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Fascinating! Just to keep the conversation going, I'll argue that HN's current format works much better for me. I appreciate newspaper formats when dozens of s

by GCA10 6y ago

Fascinating! Just to keep the conversation going, I'll argue that HN's current format works much better for me. I appreciate newspaper formats when dozens of stories have roughly equal appeal to me, and I get value out of lingering on each one for 5-30 seconds before moving on. HN, for me, is intensely bimodal. The bare-bones listing of headlines lets me skim very fast past the 93% that don't quite work for me -- and dive into the 7% that are today's gems. Those then deserve a close read and many minutes in the comments. So I'd be very frustrated if HN switched to newspaper mode. But everyone's tastes are different, and having both formats available would be cool.

tom_mellior 6y ago
Unfortunately many headlines stopped being informative with the rise of clickbait. One of HN's biggest problems is the headline-only format, as opposed to Slashdot for instance. I mostly choose what to click from an HN Twitter bot since Twitter shows short preview blurbs for many links. This is also a strength of the linked site compared to plain HN. As for the newspaper layout, yeah, that's a gimmick I don't need either.
smoe 6y ago
Well I think it also has a lot to do with, that, beyond a certain look & feel, this example has very little in common with a print news paper (or online outlet that use that style). In a traditional news paper absolutely everything is carefully curated. What stories go where, how much space they can take, whether they'll have an image, title setting guidlines, grouped by various things like topic, etc. For example the www.nytimes.com front page is very closely structured like a traditional print paper: The top stories (the main sellers from the kiosk age) of the moment are "above the fold", followed by a bit broader polical or societal pieces and the going into more and more softer content like fashion, cooking, travel. The latter topics are were generally the bulk of the advertisment money comes in. So I think a newspaper mode for sites like HN could work well. Not as a live view, but instead of say a weekly, curated edition of what has been relevant and interesting.

by GCA10 6y ago

tom_mellior 6y ago

Unfortunately many headlines stopped being informative with the rise of clickbait. One of HN's biggest problems is the headline-only format, as opposed to Slashdot for instance. I mostly choose what to click from an HN Twitter bot since Twitter shows short preview blurbs for many links. This is also a strength of the linked site compared to plain HN. As for the newspaper layout, yeah, that's a gimmick I don't need either.

smoe 6y ago

Well I think it also has a lot to do with, that, beyond a certain look & feel, this example has very little in common with a print news paper (or online outlet that use that style). In a traditional news paper absolutely everything is carefully curated. What stories go where, how much space they can take, whether they'll have an image, title setting guidlines, grouped by various things like topic, etc. For example the www.nytimes.com front page is very closely structured like a traditional print paper: The top stories (the main sellers from the kiosk age) of the moment are "above the fold", followed by a bit broader polical or societal pieces and the going into more and more softer content like fashion, cooking, travel. The latter topics are were generally the bulk of the advertisment money comes in. So I think a newspaper mode for sites like HN could work well. Not as a live view, but instead of say a weekly, curated edition of what has been relevant and interesting.