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As an Australian, I see most political HN discussion revolving around US interests. For the most part this is to be expected, but in the rare cases that other c

As an Australian, I see most political HN discussion revolving around US interests. For the most part this is to be expected, but in the rare cases that other country's politics enter HN (particularly new laws that affect tech), there seems to be a heavy bias toward comparison to the US's laws, so much so, that I think I understand more of the US laws than I do my own! Again, this is probably to be expected with the big tech companies largely residing in SV... But it sure does stand out when HN comments are made with the assumption that the fellow HN readership is US. Any time I've tried to highlight how this looks from the outside it's generally met with downvotes, to the point that I self censor comments that I otherwise feel could have enriched this global community. So, maybe there is the chance in your comments @dang to make a reminder that it serves a global community? It might help soften feelings of any comments that are heavily partisan.

stevekemp 6y ago
I've noticed the same thing and also react similarly. It also becomes apparent when talking about issues such as zoning, and housing. (Every time you hear talk about reassessing houses for taxes I get confused, because in the UK, and Finland, the two countries where I've lived and bought property, we don't have annual taxes that work like that.) Mostly I bite my tongue and keep quiet, though there have been a few Brexit-related posts over the past few years where I can sometimes be involved.
- grogenaut 6y ago
  Often even to those inside the us the zoning and housing get very SF/cali specific so I hear you
- bww 6y ago
  Isn’t zoning and housing inherently specific to the location of the housing or whatever is being zoned? It seems natural to discuss it with that frame of reference implied.
  - stevekemp 6y ago
    Absolutely, but even within the states I suspect that a lot of things relating to zoning, taxes, etc, vary. I hear people talk about "Proposition XXX" restricting "stuff", and I wonder if other Americans from different parts of the country would even know what that was.
    - driverdan 6y ago
      We don't. All of the "Proposition XXX" stuff is from California. It's pretty annoying when people post those things without an explanation, assuming everyone knows what CA is doing.
ehnto 6y ago
Fellow Australian, I even find myself wording things from the perspective that I am from the US by accident. I feel so part of the discourse thanks to technology and my line of work that I forget these aren't always my problems.
- dwd 6y ago
  Australian politics has been pretty boring of late. While not as polarising as a Jim Jordan or Ted Cruz, people like Christopher Pyne and Paul Keating made Australian politics mildly interesting. We seem to have two very centrist parties right now which is a welcome change.
  - flukus 6y ago
    Don't jinx it, I don't like the guy but I'm looking forward to an Australian prime minister lasting a full term in office. 2007-2016 aus politics was a blood sport, make politics boring again.
    - mikeyjk 6y ago
      I also wish for that as a west Aussie, but I can't help but feel with the climate crisis the way it is, we're going to have more and more pressures on top officials (the bush fire saga with Morrison comes to mind, that was an embarrassment).
      - dwd 6y ago
        Just don't count of The Greens putting any such pressure on them - you might as well rename them The Australian Woke as they seem more intent on just being politically correct on everything than actually focusing on environmental issues.
    - darkteflon 6y ago
      I was surprised to see Michael McCormack in charge this week. I always thought Morrison was acting PM? I’ll get my coat.
dang 6y ago
I point this out a lot [1]. The problem is the statelessness of the internet [2]. No matter how often you repeat something, the population that receives the message has measure zero. There's more international political battle on HN than you'd expect. There have been a lot of flamewars about Indian politics, pursued mostly by users in India or of Indian descent. And don't get me started on the internecine warfare of the Swedes [3]. It's true that a lot of misunderstandings on HN, often bitter ones, happen because readers assume other users are American when they're not. The site is a lot more international than people assume; only about half in the U.S., and a lot of those users are immigrants or expats. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20international&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20stateless&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... [3] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20internecine%20swed&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
- cmroanirgo 6y ago
  Thanks @dang, I recall seeing some of what you mention. One day you might care to write a book, but for now as others have pointed out, thanks for your delicate hand, you're a star amidst the darkness. You see everything :-)
  - dang 6y ago
    That's hilarious, but thanks!
    - ethbr0 6y ago
      Given the content is all ostensibly public, I'd put in a quick second for a blog post (or longer form) on "dang's informal observations from marinating in the raw stream of HN comments." To state the obvious, I don't think anyone spends as much time on HN as the moderation team, in the sense of reading comments widely. At least... I'd hope none of us dedicate that much time. (Btw, always thanks!)
russellbeattie 6y ago
As an American who has lived abroad, I honestly will never understand this attitude. I sympathize, but honestly if I went into a .com.au forum and complained because the people there were talking about Australian politics, I'd be ridiculed mercilessly. And for good reason. It's the same as if you complained that we're all writing in English, and you'd prefer that we didn't. Porque todos los articulos y comentarios estan en ingles?!? Debemos tener mas contenido en español! Es un comunidad global, no?! La gente aqui asuma que todos los lectores son anglos? Es un barbaridad! Oh, wait. No it isn't. HN is an American website hosted on American servers catering to Americans and there is NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. You're insinuating there is and requesting the mods act accordingly. I disagree. Seriously, I don't speak for the mods, but I don't recall it being stated anywhere that HN "serves the global community". In fact I just double checked the FAQ. It doesn't. HN has mostly been a site meant to cater to Silicon Valley tech startups for as long as I've been using it. Let me know when ycombinator.com.au is up and running and we'll join you there and not talk about American laws. Until then...
- Tomte 6y ago
  Nobody asks you not to talk about American laws. We outsiders love to do that. Many of us know American criminal law better than our own, just because of television shows and lack of experience with criminal law in our real lives. And incidentally, the FAQ don't mention the United States, either. But what's really obvious on this site is that many Americans cannot discuss other choices. I theorize it is because America is so big and powerful and there isn't a visible friendly society with different cultural views in the neighborhood that matters. Large societies that matter are far away, and rivals at best, enemies at worst. There is a strong sense of "the American way is obviously the best, and everybody who disagrees or has been socialized on different norms is an idiot and must be destroyed". Every "by the way, in X we don't have Y, we do Z" on this site is a recipe for confrontation. It's a minority of posters, I'm sure, but they downvote and flag just about everything that isn't "America's way or the highway". Nobody asks them to declare the Finnish, German or Japanese way to be better. But they simply cannot accept that other societies might be happy with other choices. And those threads are really garbage.
  - 6y ago
TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago
I'm in Tasmania, and am glued to US political news at the moment. I think some of us are acutely interested because what's happening now is historically significant and could have very interesting(?) downstream effects.
- ethbr0 6y ago
  I've always been curious about this, as an American, and specifically as an American who experienced the 2016 US election results from Tokyo. The US outputs a massive amount of media, news, and culture. But how much does it actually influence other countries, at the personal level? I'd assume, in order of impact: (1) visa / immigration, (2) free trade deals, (3) sanctions, ? Is there any truth to the "US sets world tone on climate change, etc"? It seems like even the smallest countries are more than happy to make their own choices (in their own best interests!) when the US isn't trying to compel a position.
  - mola 6y ago
    Where I am (israel), the influence is tremendous. And it's a shame. US media is so good at driving attention that american narratives which are very irrelevant to Israeli narratives take over completely. The alarmist style of discussion has permeated everywhere. We could see how a very media savvy politician like netanyahu adopted all the Trump manearisms and conspiracy talk the moment Trump came in power. It's very upsetting to watch as we parrot a failed sort of political discourse.
  - AYBABTME 6y ago
    I think most people outside the US don't actually care that much about US visa/immigration policies, and care more about US relations and influence over their own country/neighbors, and the occasional "wow this is crazy, only in the US!" observations.
  - netsharc 6y ago
    I remember my student housing in Europe delaying turning on the heating 1 winter, because of high oil prices.. then I thought, "God damn George W. Bush, I'm freezing because of his Iraq fuckery". At the moment there's a xenophobia/refugee crisis in Europe, refugees that are escaping conflicts in e.g. Syria or Afghanistan. Arguably Syria isn't the fault of USA (although ISIS grew from the chaos of the Iraqi occupation), and the xenophobia has a bit to do with austerity politics of Merkel. And then someone started bombing Yemen and now there's another proxy regional war there..
driverdan 6y ago
As an American I like it when discussion about politics from other countries comes up. It's very easy to get trapped in a US bubble and not hear from other points of view.

stevekemp 6y ago

I've noticed the same thing and also react similarly. It also becomes apparent when talking about issues such as zoning, and housing. (Every time you hear talk about reassessing houses for taxes I get confused, because in the UK, and Finland, the two countries where I've lived and bought property, we don't have annual taxes that work like that.) Mostly I bite my tongue and keep quiet, though there have been a few Brexit-related posts over the past few years where I can sometimes be involved.

grogenaut 6y ago
Often even to those inside the us the zoning and housing get very SF/cali specific so I hear you
bww 6y ago
Isn’t zoning and housing inherently specific to the location of the housing or whatever is being zoned? It seems natural to discuss it with that frame of reference implied.
- stevekemp 6y ago
  Absolutely, but even within the states I suspect that a lot of things relating to zoning, taxes, etc, vary. I hear people talk about "Proposition XXX" restricting "stuff", and I wonder if other Americans from different parts of the country would even know what that was.
  - driverdan 6y ago
    We don't. All of the "Proposition XXX" stuff is from California. It's pretty annoying when people post those things without an explanation, assuming everyone knows what CA is doing.

ehnto 6y ago

Fellow Australian, I even find myself wording things from the perspective that I am from the US by accident. I feel so part of the discourse thanks to technology and my line of work that I forget these aren't always my problems.

dwd 6y ago
Australian politics has been pretty boring of late. While not as polarising as a Jim Jordan or Ted Cruz, people like Christopher Pyne and Paul Keating made Australian politics mildly interesting. We seem to have two very centrist parties right now which is a welcome change.
- flukus 6y ago
  Don't jinx it, I don't like the guy but I'm looking forward to an Australian prime minister lasting a full term in office. 2007-2016 aus politics was a blood sport, make politics boring again.
  - mikeyjk 6y ago
    I also wish for that as a west Aussie, but I can't help but feel with the climate crisis the way it is, we're going to have more and more pressures on top officials (the bush fire saga with Morrison comes to mind, that was an embarrassment).
    - dwd 6y ago
      Just don't count of The Greens putting any such pressure on them - you might as well rename them The Australian Woke as they seem more intent on just being politically correct on everything than actually focusing on environmental issues.
  - darkteflon 6y ago
    I was surprised to see Michael McCormack in charge this week. I always thought Morrison was acting PM? I’ll get my coat.

dang 6y ago

I point this out a lot [1]. The problem is the statelessness of the internet [2]. No matter how often you repeat something, the population that receives the message has measure zero. There's more international political battle on HN than you'd expect. There have been a lot of flamewars about Indian politics, pursued mostly by users in India or of Indian descent. And don't get me started on the internecine warfare of the Swedes [3]. It's true that a lot of misunderstandings on HN, often bitter ones, happen because readers assume other users are American when they're not. The site is a lot more international than people assume; only about half in the U.S., and a lot of those users are immigrants or expats. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20international&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20stateless&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... [3] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20internecine%20swed&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

cmroanirgo 6y ago
Thanks @dang, I recall seeing some of what you mention. One day you might care to write a book, but for now as others have pointed out, thanks for your delicate hand, you're a star amidst the darkness. You see everything :-)
- dang 6y ago
  That's hilarious, but thanks!
  - ethbr0 6y ago
    Given the content is all ostensibly public, I'd put in a quick second for a blog post (or longer form) on "dang's informal observations from marinating in the raw stream of HN comments." To state the obvious, I don't think anyone spends as much time on HN as the moderation team, in the sense of reading comments widely. At least... I'd hope none of us dedicate that much time. (Btw, always thanks!)

russellbeattie 6y ago

As an American who has lived abroad, I honestly will never understand this attitude. I sympathize, but honestly if I went into a .com.au forum and complained because the people there were talking about Australian politics, I'd be ridiculed mercilessly. And for good reason. It's the same as if you complained that we're all writing in English, and you'd prefer that we didn't. Porque todos los articulos y comentarios estan en ingles?!? Debemos tener mas contenido en español! Es un comunidad global, no?! La gente aqui asuma que todos los lectores son anglos? Es un barbaridad! Oh, wait. No it isn't. HN is an American website hosted on American servers catering to Americans and there is NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. You're insinuating there is and requesting the mods act accordingly. I disagree. Seriously, I don't speak for the mods, but I don't recall it being stated anywhere that HN "serves the global community". In fact I just double checked the FAQ. It doesn't. HN has mostly been a site meant to cater to Silicon Valley tech startups for as long as I've been using it. Let me know when ycombinator.com.au is up and running and we'll join you there and not talk about American laws. Until then...

Tomte 6y ago
Nobody asks you not to talk about American laws. We outsiders love to do that. Many of us know American criminal law better than our own, just because of television shows and lack of experience with criminal law in our real lives. And incidentally, the FAQ don't mention the United States, either. But what's really obvious on this site is that many Americans cannot discuss other choices. I theorize it is because America is so big and powerful and there isn't a visible friendly society with different cultural views in the neighborhood that matters. Large societies that matter are far away, and rivals at best, enemies at worst. There is a strong sense of "the American way is obviously the best, and everybody who disagrees or has been socialized on different norms is an idiot and must be destroyed". Every "by the way, in X we don't have Y, we do Z" on this site is a recipe for confrontation. It's a minority of posters, I'm sure, but they downvote and flag just about everything that isn't "America's way or the highway". Nobody asks them to declare the Finnish, German or Japanese way to be better. But they simply cannot accept that other societies might be happy with other choices. And those threads are really garbage.
- 6y ago

TheSpiceIsLife 6y ago

I'm in Tasmania, and am glued to US political news at the moment. I think some of us are acutely interested because what's happening now is historically significant and could have very interesting(?) downstream effects.

ethbr0 6y ago
I've always been curious about this, as an American, and specifically as an American who experienced the 2016 US election results from Tokyo. The US outputs a massive amount of media, news, and culture. But how much does it actually influence other countries, at the personal level? I'd assume, in order of impact: (1) visa / immigration, (2) free trade deals, (3) sanctions, ? Is there any truth to the "US sets world tone on climate change, etc"? It seems like even the smallest countries are more than happy to make their own choices (in their own best interests!) when the US isn't trying to compel a position.
- mola 6y ago
  Where I am (israel), the influence is tremendous. And it's a shame. US media is so good at driving attention that american narratives which are very irrelevant to Israeli narratives take over completely. The alarmist style of discussion has permeated everywhere. We could see how a very media savvy politician like netanyahu adopted all the Trump manearisms and conspiracy talk the moment Trump came in power. It's very upsetting to watch as we parrot a failed sort of political discourse.
- AYBABTME 6y ago
  I think most people outside the US don't actually care that much about US visa/immigration policies, and care more about US relations and influence over their own country/neighbors, and the occasional "wow this is crazy, only in the US!" observations.
- netsharc 6y ago
  I remember my student housing in Europe delaying turning on the heating 1 winter, because of high oil prices.. then I thought, "God damn George W. Bush, I'm freezing because of his Iraq fuckery". At the moment there's a xenophobia/refugee crisis in Europe, refugees that are escaping conflicts in e.g. Syria or Afghanistan. Arguably Syria isn't the fault of USA (although ISIS grew from the chaos of the Iraqi occupation), and the xenophobia has a bit to do with austerity politics of Merkel. And then someone started bombing Yemen and now there's another proxy regional war there..

driverdan 6y ago

As an American I like it when discussion about politics from other countries comes up. It's very easy to get trapped in a US bubble and not hear from other points of view.