It's hard to compare something as being the Hacker News of "X", but one forum that has been filled with pretty solid discussion is https://bitcointalk.org/ http

It's hard to compare something as being the Hacker News of "X", but one forum that has been filled with pretty solid discussion is https://bitcointalk.org/ https://bitcointalk.org/. Contrary to its name it also holds discussions on other crypto topics in the 'Altcoin Discussion' section.