7 ms·

Poll: Is HN your main online news source?

112 points by jaxn 16y ago

Reading the thread on whether or not HN should be a "general news" site I can't help but wonder if that opinion is affected by whether or not HN is your primary news source.

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
instakill 16y ago
Nope, it's one of many, although it is one of the most sticky ones.
blhack 16y ago
HN gives me the news that I care about. Lots of tech, some science, and only a tiny, tiny bit of world events. This mix means that only really good science articles make it through, and only really really good worldnews articles make it through. I usually wake up every morning and check HN to make sure that the world isn't ending. If North Korea launches a nuke at South Korea, despite it not being technology news, I'd bet that it makes it to the top of HN within a few minutes. Recently I also started using an RSS reader that I wrote a while ago (I wrote it, then pretty much forgot about it): http://newsyndicated.com/a/reader http://newsyndicated.com/a/reader it aggregates my favorite feeds (including HN, which is how i found this thread to begin with), and also allows me to submit directly to HN.
- jseliger 16y ago
  and only a tiny, tiny bit of world events. I don't think articles about world events are bad -- but the way they're done in most of the media is: country x is doing y to country z. Who cares? Standard international bickering is just that: standard. Relatively few articles go beyond surface phenomena to figure out what's really going on, and those are the ones of interest that, as you point out, will sometimes get voted up on HN.
  - kunley 16y ago
    Those standard events you mentioned are not making their way here. And believe me, North Korean excesses are pretty non-standard.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
zdw 16y ago
I do subscribe to other RSS feeds, but looking at netnewswire's "Attention" feed report, I do visit HN linked sites more than any other. I think this is a function of how practically useful the information is to me personally. Conventional news tells me about a lot of things I can't do anything about - I'm pretty much a passive observer. I mean, in terms of politics I get to vote once every year or two? And anything macroeconomic is far outside my control, but might inform me slightly of where people may spend money in the next year or two. Contrast that with tech news and what gets posted on HN - it's stuff I can either pick up and use (new languages/concepts/scripts/etc.) or that people will actually go to me for advice on. I can take an active roll and have give and take - there are opportunities for interaction there that are manageable.
bretpiatt 16y ago
I answered yes but I probably read about the same number of articles linked on Twitter but I don't "go to Twitter" for news. I've stopped using a RSS reader, Twitter does a better job of curating the content I want.
Infomus 16y ago
1.HN 2./r/worldnews 3./r/politics 4...More Reddit. 5.Twitter
- aeurielesn 16y ago
  I migrated from un-official feeds of HN on Twitter to here. It is better anyways because you can see the discussion behind it.
jeromec 16y ago
HN is my main source for "my kind" of news. Google News is my main source for mainstream news. (BBC gets in there sometimes for more of a world/different from U.S. perspective)
_Lemon_ 16y ago
I keep telling myself that I need to explore "real" news sites like the BBC or Guardian (or...), but never quite get there. I primarily stick to Slashdot and HN but know full well that the views in the comments of the two sites can sometimes be very detached/different from the rest of society. While this isn't necessarily a bad thing, it is something to be careful of and I'd hate to find the day all of my own opinions fit a site perfectly.
mmt 16y ago
I answered "Yes," but only in a convoluted reading of the question. Most accurately, HN is the only online service I use that is mainly a source of news. Put another way, I come here for the information and discussion, and it just happens to be a news site[1]. Before HN, I went nowhere (online or offline) explicitly to obtain news. After HN, I expect I will, again, simply do without. [1] Which suits it well, IMO. I always flag old/repeat articles.
jerf 16y ago
As much as I enjoy HN, no, it is only one small part of my news consumption in a number of fields, which primarily comes in the form of RSS feeds. Currently I use Google Reader but I've used all kinds of readers. Since I prefer the Dave Winer-style "stream of news" approach I can trivially change readers since I don't generate a backlog. I've used "stream of news" since it was, well, the only choice since there was only one RSS generator and consumer and that's what it used.
parenthesis 16y ago
For `tech' news, yes. For `news' news, the BBC (Radio 4 and http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/).
- nailer 16y ago
  Well since we're discussing non-tech news - bees, wikileaks, and the TSA - that'd be a no to the poll.
dotcoma 16y ago
HN and reddit.
hendler 16y ago
Answered no - HN, Twitter, and Yahoo News
lhnn 16y ago
-Slashdot -HN -Drudge Report/Google News -WSJ (Highest quality, but I like having the paper, which has eluded me recently)
- shortlived 16y ago
  I replaced slashdot with alterslash a long time ago...
  - wyclif 16y ago
    Me too. It has just the right threshold.
adestefan 16y ago
It's my primary source of tech news. I use Google Reader and still gave a fair number of feeds, but I use HN via the main page. I used to read a lot of Reddit, but everything is too political there. I got sick of seeing 50 wikileak stories make it to the top of every sub-reddit.
ROFISH 16y ago
I like HN has the heavily tech articles float up. General news should really belong to Reddit.
CapitalistCartr 16y ago
Fark comes first.
Indyan 16y ago
It is one of my many sources. If I had to pick one service that I depend upon a lot, I would have to pick TechMeme. But, HN is often faster than TM.
sjs 16y ago
HN, reddit, Ars Technica, and several tech websites such as AnandTech and Guru3D. World news and traditional media are just depressing. I got jaded at a young age and tend not to follow it (for better and for worse).
jawee 16y ago
Hacker News is the only thing I am guaranteed to read every day. I will occasionally click over to Google News if I wish to know what is going on in the world or Slashdot if I need something else to look at. But Hacker News usually satisfies me in knowing what is most important to me in the world, which has the same basic tech emphasis as here; the other content that shows up from time-to-time usually matches what I wish to read about fairly well.
andrerobot 16y ago
Something Awful is my main news source. Being serious, Hacker News shouldn't try to be a general news site "for hackers" because believing a hacker prototype exists is absurd.
xd 16y ago
I had an RSS aggregator with around a dozen popular news sources like slashdot, digg, reddit etc but I've found that 99.99% of the interesting stories pop up on HN pretty quickly. So I gave up on news RSS feeds and just have a tab with HN and a tab with a netvibes account with actual blog feeds from the likes of the eevblog, ben heck show, adafruit industries, hack a day etc.. stuff with unique content being added which I was interested in but won't hit HN every time they posted something.
ajdecon 16y ago
I'd call it my primary professional news source, along with Twitter. HN gives me a lot of useful information about trends in the startup world, in (mostly web) technology, and so on. And it's interesting seeing what people here think about the world news that makes it through. But my real primary news source is probably my RSS reader. There's a LOT of news out there that I care about which doesn't make it onto HN. A lot of national and world news doesn't make it here, and I like being generally informed about what's going on. I also keep up with local news, and the current events in various scientific subfields which are relevant to my interests, but not the web startup crowd here.
ConceptDog 16y ago
Supplemented with Reddit. Search engines are great for answers. Reddit and HN are great for questions I didn't think of.
- fluorescentLAMP 16y ago
  Yeah, I feel that proggit has really gone downhill. I still enjoy a handful of other specific /r/ s thou - like soccer and boston.
  - omaranto 16y ago
    I can't believe I never thought to check if there was a Boston subreddit, thanks for mentioning it!
    - fluorescentLAMP 16y ago
      It is a little slow, but sometimes there is good stuff on there.
  - shortlived 16y ago
    try /r/coding or search out more specific subreddits.
savoy11 16y ago
It was, but lately it is not. News are constantly repeating and the target group is the "I do not have money, but I want to do something" group, which is largely dissatisfying as far as opinions go. I mostly tend to avoid HN nowadays.
marklabedz 16y ago
HN is where I go to find good discussion about topics in which I'm interested. For general news, the BBC still tops my list.
mikeryan 16y ago
I really want an "I don't have a primary source of news" choice. I use a variety of sources and can't really pick favorites, I use HN for hacking, reddit for fun, sfgate.com for local news and sports, NYTimes for more metro news etc.
- jaxn 16y ago
  I didn't want to complicate the poll. If HN is not your primary source of news, then it is a "no". If you don't have a "primary" source, then it is a "no".
chanux 16y ago
HN gives me `what matters`. No much time for anything else after finishing daily dose of HN. When I really got nothing else to do, Reddit.
- petercooper 16y ago
  If it's really a daily dose, the HN front page provides a mere subset of "what matters." There's so much good stuff that never makes it out of /new or that flies off the front page within a few hours.. I tend to treat news sources like rivers that I dip into - I'm always going to miss something. But it's always a little depressing when I skim a few hours back with something like HackerSlide and see what great stuff I "missed" while sleeping, etc.
  - eneveu 16y ago
    I had the same problem. Solved it a few months ago by using one of Jeff Miller's HN RSS feeds ( http://feeds.feedburner.com/newsyc50 http://feeds.feedburner.com/newsyc50 ). More info : http://jeffmiller.github.com/2010/07/23/a-cure-for-hacker-news-overload http://jeffmiller.github.com/2010/07/23/a-cure-for-hacker-ne...
jcfrei 16y ago
To me HN is like a huge and perfect filter - picking out all the interesting tech/science articles and showing only the really relevant 'general' news.
mcdowall 16y ago
I primarily read my news via Flipboard these days as I find a much more enjoyable experience, HN being one of the first tabs I visit, alongside BBC, Wired and Sky Sports.
ronnier 16y ago
My primary news sources are drudgereport.com for insider news and politics, HN for tech, twitter for various topics and interests, podcasts for news and ultimate issues, cnn.com for big breaking news, and news.google.com for a general overview of the news. It used to be reddit, but due to the hateful nature of the site, I had to stop reading it.
- m_myers 16y ago
  I can't stomach the level of discourse on /r/worldnews or /r/politics. I'm too young for my blood pressure to spike like that.
s810 16y ago
I think meta-aggregates such as popurls or googlenews should qualify as a 3rd option. It seems to me that both yes and no would apply if one frequently views the headlines of hackernews(et al.) through such an aggregate but rarely clicks on the stories.
JusticeJones 16y ago
Personally I don't think social bookmarking websites should be used for anything but entertainment. Because we only upvote things we want to see, so if submitted content is hugely important but rubs us the wrong way it wont get any traction.
Flemlord 16y ago
http://memeorandum.com/ http://memeorandum.com/
igravious 16y ago
Not really? For general tech? Sure. For open source? It's hard to beat the in-depth coverage of http://lwn.net http://lwn.net and http://www.groklaw.net http://www.groklaw.net I have become increasingly disappointed with Wired over the last few years, it has gotten to the point where I deliberately avoid them even though they have soem great writers. I'm from Ireland but not living there at the moment so my go to source for quality reportage of all things Oirish is http://www.irishtimes.com http://www.irishtimes.com I like to dip into The Economist for geopolitical stuff but it's surprising how many of the stories that would interest me from The Economist hit the main page of HN anyway. I have been on /. for many many years - I have a 5 digit UID :) - but I stopped going there religiously a number of years ago. Having said that, I have returned there more and more often recently as I have noticed an unusual amount of group-think on HN when it comes to certain matters and that kind of irks me. I go to to http://counterpunch.org/ http://counterpunch.org/ to counterbalance the establishment reporting of the traditional mass media. This because I find that my political, social and economic views (which I know to be held by most of my peers) are underreported and underrepresented by the corporate media. There are other niche sites that I visit but these are particular to my tastes. There are a couple of blogs I follow on RSS because I like the author's style and voice, these are all political, philosophical or literary in nature.
jamii 16y ago
Al Jazeera and BBC World for breaking news. Global Voices for more in-depth articles ( http://globalvoicesonline.org/ http://globalvoicesonline.org/ ).
igorgue 16y ago
I think HN is #2 after all the individual sources I got in my Google Reader; HN is great to find new sources though.
10smom 16y ago
now it is that I figured out how to use it after 3 months of DH!
miguelrios 16y ago
For me it is a mix os HN, Reddit and Techmeme, all consumed either from Twitter (any time) or from the occasional browsing (three - four times a day).
moge 16y ago
No, it IS my primary source for tech/startup/entrepreneur news but not 'general news'.
kefeizhou 16y ago
I follow about a dozen news sources. HN is my favorite, mostly because I've been able to discover other interesting new sources/blogs (many of which I now follow on my RSS reader).
code_duck 16y ago
Hmm. I'd not really thought of this, but yes, it is. I visit mainstream general news sites (Google, NYT, etc), Reddit, tech news sites, and others, but this is consistently the source of the highest quality information. The comments are news, too. If something happens and it's important, it WILL be on HN.
dpcan 16y ago
Yes and No. I come here first, but I'm on Reddit as much. Never comment at Reddit though. Digg is toast. Google News is just "news" so I don't really bother, and I've completely dumped all RSS readers. I'm not going to "self filter" blogs when I can come to HN or Reddit and see what people have already "socially filtered" as the best stories for me :)
steauengeglase 16y ago
What is this "general news" you speak of? Between the hundreds of bookmarks on tech related articles, piles of RSS feeds, stacks of programming books around me, constant work and a single blog for local news on the state legislature, I can't remember when I last had time for "general news". Maybe Bush's 6th or 7th year in office? Back then I'd spend at least an hour on NYT. Now with the work load of two others I just don't have the time. As far as HN's format, more "hacker" articles would be nice. I enjoy when my jaw drops at the thought of interesting or clever solution to a problem.
dillon 16y ago
Since HN has strict rules on behavior I think that's one reason why it makes this site so appeasing to readers. This site is mainly factual with the sharing of opinions that creates a setting filled with lush information.
chrisaycock 16y ago
I'd say I use Google Reader more than HN since I have to read niche technical publications for what I do, like HPCwire, InsideHPC, The Register (for their enterprise coverage), plus a few finance newspapers.
fecklessyouth 16y ago
I just came here from Reddit, but HuffPo is still my main news source. Most of what I've seen here (and can understand, since I don't have a programming bg) are "make you think" stories, and not a lot of news. Which is completely fine.
mmaunder 16y ago
Love the odd article on economics that appears.
anonymoushn 16y ago
No, I primarily use 4chan.org/new/. HN is relevant to me because I live in SF and work at a startup, but I'm more interested in politics and world events than tech news.
Smirnoff 16y ago
HN is one of the three: 1. Tech Crunch 2. Hacker News 3. Tech Meme
blacksmythe 16y ago
Yes
bballbackus 16y ago
My main sources of news are: 1) HN for news about technology, startups, and some programming 2) Reddit mainly for entertainment now, maybe a tiny bit of news, psychology articles 3) New Yorker for interesting articles about topics I would never think of learning about. 4) Economist to get a good idea of all important things going on in the world (I don't read them cover to cover, more just skim. Reading a full issue would take almost a day of my time). 5) Ny Times and WSJ rss, mainly just read the headlines and read occasional articles if they catch my eye
stanmancan 16y ago
I would hate for HN to become a "General News" site. There are plenty of places I can go to get "General News". I come to HN because it provides the exact type of articles I believe we all come here to find. This is the only site I check multiple times per day, and it's because I know there's no messing around. Quite often I'll read, or at least skim, 80% of the articles on the front page. Let Digg do it's own thing. HN is a niche news site for a niche group.
linker3000 16y ago
I dip in to HN regularly because some interesting articles pop up, but I find the site design to be soulless and depressing.
Swannie 16y ago
HN is my only "news" source. I wouldn't call most of it news though.
bdwalter 16y ago
I find it very interesting that I always find articles on slashdot 3 days after I read them on HN. HN always seems to be super fresh.
novocaine 16y ago
I read the Guardian as a primary news source as I have a great interest in world politics and it's the best source - their wikileaks coverage was pretty exceptional. nyt is ok but I find the layout too busy and there's rather a lot of obscure American politics that I don't care about.
MrFlibble 16y ago
Reddit.
JimmyL 16y ago
I figure my morning routine (when the goal is to get as up-to-speed as I need to be about the world in the most efficient way possible) is the best indicator. When I wake up every morning, I consult the following: 1. My BlackBerry, for several emails that come every morning with tailored news about what's going on in my field. 2. Google News 3. A number of Canada-specific news aggregators 4. The Toronto Star (I don't live in Toronto any more, but I still have some fondness for the paper) 5. HN 6. Twitter So by that count, I'd say the answer is No. I consider HN to be my go-to source for interesting technology-related stories, but not necessarily for current news.
IgorPartola 16y ago
It is kind of scary actually. I only read HN and a few blogs. I also don't listen to local radio or etch TV so if a natural disaster happened where I live or work I wouldn't know.
Concours 16y ago
1- http://www.mcsquare.me http://www.mcsquare.me 2- Hacker news
pinchyfingers 16y ago
No Agenda
mda 16y ago
Yes, HN is the main source where you can read sane comments about technology. Google news and Techmeme are ok. Techcrunch went down so quickly with its technologically challenged authors, bad site design, mindless comments from fanboys, astroturfers etc.
hardaway 16y ago
Twitter still is.

112 points by jaxn 16y ago

Reading the thread on whether or not HN should be a "general news" site I can't help but wonder if that opinion is affected by whether or not HN is your primary news source.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

instakill 16y ago

Nope, it's one of many, although it is one of the most sticky ones.

blhack 16y ago

HN gives me the news that I care about. Lots of tech, some science, and only a tiny, tiny bit of world events. This mix means that only really good science articles make it through, and only really really good worldnews articles make it through. I usually wake up every morning and check HN to make sure that the world isn't ending. If North Korea launches a nuke at South Korea, despite it not being technology news, I'd bet that it makes it to the top of HN within a few minutes. Recently I also started using an RSS reader that I wrote a while ago (I wrote it, then pretty much forgot about it): http://newsyndicated.com/a/reader http://newsyndicated.com/a/reader it aggregates my favorite feeds (including HN, which is how i found this thread to begin with), and also allows me to submit directly to HN.

jseliger 16y ago
and only a tiny, tiny bit of world events. I don't think articles about world events are bad -- but the way they're done in most of the media is: country x is doing y to country z. Who cares? Standard international bickering is just that: standard. Relatively few articles go beyond surface phenomena to figure out what's really going on, and those are the ones of interest that, as you point out, will sometimes get voted up on HN.
- kunley 16y ago
  Those standard events you mentioned are not making their way here. And believe me, North Korean excesses are pretty non-standard.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

zdw 16y ago

I do subscribe to other RSS feeds, but looking at netnewswire's "Attention" feed report, I do visit HN linked sites more than any other. I think this is a function of how practically useful the information is to me personally. Conventional news tells me about a lot of things I can't do anything about - I'm pretty much a passive observer. I mean, in terms of politics I get to vote once every year or two? And anything macroeconomic is far outside my control, but might inform me slightly of where people may spend money in the next year or two. Contrast that with tech news and what gets posted on HN - it's stuff I can either pick up and use (new languages/concepts/scripts/etc.) or that people will actually go to me for advice on. I can take an active roll and have give and take - there are opportunities for interaction there that are manageable.

bretpiatt 16y ago

I answered yes but I probably read about the same number of articles linked on Twitter but I don't "go to Twitter" for news. I've stopped using a RSS reader, Twitter does a better job of curating the content I want.

Infomus 16y ago

1.HN 2./r/worldnews 3./r/politics 4...More Reddit. 5.Twitter

aeurielesn 16y ago
I migrated from un-official feeds of HN on Twitter to here. It is better anyways because you can see the discussion behind it.

jeromec 16y ago

HN is my main source for "my kind" of news. Google News is my main source for mainstream news. (BBC gets in there sometimes for more of a world/different from U.S. perspective)

_Lemon_ 16y ago

I keep telling myself that I need to explore "real" news sites like the BBC or Guardian (or...), but never quite get there. I primarily stick to Slashdot and HN but know full well that the views in the comments of the two sites can sometimes be very detached/different from the rest of society. While this isn't necessarily a bad thing, it is something to be careful of and I'd hate to find the day all of my own opinions fit a site perfectly.

mmt 16y ago

I answered "Yes," but only in a convoluted reading of the question. Most accurately, HN is the only online service I use that is mainly a source of news. Put another way, I come here for the information and discussion, and it just happens to be a news site[1]. Before HN, I went nowhere (online or offline) explicitly to obtain news. After HN, I expect I will, again, simply do without. [1] Which suits it well, IMO. I always flag old/repeat articles.

jerf 16y ago

As much as I enjoy HN, no, it is only one small part of my news consumption in a number of fields, which primarily comes in the form of RSS feeds. Currently I use Google Reader but I've used all kinds of readers. Since I prefer the Dave Winer-style "stream of news" approach I can trivially change readers since I don't generate a backlog. I've used "stream of news" since it was, well, the only choice since there was only one RSS generator and consumer and that's what it used.

parenthesis 16y ago

For `tech' news, yes. For `news' news, the BBC (Radio 4 and http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/).

nailer 16y ago
Well since we're discussing non-tech news - bees, wikileaks, and the TSA - that'd be a no to the poll.

dotcoma 16y ago

HN and reddit.

hendler 16y ago

Answered no - HN, Twitter, and Yahoo News

lhnn 16y ago

-Slashdot -HN -Drudge Report/Google News -WSJ (Highest quality, but I like having the paper, which has eluded me recently)

shortlived 16y ago
I replaced slashdot with alterslash a long time ago...
- wyclif 16y ago
  Me too. It has just the right threshold.

adestefan 16y ago

It's my primary source of tech news. I use Google Reader and still gave a fair number of feeds, but I use HN via the main page. I used to read a lot of Reddit, but everything is too political there. I got sick of seeing 50 wikileak stories make it to the top of every sub-reddit.

ROFISH 16y ago

I like HN has the heavily tech articles float up. General news should really belong to Reddit.

CapitalistCartr 16y ago

Fark comes first.

Indyan 16y ago

It is one of my many sources. If I had to pick one service that I depend upon a lot, I would have to pick TechMeme. But, HN is often faster than TM.

sjs 16y ago

HN, reddit, Ars Technica, and several tech websites such as AnandTech and Guru3D. World news and traditional media are just depressing. I got jaded at a young age and tend not to follow it (for better and for worse).

jawee 16y ago

Hacker News is the only thing I am guaranteed to read every day. I will occasionally click over to Google News if I wish to know what is going on in the world or Slashdot if I need something else to look at. But Hacker News usually satisfies me in knowing what is most important to me in the world, which has the same basic tech emphasis as here; the other content that shows up from time-to-time usually matches what I wish to read about fairly well.

andrerobot 16y ago

Something Awful is my main news source. Being serious, Hacker News shouldn't try to be a general news site "for hackers" because believing a hacker prototype exists is absurd.

xd 16y ago

I had an RSS aggregator with around a dozen popular news sources like slashdot, digg, reddit etc but I've found that 99.99% of the interesting stories pop up on HN pretty quickly. So I gave up on news RSS feeds and just have a tab with HN and a tab with a netvibes account with actual blog feeds from the likes of the eevblog, ben heck show, adafruit industries, hack a day etc.. stuff with unique content being added which I was interested in but won't hit HN every time they posted something.

ajdecon 16y ago

I'd call it my primary professional news source, along with Twitter. HN gives me a lot of useful information about trends in the startup world, in (mostly web) technology, and so on. And it's interesting seeing what people here think about the world news that makes it through. But my real primary news source is probably my RSS reader. There's a LOT of news out there that I care about which doesn't make it onto HN. A lot of national and world news doesn't make it here, and I like being generally informed about what's going on. I also keep up with local news, and the current events in various scientific subfields which are relevant to my interests, but not the web startup crowd here.

ConceptDog 16y ago

Supplemented with Reddit. Search engines are great for answers. Reddit and HN are great for questions I didn't think of.

fluorescentLAMP 16y ago
Yeah, I feel that proggit has really gone downhill. I still enjoy a handful of other specific /r/ s thou - like soccer and boston.
- omaranto 16y ago
  I can't believe I never thought to check if there was a Boston subreddit, thanks for mentioning it!
  - fluorescentLAMP 16y ago
    It is a little slow, but sometimes there is good stuff on there.
- shortlived 16y ago
  try /r/coding or search out more specific subreddits.

savoy11 16y ago

It was, but lately it is not. News are constantly repeating and the target group is the "I do not have money, but I want to do something" group, which is largely dissatisfying as far as opinions go. I mostly tend to avoid HN nowadays.

marklabedz 16y ago

HN is where I go to find good discussion about topics in which I'm interested. For general news, the BBC still tops my list.

mikeryan 16y ago

I really want an "I don't have a primary source of news" choice. I use a variety of sources and can't really pick favorites, I use HN for hacking, reddit for fun, sfgate.com for local news and sports, NYTimes for more metro news etc.

jaxn 16y ago
I didn't want to complicate the poll. If HN is not your primary source of news, then it is a "no". If you don't have a "primary" source, then it is a "no".

chanux 16y ago

HN gives me `what matters`. No much time for anything else after finishing daily dose of HN. When I really got nothing else to do, Reddit.

petercooper 16y ago
If it's really a daily dose, the HN front page provides a mere subset of "what matters." There's so much good stuff that never makes it out of /new or that flies off the front page within a few hours.. I tend to treat news sources like rivers that I dip into - I'm always going to miss something. But it's always a little depressing when I skim a few hours back with something like HackerSlide and see what great stuff I "missed" while sleeping, etc.
- eneveu 16y ago
  I had the same problem. Solved it a few months ago by using one of Jeff Miller's HN RSS feeds ( http://feeds.feedburner.com/newsyc50 http://feeds.feedburner.com/newsyc50 ). More info : http://jeffmiller.github.com/2010/07/23/a-cure-for-hacker-news-overload http://jeffmiller.github.com/2010/07/23/a-cure-for-hacker-ne...

jcfrei 16y ago

To me HN is like a huge and perfect filter - picking out all the interesting tech/science articles and showing only the really relevant 'general' news.

mcdowall 16y ago

I primarily read my news via Flipboard these days as I find a much more enjoyable experience, HN being one of the first tabs I visit, alongside BBC, Wired and Sky Sports.

ronnier 16y ago

My primary news sources are drudgereport.com for insider news and politics, HN for tech, twitter for various topics and interests, podcasts for news and ultimate issues, cnn.com for big breaking news, and news.google.com for a general overview of the news. It used to be reddit, but due to the hateful nature of the site, I had to stop reading it.

m_myers 16y ago
I can't stomach the level of discourse on /r/worldnews or /r/politics. I'm too young for my blood pressure to spike like that.

s810 16y ago

I think meta-aggregates such as popurls or googlenews should qualify as a 3rd option. It seems to me that both yes and no would apply if one frequently views the headlines of hackernews(et al.) through such an aggregate but rarely clicks on the stories.

JusticeJones 16y ago

Personally I don't think social bookmarking websites should be used for anything but entertainment. Because we only upvote things we want to see, so if submitted content is hugely important but rubs us the wrong way it wont get any traction.

Flemlord 16y ago

http://memeorandum.com/ http://memeorandum.com/

igravious 16y ago

Not really? For general tech? Sure. For open source? It's hard to beat the in-depth coverage of http://lwn.net http://lwn.net and http://www.groklaw.net http://www.groklaw.net I have become increasingly disappointed with Wired over the last few years, it has gotten to the point where I deliberately avoid them even though they have soem great writers. I'm from Ireland but not living there at the moment so my go to source for quality reportage of all things Oirish is http://www.irishtimes.com http://www.irishtimes.com I like to dip into The Economist for geopolitical stuff but it's surprising how many of the stories that would interest me from The Economist hit the main page of HN anyway. I have been on /. for many many years - I have a 5 digit UID :) - but I stopped going there religiously a number of years ago. Having said that, I have returned there more and more often recently as I have noticed an unusual amount of group-think on HN when it comes to certain matters and that kind of irks me. I go to to http://counterpunch.org/ http://counterpunch.org/ to counterbalance the establishment reporting of the traditional mass media. This because I find that my political, social and economic views (which I know to be held by most of my peers) are underreported and underrepresented by the corporate media. There are other niche sites that I visit but these are particular to my tastes. There are a couple of blogs I follow on RSS because I like the author's style and voice, these are all political, philosophical or literary in nature.

jamii 16y ago

Al Jazeera and BBC World for breaking news. Global Voices for more in-depth articles ( http://globalvoicesonline.org/ http://globalvoicesonline.org/ ).

igorgue 16y ago

I think HN is #2 after all the individual sources I got in my Google Reader; HN is great to find new sources though.

10smom 16y ago

now it is that I figured out how to use it after 3 months of DH!

miguelrios 16y ago

For me it is a mix os HN, Reddit and Techmeme, all consumed either from Twitter (any time) or from the occasional browsing (three - four times a day).

moge 16y ago

No, it IS my primary source for tech/startup/entrepreneur news but not 'general news'.

kefeizhou 16y ago

I follow about a dozen news sources. HN is my favorite, mostly because I've been able to discover other interesting new sources/blogs (many of which I now follow on my RSS reader).

code_duck 16y ago

Hmm. I'd not really thought of this, but yes, it is. I visit mainstream general news sites (Google, NYT, etc), Reddit, tech news sites, and others, but this is consistently the source of the highest quality information. The comments are news, too. If something happens and it's important, it WILL be on HN.

dpcan 16y ago

Yes and No. I come here first, but I'm on Reddit as much. Never comment at Reddit though. Digg is toast. Google News is just "news" so I don't really bother, and I've completely dumped all RSS readers. I'm not going to "self filter" blogs when I can come to HN or Reddit and see what people have already "socially filtered" as the best stories for me :)

steauengeglase 16y ago

What is this "general news" you speak of? Between the hundreds of bookmarks on tech related articles, piles of RSS feeds, stacks of programming books around me, constant work and a single blog for local news on the state legislature, I can't remember when I last had time for "general news". Maybe Bush's 6th or 7th year in office? Back then I'd spend at least an hour on NYT. Now with the work load of two others I just don't have the time. As far as HN's format, more "hacker" articles would be nice. I enjoy when my jaw drops at the thought of interesting or clever solution to a problem.

dillon 16y ago

Since HN has strict rules on behavior I think that's one reason why it makes this site so appeasing to readers. This site is mainly factual with the sharing of opinions that creates a setting filled with lush information.

chrisaycock 16y ago

I'd say I use Google Reader more than HN since I have to read niche technical publications for what I do, like HPCwire, InsideHPC, The Register (for their enterprise coverage), plus a few finance newspapers.

fecklessyouth 16y ago

I just came here from Reddit, but HuffPo is still my main news source. Most of what I've seen here (and can understand, since I don't have a programming bg) are "make you think" stories, and not a lot of news. Which is completely fine.

mmaunder 16y ago

Love the odd article on economics that appears.

anonymoushn 16y ago

No, I primarily use 4chan.org/new/. HN is relevant to me because I live in SF and work at a startup, but I'm more interested in politics and world events than tech news.

Smirnoff 16y ago

HN is one of the three: 1. Tech Crunch 2. Hacker News 3. Tech Meme

blacksmythe 16y ago

Yes

bballbackus 16y ago

My main sources of news are: 1) HN for news about technology, startups, and some programming 2) Reddit mainly for entertainment now, maybe a tiny bit of news, psychology articles 3) New Yorker for interesting articles about topics I would never think of learning about. 4) Economist to get a good idea of all important things going on in the world (I don't read them cover to cover, more just skim. Reading a full issue would take almost a day of my time). 5) Ny Times and WSJ rss, mainly just read the headlines and read occasional articles if they catch my eye

stanmancan 16y ago

I would hate for HN to become a "General News" site. There are plenty of places I can go to get "General News". I come to HN because it provides the exact type of articles I believe we all come here to find. This is the only site I check multiple times per day, and it's because I know there's no messing around. Quite often I'll read, or at least skim, 80% of the articles on the front page. Let Digg do it's own thing. HN is a niche news site for a niche group.

linker3000 16y ago

I dip in to HN regularly because some interesting articles pop up, but I find the site design to be soulless and depressing.

Swannie 16y ago

HN is my only "news" source. I wouldn't call most of it news though.

bdwalter 16y ago

I find it very interesting that I always find articles on slashdot 3 days after I read them on HN. HN always seems to be super fresh.

novocaine 16y ago

I read the Guardian as a primary news source as I have a great interest in world politics and it's the best source - their wikileaks coverage was pretty exceptional. nyt is ok but I find the layout too busy and there's rather a lot of obscure American politics that I don't care about.

MrFlibble 16y ago

Reddit.

JimmyL 16y ago

I figure my morning routine (when the goal is to get as up-to-speed as I need to be about the world in the most efficient way possible) is the best indicator. When I wake up every morning, I consult the following: 1. My BlackBerry, for several emails that come every morning with tailored news about what's going on in my field. 2. Google News 3. A number of Canada-specific news aggregators 4. The Toronto Star (I don't live in Toronto any more, but I still have some fondness for the paper) 5. HN 6. Twitter So by that count, I'd say the answer is No. I consider HN to be my go-to source for interesting technology-related stories, but not necessarily for current news.

IgorPartola 16y ago

It is kind of scary actually. I only read HN and a few blogs. I also don't listen to local radio or etch TV so if a natural disaster happened where I live or work I wouldn't know.

Concours 16y ago

1- http://www.mcsquare.me http://www.mcsquare.me 2- Hacker news

pinchyfingers 16y ago

No Agenda

mda 16y ago

Yes, HN is the main source where you can read sane comments about technology. Google news and Techmeme are ok. Techcrunch went down so quickly with its technologically challenged authors, bad site design, mindless comments from fanboys, astroturfers etc.

hardaway 16y ago

Twitter still is.