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> Feedback is appreciated. Ok. In my opinion: 1. The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. 2. Site layout resembles generic link ag

> Feedback is appreciated. Ok. In my opinion: 1. The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. 2. Site layout resembles generic link aggregating sites with no real content, which discourages the viewer from exploring the site further. 3. The boxes with numbers stand out too much among the other content. Thanks to the fact that they take various amount of space depending on the number's length, it causes the entire list of articles to appear unaligned. 4. I was not able to find a link from the main website to the credits link you have posted. Also, it is unclear how much the credits cost. The purchase page is only available once you register and log in. In my opinion that is not transparent at all. It is also unclear to me why the credits system has been introduced in the first place. The linked page mentions that it is supposed to "limit spam and reward quality contributors". It seems to me that the same goal can be achieved by using upvoting-based reputation system with carefully configured entry barriers that is already in use at many Stack Exchange sites. In my opinion, the most reasonable way to cover your website's running costs is to ask for donations. But it needs to be done in a very transparent way. For instance, show a chart of real Google Cloud / Amazon AWS bills offset by donations. People need to be 100% sure that when they donate money to "running costs", it would not end up being used for something else like your new iPhone or a vacation in Mexico. Edit: add line breaks

misterdoubt 7y ago
There's a reason that essentially zero websites default to a dark theme. I may be in the extreme end, but in the rare occasion that I find a dark website, if I can't run it through a browser extension to make it light and readable: I leave and never return.
- pbasista 7y ago
  > There's a reason that essentially zero websites default to a dark theme. Yes, it seems like there is. I am wondering what that reason may be. My preference for dark themes is based on my current typical viewing conditions, which are rooms with low to medium light levels where the brightness of my screen is also low. In such a situation, I do not wish to look at white-themed content because it is uncomfortably bright. In a place with a lot of light, I would not mind the light theme, but it still would not be my preference because of the established habit. With the sun shining directly into the screen, it may even be impossible to use the dark theme, but that is an edge case which, in my opinion, should not affect how a website looks by default. I assume that many theme-related preferences are habit-based. In my opinion, a reasonable UI design should at least allow simple switching between dark and light themes.
alexandercrohde 7y ago
The credit thing is my only real concern here. As far as I'm concern, upvoting/downvoting isn't fun, it's an act of public service. I'd be incredibly concerned that corporate entities will have huge incentive to buy fact-upvotes and since there is no limit how many they can use, it would take 5,000 good samaritans to undo the damage of 1-shill with $5. Basically a deal-breaker to me that the site is that out-of-touch with the problem of internet news. Frankly, I'd like a news site that does the opposite - 1 vote per proven US citizen (no bots, no foreign influencers, no corporations).
- thekyle 7y ago
  It seems like the bulk of your concern is about the voting specifically. I'm curious if the voting aspect of the credit system were removed and voting worked more like it does on Reddit/HN (one vote per user), but the other aspects of it were left intact would that alleviate most of your concerns? Specifically, it would still cost credits to leave comments, submit stories and facts, but not to vote.
  - alexandercrohde 7y ago
    I mean, I don't imagine I'd "pay" to leave comments, submit stories, or facts. Maybe I'm an odd-breed but I see HN as a charitable place for those in the know to contribute to the pool of public knowledge. I think the best version of HN (or equivalent) is full of people with that objective (e.g. wikipedia). The worst version is full of people grinding emotional axes (4chan) or self-promoting. I think you'll find the people who are self-promoting (e.g. trying to start a new cryptocurrency, or a PR firm) will have much more resources to submit articles than good-samaritans. The thing I do like is breaking an article into a list of cited facts. I like the brevity, and I like sources.
jnbiche 7y ago
> People need to be 100% sure that when they donate money to "running costs", it would not end up being used for something else like your new iPhone or a vacation in Mexico. So what if it does? Yes, if you explicitly say that all donations will be used for site maintenance, then maybe. But even that could include labor? In any case, the point is moot. Very, very, very few open source projects take in enough donations from the general public to pay for a new iPhone. Most are very lucky to get $100-$200 in a year.
ebg13 7y ago
> I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I would not. Now we're cancelled out.
- bovermyer 7y ago
  I also don't want a dark theme.
  - nerdponx 7y ago
    Likewise. Of all the things to complain about, this is not an important one.
dangoor 7y ago
+1 to everything you said. I can see the features of this site supporting a quick view into stuff that's going on, but the design needs a lot of work. One thing I wish: I don't want to go to a separate page to see the few facts, especially for the top stories.
- thekyle 7y ago
  I'll see if I can add a button to show the first few facts without leaving the list pages.
- thekyle 7y ago
  Alright, I've updated the site. Each story now has a "facts" link that will expand the top 5 facts without leaving the page.
  - dangoor 7y ago
    That’s a great improvement! Thanks
rovyko 7y ago
>The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I made a stylesheet to fix a few of the glaring UI problems, as well as a sheet for dark mode: https://github.com/rovyko/hoxly-gui-patch-stylesheets https://github.com/rovyko/hoxly-gui-patch-stylesheets * Horizontally align news item titles * New Items take up full margined-page width * Search input at the top of the page * All facts button has a pointer cursor * Increase button text size
- thekyle 7y ago
  Thanks for taking the time to do this. Frontend dev is really not my thing. I'll see if I can integrate some of these changes.
thekyle 7y ago
Thanks for the feedback! > 1. The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I'll see if I can add an optional dark mode. > 2. Site layout resembles generic link aggregating sites with no real content, which discourages the viewer from exploring the site further. I'm not really sure what changes could be made that would encourage users to explore. Could you elaborate? > 3. The boxes with numbers stand out too much among the other content. Thanks to the fact that they take various amount of space depending on the number's length, it causes the entire list of articles to appear unaligned. Yeah, this is a problem. I think maybe it can be partially solved by abbreviating 3,000 as 3k, etc. > 4. I was not able to find a link from the main website to the credits link you have posted. Also, it is unclear how much the credits cost. The purchase page is only available once you register and log in. In my opinion that is not transparent at all. Okay, this is something I hadn't even considered. Originally the entire credits pack actually required authentication to view but I changed that last minute. I'll see what I can do to make the pricing more transparent. > In my opinion, the most reasonable way to cover your website's running costs is to ask for donations. I have run websites in the past on the donation model. In my experience it hits a wall once you have more general web surfers on your site than power users. Reddit tried the donation model with a transparent meter that showed the sites costs each day but it eventually had to pivot to ads.
- johnnyfived 7y ago
  A dark mode would definitely be nice, but I think there are some larger UI improvements that can be done. Some basic ones would be better padding and spacing for legibility, and making use of the large empty spaces for additional content. And being able to see the number of comments a post has without clicking on it is a must. I really like this project and the credits system in place. If you're open to the idea I'd be down to collaborate on some of the frontend / design work. Feel free to message me.
  - thekyle 7y ago
    > If you're open to the idea I'd be down to collaborate on some of the frontend / design work. Feel free to message me. Sure, I'd like to hear more if you had some ideas. It doesn't look like your profile has any contact info, but you can email me: contact@kylepiira.com
Buttons840 7y ago
> People need to be 100% sure that when they donate money to "running costs", it would not end up being used for something else like your new iPhone or a vacation in Mexico. You may be right, but I wonder how many of those people would be ok with their employer saying "we're willing to cover living costs, but your recent trip shows we're paying you too much. We value the work and service you provide us, but we'd prefer to only pay the bare minimum that it takes to maintain that service. By all means, buy food for yourself, and a bed is ok, maybe a modest television, but a trip is right out."

misterdoubt 7y ago

There's a reason that essentially zero websites default to a dark theme. I may be in the extreme end, but in the rare occasion that I find a dark website, if I can't run it through a browser extension to make it light and readable: I leave and never return.

pbasista 7y ago
> There's a reason that essentially zero websites default to a dark theme. Yes, it seems like there is. I am wondering what that reason may be. My preference for dark themes is based on my current typical viewing conditions, which are rooms with low to medium light levels where the brightness of my screen is also low. In such a situation, I do not wish to look at white-themed content because it is uncomfortably bright. In a place with a lot of light, I would not mind the light theme, but it still would not be my preference because of the established habit. With the sun shining directly into the screen, it may even be impossible to use the dark theme, but that is an edge case which, in my opinion, should not affect how a website looks by default. I assume that many theme-related preferences are habit-based. In my opinion, a reasonable UI design should at least allow simple switching between dark and light themes.

alexandercrohde 7y ago

The credit thing is my only real concern here. As far as I'm concern, upvoting/downvoting isn't fun, it's an act of public service. I'd be incredibly concerned that corporate entities will have huge incentive to buy fact-upvotes and since there is no limit how many they can use, it would take 5,000 good samaritans to undo the damage of 1-shill with $5. Basically a deal-breaker to me that the site is that out-of-touch with the problem of internet news. Frankly, I'd like a news site that does the opposite - 1 vote per proven US citizen (no bots, no foreign influencers, no corporations).

thekyle 7y ago
It seems like the bulk of your concern is about the voting specifically. I'm curious if the voting aspect of the credit system were removed and voting worked more like it does on Reddit/HN (one vote per user), but the other aspects of it were left intact would that alleviate most of your concerns? Specifically, it would still cost credits to leave comments, submit stories and facts, but not to vote.
- alexandercrohde 7y ago
  I mean, I don't imagine I'd "pay" to leave comments, submit stories, or facts. Maybe I'm an odd-breed but I see HN as a charitable place for those in the know to contribute to the pool of public knowledge. I think the best version of HN (or equivalent) is full of people with that objective (e.g. wikipedia). The worst version is full of people grinding emotional axes (4chan) or self-promoting. I think you'll find the people who are self-promoting (e.g. trying to start a new cryptocurrency, or a PR firm) will have much more resources to submit articles than good-samaritans. The thing I do like is breaking an article into a list of cited facts. I like the brevity, and I like sources.

jnbiche 7y ago

> People need to be 100% sure that when they donate money to "running costs", it would not end up being used for something else like your new iPhone or a vacation in Mexico. So what if it does? Yes, if you explicitly say that all donations will be used for site maintenance, then maybe. But even that could include labor? In any case, the point is moot. Very, very, very few open source projects take in enough donations from the general public to pay for a new iPhone. Most are very lucky to get $100-$200 in a year.

ebg13 7y ago

> I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I would not. Now we're cancelled out.

bovermyer 7y ago
I also don't want a dark theme.
- nerdponx 7y ago
  Likewise. Of all the things to complain about, this is not an important one.

dangoor 7y ago

+1 to everything you said. I can see the features of this site supporting a quick view into stuff that's going on, but the design needs a lot of work. One thing I wish: I don't want to go to a separate page to see the few facts, especially for the top stories.

thekyle 7y ago
I'll see if I can add a button to show the first few facts without leaving the list pages.
thekyle 7y ago
Alright, I've updated the site. Each story now has a "facts" link that will expand the top 5 facts without leaving the page.
- dangoor 7y ago
  That’s a great improvement! Thanks

rovyko 7y ago

>The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I made a stylesheet to fix a few of the glaring UI problems, as well as a sheet for dark mode: https://github.com/rovyko/hoxly-gui-patch-stylesheets https://github.com/rovyko/hoxly-gui-patch-stylesheets * Horizontally align news item titles * New Items take up full margined-page width * Search input at the top of the page * All facts button has a pointer cursor * Increase button text size

thekyle 7y ago
Thanks for taking the time to do this. Frontend dev is really not my thing. I'll see if I can integrate some of these changes.

thekyle 7y ago

Thanks for the feedback! > 1. The UI is unappealing. I would prefer the default theme to be dark. I'll see if I can add an optional dark mode. > 2. Site layout resembles generic link aggregating sites with no real content, which discourages the viewer from exploring the site further. I'm not really sure what changes could be made that would encourage users to explore. Could you elaborate? > 3. The boxes with numbers stand out too much among the other content. Thanks to the fact that they take various amount of space depending on the number's length, it causes the entire list of articles to appear unaligned. Yeah, this is a problem. I think maybe it can be partially solved by abbreviating 3,000 as 3k, etc. > 4. I was not able to find a link from the main website to the credits link you have posted. Also, it is unclear how much the credits cost. The purchase page is only available once you register and log in. In my opinion that is not transparent at all. Okay, this is something I hadn't even considered. Originally the entire credits pack actually required authentication to view but I changed that last minute. I'll see what I can do to make the pricing more transparent. > In my opinion, the most reasonable way to cover your website's running costs is to ask for donations. I have run websites in the past on the donation model. In my experience it hits a wall once you have more general web surfers on your site than power users. Reddit tried the donation model with a transparent meter that showed the sites costs each day but it eventually had to pivot to ads.

johnnyfived 7y ago
A dark mode would definitely be nice, but I think there are some larger UI improvements that can be done. Some basic ones would be better padding and spacing for legibility, and making use of the large empty spaces for additional content. And being able to see the number of comments a post has without clicking on it is a must. I really like this project and the credits system in place. If you're open to the idea I'd be down to collaborate on some of the frontend / design work. Feel free to message me.
- thekyle 7y ago
  > If you're open to the idea I'd be down to collaborate on some of the frontend / design work. Feel free to message me. Sure, I'd like to hear more if you had some ideas. It doesn't look like your profile has any contact info, but you can email me: contact@kylepiira.com

Buttons840 7y ago

> People need to be 100% sure that when they donate money to "running costs", it would not end up being used for something else like your new iPhone or a vacation in Mexico. You may be right, but I wonder how many of those people would be ok with their employer saying "we're willing to cover living costs, but your recent trip shows we're paying you too much. We value the work and service you provide us, but we'd prefer to only pay the bare minimum that it takes to maintain that service. By all means, buy food for yourself, and a bed is ok, maybe a modest television, but a trip is right out."