4 ms·

I used to submit more years ago, but it got ridiculous to get votes. I suspect there must be a LOT of brigading to get posts out of the /newest cesspool.

by alecco 7y ago

test1235 7y ago
The internet feels very hostile nowadays - it seems like there's no end of people ready to take any comment out of context, and misconstrue to start an argument.
- dang 7y ago
  HN's guidelines are designed to dampen that. Example: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." Of course the existence of guidelines does not imply the existence of guideline-following. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
sixothree 7y ago
I have posted three Healthcare IT related posts, none of which received more than 2 points. So yeah. I'm done.
- dang 7y ago
  I took a look and saw two: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20422094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20422094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18363410 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18363410 Those are both a bit too bureaucratic to be what the HN community finds intellectually interesting. There are a lot of submissions like this, often from trade journals, and they rarely do well because they lack motivation for a non-specialist audience to find them interesting. Usually there needs to be something tasty to entice the reader in, some hope of curiosity being satisfied. You can sometimes help with that by posting an initial comment in the thread explaining why you personally found an article interesting, especially if there's something non-obvious about it.
  - sixothree 7y ago
    I appreciate the feedback. I feel like there is a healthcare revolution taking place that most people have no clue about, especially in terms of interoperability. I am constantly amazed at how few tech workers have any knowledge of FHIR and related technologies, especially considering the opportunities they provide to startups. Also another one of my links includes Direct which is a healthcare technology that provides secure communication for clinicians that uses identity vetting to ensure the recipient is who they say they are. I wish it had wider adoption.
    - dang 7y ago
      It's a communication problem. The way those articles are written simply doesn't communicate what's new or of interest there—at least not in a style that HN readers are likely to be open to. What might work better is writing a blog-style article about each of these: what's new, what's different, why it matters—and then linking to some of these other more enterprisey or bureaucratic sources. If you decide to work on that, or know someone who is, feel free to contact hn@ycombinator.com because we might be able to give some tips about how to structure it for HN appeal. "New opportunities for startups in healthcare" is definitely a theme with a lot of HN juice, if presented the right way. "A healthcare revolution is taking place" is another. One thing that would help is if the voice presenting this material comes from someone the community perceives as a peer—not necessarily an HN member but someone who could be. When first impressions suggest something dry and managerial, it gets pattern-matched into the same category as rote bureaucratic or industry sources, and people quickly close the tab.
dang 7y ago
I've looked closely at this data for years, and I don't think so. What there's a lot of is randomness. It's of course possible that some people are clever enough that we don't even know what they're getting away with. But I can tell you that HN's anti-voting-ring software catches a great many cases. So many, in fact, that we'll often go through that list and remove the penalty on particularly good submissions, because sometimes people were clueless about trying to promote otherwise good content. Edit: the other thing is that we regularly get independent confirmations that the anti-voting-ring software works...so at least it's not totally off.
gigama 7y ago
I just try to post things I find interesting and that maybe others would too. And not worry about votes... mainly because as "dang" indicates (in comments above) most hn readers aren't logged in and therefore aren't voting anyway. Never heard the term "brigading" before... but yeah I see that behavior elsewhere a lot... the regulars who echo-chamber each other. People who choose to spend their time doing that are, I think, just wasting their time. Since I am skeptical by default a cacophony of voices doesn't convince me of anything other than there's a mob afoot. Share what you find interesting and let the curiosity and comments fall where they may.

I used to submit more years ago, but it got ridiculous to get votes. I suspect there must be a LOT of brigading to get posts out of the /newest cesspool.

by alecco 7y ago

I used to submit more years ago, but it got ridiculous to get votes. I suspect there must be a LOT of brigading to get posts out of the /newest cesspool.

test1235 7y ago

The internet feels very hostile nowadays - it seems like there's no end of people ready to take any comment out of context, and misconstrue to start an argument.

dang 7y ago
HN's guidelines are designed to dampen that. Example: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." Of course the existence of guidelines does not imply the existence of guideline-following. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

sixothree 7y ago

I have posted three Healthcare IT related posts, none of which received more than 2 points. So yeah. I'm done.

dang 7y ago
I took a look and saw two: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20422094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20422094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18363410 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18363410 Those are both a bit too bureaucratic to be what the HN community finds intellectually interesting. There are a lot of submissions like this, often from trade journals, and they rarely do well because they lack motivation for a non-specialist audience to find them interesting. Usually there needs to be something tasty to entice the reader in, some hope of curiosity being satisfied. You can sometimes help with that by posting an initial comment in the thread explaining why you personally found an article interesting, especially if there's something non-obvious about it.
- sixothree 7y ago
  I appreciate the feedback. I feel like there is a healthcare revolution taking place that most people have no clue about, especially in terms of interoperability. I am constantly amazed at how few tech workers have any knowledge of FHIR and related technologies, especially considering the opportunities they provide to startups. Also another one of my links includes Direct which is a healthcare technology that provides secure communication for clinicians that uses identity vetting to ensure the recipient is who they say they are. I wish it had wider adoption.
  - dang 7y ago
    It's a communication problem. The way those articles are written simply doesn't communicate what's new or of interest there—at least not in a style that HN readers are likely to be open to. What might work better is writing a blog-style article about each of these: what's new, what's different, why it matters—and then linking to some of these other more enterprisey or bureaucratic sources. If you decide to work on that, or know someone who is, feel free to contact hn@ycombinator.com because we might be able to give some tips about how to structure it for HN appeal. "New opportunities for startups in healthcare" is definitely a theme with a lot of HN juice, if presented the right way. "A healthcare revolution is taking place" is another. One thing that would help is if the voice presenting this material comes from someone the community perceives as a peer—not necessarily an HN member but someone who could be. When first impressions suggest something dry and managerial, it gets pattern-matched into the same category as rote bureaucratic or industry sources, and people quickly close the tab.

dang 7y ago

I've looked closely at this data for years, and I don't think so. What there's a lot of is randomness. It's of course possible that some people are clever enough that we don't even know what they're getting away with. But I can tell you that HN's anti-voting-ring software catches a great many cases. So many, in fact, that we'll often go through that list and remove the penalty on particularly good submissions, because sometimes people were clueless about trying to promote otherwise good content. Edit: the other thing is that we regularly get independent confirmations that the anti-voting-ring software works...so at least it's not totally off.

gigama 7y ago

I just try to post things I find interesting and that maybe others would too. And not worry about votes... mainly because as "dang" indicates (in comments above) most hn readers aren't logged in and therefore aren't voting anyway. Never heard the term "brigading" before... but yeah I see that behavior elsewhere a lot... the regulars who echo-chamber each other. People who choose to spend their time doing that are, I think, just wasting their time. Since I am skeptical by default a cacophony of voices doesn't convince me of anything other than there's a mob afoot. Share what you find interesting and let the curiosity and comments fall where they may.