to have a comment gets bumped to the top of the page listing. You'll find they rarely have any worse ordering of content than voting systems provide. In my opinion it tends to be simply superior. It also avoids the huge problem in point based systems of requiring some 'parallel universe' /new stream that only a tiny and biased minority ever view. But voting systems drive "engagement." One intuitively surprising discovery is that downvoting users tends to drive them to comment more, frequently with lower quality posts following. I say 'intuitively surprising' because it seems counter intuitive, yet if you've spent any time on point driven message boards, including here, you see the constant stream of little tit-for-tats as a downvoted user (or two) engage in an ever lower quality of 'debate' in some isolated thread. As for upvotes it goes without saying that that little micro-shot of dopamine is what's built, and arguably sustaining, the social platforms of today.

ams6110 8y ago
Bump driven systems suffer from the problem that half the posts are simply people posting the word "bump" in order to drive the parent post higher up on the list.
mulmen 8y ago
In my experience on forums posting bumps is frowned upon. The ordering is then based on activity and presumably interest.
kibwen 8y ago
To its credit, HN actually has systems in place to deliberately discourage tit-for-tat commenting. First, it deliberately has no inbox to notify you of replies to your own comments, so you're much more likely to neglect to discover that someone has replied to your comment. Secondly, it disables the inline "reply" button for comments whose age is below a certain threshold, so that only power users who understand the workaround can actually reply to young comments. Thirdly, it has no support for navigating deep comments into dedicated subthreads like Reddit has, so instead successive comments will become narrower and narrower until eventually becoming literally unreadable (not actually sure if this one is deliberate, it could also be laziness, but the effect is the same). As for bump-ordering, I lost most of my youth to phpbb-like forums, and I'd say they foster a mindset of even more obsessive interaction because not only do non-nested threads become impossible to follow if you're away for long enough, but keeping your preferred topics on the front page requires frequent monitoring and carefully-timed comments.
- sobani 8y ago
  > Thirdly, it has no support for navigating deep comments into dedicated subthreads like Reddit has You mean like this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129671 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19129671 which directly links to the 'parent' of your comment and is formatted almost exactly like a 'Ask HN' post?

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

anonred 8y ago

>does HN have any sort of algorithm designed to maximize my time on it? HN, like reddit, optimizes for engagement using the post ranking algorithm.

chiefalchemist 8y ago

I believe you raise a fair point. That is, plenty of humans have plenty of habits. We are, as they say, creatures of habit. The difference now, is the online habit is easy to identify, as well as self perpetual when we interact with others. Even email can be habitual. Stop sending them and - sans spam and newletters - you stop getting emails.

chrisco255 8y ago
Yeah, people were addicted to cable television too and some spent inordinate amount of hours in front of the boob tube. Is YouTube fundamentally different? Because it's able to serve more specific content to users? Maybe. Maybe some are prone to addiction regardless.
- setr 8y ago
  The big threat is that if ML/AI works out, they’ll become far more efficient at it than ever before. That is, we’re following a trend/path that as a society we probably shouldn’t
  - chiefalchemist 8y ago
    If ML / AI works out The Matrix will be soon to follow. It's going to be a lot easier to keep the masses happy (and passive) is they're immersed in VR.
- chiefalchemist 8y ago
  I think the difference is the primary device of content consumption. There were TV addicts who never left the house. Now there are internet addicts and they walk - and drive - and work among us. It's too easy to be addict today.

freewilly1040 8y ago

The lack of explicit intent doesn’t absolve these companies from responsibility. They are culpable for their externalities.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

kibwen 8y ago

Just so you're aware, HN has configurable settings to help force you off the site after a certain amount of time: "Like email, social news sites can be dangerously addictive. So the latest version of Hacker News has a feature to let you limit your use of the site. There are three new fields in your profile, noprocrast, maxvisit, and minaway. (You can edit your profile by clicking on your username.) Noprocrast is turned off by default. If you turn it on by setting it to "yes," you'll only be allowed to visit the site for maxvisit minutes at a time, with gaps of minaway minutes in between. The defaults are 20 and 180, which would let you view the site for 20 minutes at a time, and then not allow you back in for 3 hours. You can override noprocrast if you want, in which case your visit clock starts over at zero."

antonkm 8y ago
Wow, HN is awesome. Activating now, thanks for letting me know.
trhway 8y ago
That should have been part of GDPR.
jlillesand 8y ago
Facebook actally has this too, at least in their mobile app.

Barrin92 8y ago

>I’m clearly addicted, but does HN have any sort of algorithm designed to maximize my time on it? that upvotes are visible to the user is a big one. Hackernews (or reddit for that matter, which employs a similar mechanism), would work just as well for the purpose of conversation if your score was hidden. But seeing that number next to your name climb up is something that drives a lot of engagement on the platform. I don't think this is intentional on HN's part, but on Reddit for example I have no doubt that the activity generated by the 'karma' mechanism is left in place precisely because it generates so much (meaningless) content.

astazangasta 8y ago
I think I would engage in a much healthier fashion with this site if that number was hidden (along with comment upvotes, clearly invented by Old Scratch himself). But since it is prominently displayed in the header I assume it is intentional.