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Then I might suggest subscribing to the New York Times. Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed?

by wheels 18y ago

deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
rms 18y ago
>Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed? The Hacker News RSS feed is in the same place it has always been.
- wheels 18y ago
  Uhm, the point was that this isn't hacker news.
  - rms 18y ago
    I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News for you. The main Hacker News page is never going to be 30 perfect stories for every single hacker in the world because it isn't a customized page so it can't be perfectly individualized. Hackers like different stories. More than 50 people liked this. Hacking doesn't have to be in python. The hacking Mr. Mortenson is doing is incredibly noble. Why do you find this story to be so objectionable? From the guidelines: >Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
    - davidw 18y ago
      > I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News for you If it gets bad enough, then eventually people will start moving on to something better, that is actually about hacker news, and not the political article du jour. This article and discussion were both extremely off topic. And it's not just any off topic, it's politics, which brings out the lowest common denominator in most forums it's introduced in. I mean, how can people vote up stuff like "The system we are part of is not the best. In fact it is arguably the worst system since the caveman era." ? Apologies to rokhayakebe, but that's not serious, interesting discussion, it's hyperbole typical of thousands of other internet forums. I would prefer to try and keep HN from becoming just like all those other forums, although perhaps it's a vain hope.
      - rms 18y ago
        Well... we've had this discussion before, but my attitude is that politics and economics will show up here because they don't violate the guidelines and I think it's great. You think that having articles about economics and politics (which do indeed generate conversation of lower quality than the rest of the site) will inevitably pollute the rest of the site and drive away users. Right now economics and politics stories are a small percentage of stories here and I find the negative response rather annoying. If they get to be too much, PG can change the guidelines or the voting mechanism. I'll agree that the discussion in this thread is rather mediocre and is evidence of the phenomenon you are concerned about. But I've seen great discussions about politics and economics here and I like hearing it from the perspective of the users here. I've learned things and I just don't understand why you think we'll be better off not learning about these issues from each other. It reminds me too much of a generic rule for pleasant banal conversation, "don't talk about religion or politics." We disagree about whether such discussion about things we are less knowledgeable is inevitably bad for the site. Ultimately the answer is unknown and I would like to see the limit pushed as far as possible to make the test of not degenerating into the lowest common denominator harder. I think it can be done, though downvoting stories may have to be enabled eventually.
        davidw 18y ago
        My feeling is that over the past few weeks, there has been a small but significant rise in 'bad' stories. Stuff like this is getting voted up: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247404 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247404
        rms 18y ago
        Yeah, that's pretty bad...
      - edw519 18y ago
        I agree with you, davidw. Except we're beginning to have a new problem here at hn. The only thing worse than threads about politics, religion, drugs, or popular culture are the comments about how they're not "hacker news". We're starting to sound like a committee that gets together and spends most of our time writing the agenda.
deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
rokhayakebe 18y ago
Wheels, HN readers are primarily problem solvers. The only thing that separate us from other problems solvers is that we do not mostly using software. If you cannot see the relation between this problem and how software can help solve it, then I suggest you look again. Even a self-centered hacker could see opportunity here. In all fairness you have submitted 4 articles in the last 70 days i do not know how much that says about the "HN for the rest of us". If you want to see less articles as this one make it to the top, then be my guest and SUBMIT.

Then I might suggest subscribing to the New York Times. Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed?

by wheels 18y ago

Then I might suggest subscribing to the New York Times. Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed?

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

rms 18y ago

>Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed? The Hacker News RSS feed is in the same place it has always been.

wheels 18y ago
Uhm, the point was that this isn't hacker news.
- rms 18y ago
  I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News for you. The main Hacker News page is never going to be 30 perfect stories for every single hacker in the world because it isn't a customized page so it can't be perfectly individualized. Hackers like different stories. More than 50 people liked this. Hacking doesn't have to be in python. The hacking Mr. Mortenson is doing is incredibly noble. Why do you find this story to be so objectionable? From the guidelines: >Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
  - davidw 18y ago
    > I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News for you If it gets bad enough, then eventually people will start moving on to something better, that is actually about hacker news, and not the political article du jour. This article and discussion were both extremely off topic. And it's not just any off topic, it's politics, which brings out the lowest common denominator in most forums it's introduced in. I mean, how can people vote up stuff like "The system we are part of is not the best. In fact it is arguably the worst system since the caveman era." ? Apologies to rokhayakebe, but that's not serious, interesting discussion, it's hyperbole typical of thousands of other internet forums. I would prefer to try and keep HN from becoming just like all those other forums, although perhaps it's a vain hope.
    - rms 18y ago
      Well... we've had this discussion before, but my attitude is that politics and economics will show up here because they don't violate the guidelines and I think it's great. You think that having articles about economics and politics (which do indeed generate conversation of lower quality than the rest of the site) will inevitably pollute the rest of the site and drive away users. Right now economics and politics stories are a small percentage of stories here and I find the negative response rather annoying. If they get to be too much, PG can change the guidelines or the voting mechanism. I'll agree that the discussion in this thread is rather mediocre and is evidence of the phenomenon you are concerned about. But I've seen great discussions about politics and economics here and I like hearing it from the perspective of the users here. I've learned things and I just don't understand why you think we'll be better off not learning about these issues from each other. It reminds me too much of a generic rule for pleasant banal conversation, "don't talk about religion or politics." We disagree about whether such discussion about things we are less knowledgeable is inevitably bad for the site. Ultimately the answer is unknown and I would like to see the limit pushed as far as possible to make the test of not degenerating into the lowest common denominator harder. I think it can be done, though downvoting stories may have to be enabled eventually.
      - davidw 18y ago
        My feeling is that over the past few weeks, there has been a small but significant rise in 'bad' stories. Stuff like this is getting voted up: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247404 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247404
        rms 18y ago
        Yeah, that's pretty bad...
    - edw519 18y ago
      I agree with you, davidw. Except we're beginning to have a new problem here at hn. The only thing worse than threads about politics, religion, drugs, or popular culture are the comments about how they're not "hacker news". We're starting to sound like a committee that gets together and spends most of our time writing the agenda.

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

rokhayakebe 18y ago

Wheels, HN readers are primarily problem solvers. The only thing that separate us from other problems solvers is that we do not mostly using software. If you cannot see the relation between this problem and how software can help solve it, then I suggest you look again. Even a self-centered hacker could see opportunity here. In all fairness you have submitted 4 articles in the last 70 days i do not know how much that says about the "HN for the rest of us". If you want to see less articles as this one make it to the top, then be my guest and SUBMIT.