9 ms·

I rather suspect that it's because of the Facebook outage, but indirectly. HN is always slow when major tech services (Facebook, Google, AWS, Github, Slack, Fas

I rather suspect that it's because of the Facebook outage, but indirectly. HN is always slow when major tech services (Facebook, Google, AWS, Github, Slack, Fastly, Cloudflare, etc) services are down. The HN community seems to congregate here for updates causing higher than usual traffic.

asddubs 5y ago
plus HN has been a bit spotty as of late anyway
suyash 5y ago
or it could be a malicious attack? I doubt most facebook users even know what HN is.
- shadowgovt 5y ago
  Most Facebook users don't know what HN is, but most HN users have Facebook accounts and will migrate here for the dopamine-inducing refresh clicks (don't let them try to claim otherwise ;) ). If most Facebook users knew what HN was and congregated here when FB was down, the site would be utterly crushed.
- djmips 5y ago
  It doesn't have to be 'most' facebook users.
- rplnt 5y ago
  But all HN users know what Facebook is. And outage of this scale is rare and interesting.
  - tuke 5y ago
    What is Facebook?
    - ed_elliott_asc 5y ago
      The beginning of the end of humanity
      - peakaboo 5y ago
        Its a daycare center for young adults. They grow up eventually.
        ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
        > Its a daycare center for young adults. Actually, my experience with FB (I have an account, but don't spend much time, there), is that it is packed with grayhairs, like me. I think the younger folks have other venues they frequent.
        130e13a 5y ago
        This is definitely the correct take. I fall into the 18-24 demographic and I don't think I've used Facebook at all in the past 3-4 years. Neither does anyone else I know who is my age. This is essentially a reverse network effect: because so few young people are on the platform, few other young people see a reason to use it.
        tapas73 5y ago
        Also when parents and grandparents join, kids start to leave.
        aabbcc1241 5y ago
        Interesting relationship
        ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
        In the US, at least, this is definitely the case. We like to throw anyone over 40 into the skip (especially in the tech industry). It has caused some issues.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- flutas 5y ago
  > The HN community seems to congregate here for updates causing higher than usual traffic. IMO it's probably a lot of us tech workers watching in awe of what's going on when a big tech company craps itself.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- gkoberger 5y ago
  No, but most HN users know what Facebook (and WhatsApp and Instagram) are. That being said, I've seen theories that certain non-FB sites are slow just because DNS lookups are so backed up.
  - blendergeek 5y ago
    > That being said, I've seen theories that certain non-FB sites are slow just because DNS lookups are so backed up. I have been getting a Hacker News error message more often then usual today. So I don't think it is just DNS.
  - nottorp 5y ago
    DNS lookups are certainly slower for random sites. I just opened an about zero traffic site that i hadn't gone to in a while (so dns not cached). It took a while (10 seconds?) to load the first time. Insta load the second time. This seems to happen for .com but not other TLDs so maybe .com is getting hammered?
unethical_ban 5y ago
Either there is a massive number of HN users F5ing the homepage for the last few hours, HN is woefully unprepared for surges in traffic, or there is some kind of outage with their infrastructure. hnstatus on twitter and hund.io show no outage news.
- oneeyedpigeon 5y ago
  > a massive number of HN users It'll be this, I'd bet money on it. Lots like me who don't visit every day are coming to HN for more info. This site probably only ever sees a tiny percentage of its registered users accessing at once; right now, it'll be a much larger percent.
  - hinfaits 5y ago
    I am one of the many that only goes to HN when a major service appears down (usually AWS)
- nicoburns 5y ago
  IIRC HN runs on a single server. So they don't really put much effort into scaling to higher traffic levels. They don't really need to. Even now the site is available, if a little slow.
  - prirai 5y ago
    Yep and that's great. Whole of Fediverse, Matrix, IRC, Telegram works just fine. Lesson: Never depend on a centralized server.
    - ufmace 5y ago
      Seems like the opposite lesson to me - Telegram is kind of iffy, not sure about the others. The only thing that's been really solid today is Google. So I guess depend on multiple enormous centralized services?
    - joecool1029 5y ago
nafizh 5y ago
That's what I thought but now Twitter is having problem loading replies to a tweet. I think it's something more general rather than FB centric.
- nicoburns 5y ago
  Apparently DNS services are getting hammered with much higher traffic than usual for Facebook domains (as FB DNS is down so millions of devices are continually retrying the lookup). For twitter specifically, I also wouldn't be surprised if a non-trivial number of people have increased their use of twitter while facebook is down.
  - raelmiu 5y ago
    That’s really interesting. Where did you find that info?
    - jfrunyon 5y ago
      The DNS hammering bit was posted by Cloudflare CTO on Twitter. https://twitter.com/jgrahamc/status/1445066136547217413 https://twitter.com/jgrahamc/status/1445066136547217413
    - jonah 5y ago
      "hello literally everyone" --@twitter https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1445078208190291973 https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1445078208190291973
      - edoceo 5y ago
        WhatsApp in the replies like "hi". I hate the internet.
        simonklitj 5y ago
        I at least like what Instagram commented! https://twitter.com/instagram/status/1445084977096314880 https://twitter.com/instagram/status/1445084977096314880

asddubs 5y ago

plus HN has been a bit spotty as of late anyway

suyash 5y ago

or it could be a malicious attack? I doubt most facebook users even know what HN is.

shadowgovt 5y ago
Most Facebook users don't know what HN is, but most HN users have Facebook accounts and will migrate here for the dopamine-inducing refresh clicks (don't let them try to claim otherwise ;) ). If most Facebook users knew what HN was and congregated here when FB was down, the site would be utterly crushed.
djmips 5y ago
It doesn't have to be 'most' facebook users.
rplnt 5y ago
But all HN users know what Facebook is. And outage of this scale is rare and interesting.
- tuke 5y ago
  What is Facebook?
  - ed_elliott_asc 5y ago
    The beginning of the end of humanity
    - peakaboo 5y ago
      Its a daycare center for young adults. They grow up eventually.
      - ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
        > Its a daycare center for young adults. Actually, my experience with FB (I have an account, but don't spend much time, there), is that it is packed with grayhairs, like me. I think the younger folks have other venues they frequent.
        130e13a 5y ago
        This is definitely the correct take. I fall into the 18-24 demographic and I don't think I've used Facebook at all in the past 3-4 years. Neither does anyone else I know who is my age. This is essentially a reverse network effect: because so few young people are on the platform, few other young people see a reason to use it.
        tapas73 5y ago
        Also when parents and grandparents join, kids start to leave.
        aabbcc1241 5y ago
        Interesting relationship
        ChrisMarshallNY 5y ago
        In the US, at least, this is definitely the case. We like to throw anyone over 40 into the skip (especially in the tech industry). It has caused some issues.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
flutas 5y ago
> The HN community seems to congregate here for updates causing higher than usual traffic. IMO it's probably a lot of us tech workers watching in awe of what's going on when a big tech company craps itself.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
gkoberger 5y ago
No, but most HN users know what Facebook (and WhatsApp and Instagram) are. That being said, I've seen theories that certain non-FB sites are slow just because DNS lookups are so backed up.
- blendergeek 5y ago
  > That being said, I've seen theories that certain non-FB sites are slow just because DNS lookups are so backed up. I have been getting a Hacker News error message more often then usual today. So I don't think it is just DNS.
- nottorp 5y ago
  DNS lookups are certainly slower for random sites. I just opened an about zero traffic site that i hadn't gone to in a while (so dns not cached). It took a while (10 seconds?) to load the first time. Insta load the second time. This seems to happen for .com but not other TLDs so maybe .com is getting hammered?

unethical_ban 5y ago

Either there is a massive number of HN users F5ing the homepage for the last few hours, HN is woefully unprepared for surges in traffic, or there is some kind of outage with their infrastructure. hnstatus on twitter and hund.io show no outage news.

oneeyedpigeon 5y ago
> a massive number of HN users It'll be this, I'd bet money on it. Lots like me who don't visit every day are coming to HN for more info. This site probably only ever sees a tiny percentage of its registered users accessing at once; right now, it'll be a much larger percent.
- hinfaits 5y ago
  I am one of the many that only goes to HN when a major service appears down (usually AWS)
nicoburns 5y ago
IIRC HN runs on a single server. So they don't really put much effort into scaling to higher traffic levels. They don't really need to. Even now the site is available, if a little slow.
- prirai 5y ago
  Yep and that's great. Whole of Fediverse, Matrix, IRC, Telegram works just fine. Lesson: Never depend on a centralized server.
  - ufmace 5y ago
    Seems like the opposite lesson to me - Telegram is kind of iffy, not sure about the others. The only thing that's been really solid today is Google. So I guess depend on multiple enormous centralized services?
  - joecool1029 5y ago

nafizh 5y ago

That's what I thought but now Twitter is having problem loading replies to a tweet. I think it's something more general rather than FB centric.

nicoburns 5y ago
Apparently DNS services are getting hammered with much higher traffic than usual for Facebook domains (as FB DNS is down so millions of devices are continually retrying the lookup). For twitter specifically, I also wouldn't be surprised if a non-trivial number of people have increased their use of twitter while facebook is down.
- raelmiu 5y ago
  That’s really interesting. Where did you find that info?
  - jfrunyon 5y ago
    The DNS hammering bit was posted by Cloudflare CTO on Twitter. https://twitter.com/jgrahamc/status/1445066136547217413 https://twitter.com/jgrahamc/status/1445066136547217413
  - jonah 5y ago
    "hello literally everyone" --@twitter https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1445078208190291973 https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1445078208190291973
    - edoceo 5y ago
      WhatsApp in the replies like "hi". I hate the internet.
      - simonklitj 5y ago
        I at least like what Instagram commented! https://twitter.com/instagram/status/1445084977096314880 https://twitter.com/instagram/status/1445084977096314880