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Ask HN: Favorite/Classic HN threads of all time
The only similar thread that I could find was from 2012 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3996652), so I decided to start one. Please share your all-time favorite HN threads here.
- jpgvm 5y agoProbably still ranks #1 in ultimate HN comebacks: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35079 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35079
- sokoloff 5y agoCame here to post that one as my all time favorite. Since you posted that one, I’ll give another classic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224 (“I have qualms with Dropbox because Linux users could just X and Y and Z…”)
- anyfactor 5y agoFor people who are new here (like me): cperciva >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Percival https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Percival
- capableweb 5y agoLurking in a sibling thread is Colin speaking with Drew Houston (of Dropbox fame): > we're in a similar space -- http://www.getdropbox.com http://www.getdropbox.com (and part of the yc summer 07 program) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35088 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35088 In an alternative universe, Colin joined Dropbox and their UI would have been much more hardcore with better the whole product having better support for other OSes than just Windows and macOS!
- martincmartin 5y agoThis is a great comeback. But I don't understand the reference to Ravi Vakil. Is Ravi known for being humble or something?
- antonegc 5y agoI’d wager sanj@ is a sibling of Ravi Vakil, from a quick LinkedIn search. Still, a little perplexing appeal to authority there.
- ZhangSWEFAANG 5y agoThat's his brother. The poster's name is Sanjay Vakil. I think he's saying - look at my brother. He is so successful and intelligent. Unless you have won the putnam (his bro was a 4 time putnam fellow), you have no right to be bolder than him. As an aside, I think Sanjay has an inferiority complex or can't see outside of his immediate circle who knows his brother.
- syspec 5y agoI'm a little lost, what makes it a good comeback
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- moritonal 5y agoSomeone sarcastically asked if he'd won a difficult math competition due to his self-grandourous parent comment. His response was, yes, yes he had won the difficult competition they referenced.
- gnicholas 5y agoTIL that handles stay green forever in early comments. I assumed they lost the green indicator after the account had weathered.
- 1123581321 5y agoIt’s a great one. I have to say I also love sanj’s “Totally busted. Just the once, though, huh?” response.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- elorant 5y agoAll passive income threads
- scary-size 5y agoCare to share your favorites?
- Glench 5y agoYes I'd also love to see those!
- doovd 5y agoTagging onto this
- harperlee 5y agoYou have the “favorite” function for this.
- elorant 5y agoI don't have a favorite. There's a whole series of relative posts. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=131501443 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=131501443 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12318449 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12318449 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7094402 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7094402 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6146930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6146930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11026699 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11026699 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8107588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8107588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21389776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21389776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8246255 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8246255 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14583312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14583312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18479588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18479588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4639271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4639271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3770510 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3770510 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18906094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18906094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5903868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5903868 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2358111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2358111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11755036 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11755036 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27107919 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27107919 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=387789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=387789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10726489 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10726489 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15483692 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15483692 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24859111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29766034 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29766034
- 542458 5y agoThe Dropbox launch post is a great example of why you shouldn’t take (particularly dismissive) comments here too seriously. (This isn’t to dunk on any of the contributors there - but just a reminder that we’re all fallible and have biases) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 On that note, PG coining “middlebrow dismissal” isn’t a very elaborate comment, but is a term that has entered a few people’s lexicon. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4726248 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4726248 Both the article and the comments here have some good life info (“I Thought I Would Have Accomplished More Today and Also Before I Was 35”) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24316725 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24316725 Also, check out the top posts all time, and top comments all time. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=&sort=byPopularity&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- scrollaway 5y agoThe parent comment is the one coining the term, not pg. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4726218 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4726218
- dang 5y agoIt was pg's coinage, but I don't know where he first used it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4693920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4693920 was the first time on HN, a few weeks before the link you mention. I think he might have introduced it in an essay before that, though. We use the term 'shallow dismissal' in HN moderation instead—arguably a bit of a euphemistic move, but for moderation purposes it's a lot better to talk about the post than about the person. The word 'shallow' makes that clearer than the word 'middlebrow' does.
- herodotus 5y agoThe algolia results are not that accurate unfortunately
- larrykubin 5y agoI was going to post this standalone, but will post it here. I was recently reading the Hacker News initial reaction to Facebook acquiring Instagram in 2012: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3817840 One of the commenters says it will be the equivalent to Google buying YouTube. To which another commenter replies "bookmark this comment, see you in 2022". And here we are: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3818055 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3818055
- soneca 5y agoSuch confidence while having no way to know if they would be right (because, no matter the arguments, they were trying to predict the future).
- throwaway990dv 5y agoIf they were wrong, the comment would have continued rotting away unnoticed. But they got lucky and were right -- confirmation bias is a wonderful thing.
- harshalizee 5y agoMy favorite part is that a comment thread further down convinced that 'we're in a 2nd bubble now more than ever.'. A decade later, nothing much has changed it seems.
- rak1507 5y agohttps://danluu.com/hn-comments/ https://danluu.com/hn-comments/ is a good list
- flurie 5y agoIt's a job posting, but I think about Dear Future Homejoy Engineer near the end of every year. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956
- emehex 5y agoThread posted on Dec 25, 2014. "Homejoy shut down on July 31, 2015." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homejoy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homejoy)
- acalzycalzy 5y agoAre you saying this is a good post or a stupid post?
- yuppie_scum 5y agoThat CEO was a POS for making his employees work Christmas
- synaesthesisx 5y agoThis is incredibly cringeworthy - for a company CEO to brag about employees working through Christmas. Just wow.
- entelechy0 5y ago[dead]
- nischalsamji 5y agoI sell onions on the internet. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728132 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728132 I keep coming back to read this every once in a while.
- eightturn 5y agoappreciate that (peter here).. the 2022 Vidalia crop is planted, and we recently trimmed the tops.. I posted some pics here if you're curious: https://www.vidaliaonions.com/farm-news/trimming-vidalia-onion-tops/ https://www.vidaliaonions.com/farm-news/trimming-vidalia-oni...
- ElCapitanMarkla 5y agoLook at those blue skies. Looks great
- CTDOCodebases 5y agoThe comment thread about a developer of a high level of mathematic ability who wrote and maintained a widely used piece of software used for backups. Someone commented something to the effect of “He gave up on solving Millennium problems to write backup software”.
- _dain_ 5y agoAnd in so doing, saving the world orders of magnitude more in $$$ than he could have won solving a Millenium problem.
- lambdatronics 5y agoThis one? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24537865 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24537865
- CTDOCodebases 5y agoYes that was it. Thanks for providing the link.
- mwattsun 5y agoI looked on my hard drive to see what I saved and there were two, other than the usual technical saves: Why Hacker News Thinks PHP Won Something (2009) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=438871 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=438871 Unfortunately the article appears to have been scrubbed from gilesbowkett.blogspot.com and is not on the Wayback machine. Basically, the article trashes PHP and Hacker News, which I thought was interesting. and The company that has a monopoly on ice cream truck music (2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24744879 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24744879
- duckmysick 5y agoI've been saving interesting threads and comments in my favorites (they are in my profile). Many old-timers are surprised that Hacker News has a favorite feature. Comments are tricky: to favorite a comment you need to first show its details by clicking on the timestamp. Now, for the links. A lot of freelancing and consulting advice threads have a good discussion and stories from the trenches: Starting as a consultant - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21189801 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21189801 Getting paid - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4817193 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4817193 Common mistakes - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21728436 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21728436 Lessons learned from a veteran developer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25658216 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25658216 Branding and marketing - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23282278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23282278 Hiring a personal assistant - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29336234 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29336234 Other pretty cool and fun threads: Crowdsourced HN book recommendations: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28595967 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28595967 Product recommendations from HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29353980 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29353980 What 4chan thinks of HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6747373 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6747373
- Noumenon72 5y agoFred, that coworker who never stops refactoring: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120359 I will never stop being Fred, but this thread keeps me from confusing my drive to refactor with what the company actually needs. Particularly these comments: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120713 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24120713 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121018 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24121018
- lambdatronics 5y agoThe famous Alan Kay appearance: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11939851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11939851