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As an older person who's been exposed to the web and IRC for several decades, I've seen all kind of places, some of them well-moderated, and others where verbal

As an older person who's been exposed to the web and IRC for several decades, I've seen all kind of places, some of them well-moderated, and others where verbal violence was recurrent or moderation abusive. The moderation in HN is good, but the success of the site in a increasing problem. As the audience widens, the Guidelines are less respected. Nowadays, I almost never follow a link posted in HN, and rarely glance at the comments. For the past weeks, I hid one third to one half of the frontpage posts, because I thought they are off-topic. Quoting the Guidelines: > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. [...] If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. I expect to find on HN what most non-hacker sites would not include.

Thorentis 4y ago
I think HN needs to figure out how to expand the moderation team in a transparent way. The risk of course is introducing all the reddit-esque drama around moderator selection, abuse etc. Stackoverflow has had similar issues, though somehow stumbles along better than reddit. Regardless, there have been some huge thread recently that would have benefited from moderation.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- Arrivest 4y ago
  Stackoverflow is completely different. It prioritizes the experience of readers over posters - being the one who asks a question is not a good experience at all, but being the one who searches and finds an answer is really good. What they do have worked really well for this goal, and I have great respect for their initial decision.
InCityDreams 4y ago
I rarely read the articles, but thoroughly enjoy...even the occasional slightly ott political comments...and certainly all of the others. Sometimes i feel it's a shame that the USA is so predominantly: choose 1 or 0, there is no nuance; whatever you criticise means you're 100% for the other. But then again, that's all part of the deal, and I'm grateful for it, not against it.
shreyshnaccount 4y ago
I like how HN walks the fine line between moderation and censorship really well.
epolanski 4y ago
ineedasername 4y ago
On the other hand: >anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. That casts a wide net, and something that a segment of HN would find intellectually gratifying and produce good conversation shouldn't be avoided just because traditional media happened to stumble on it too. I try to keep in mind the "probably" modifier, and that other people may be gratified by different content. Generally speaking I only flag clickbait or things that are divisively partisan and probably won't produce any actual conversation. Then on things like politics... Well, just consider this headline currently on the front page: "Crypto, the Left & Technofeudalism" Crypto is a massive bit of emerging technology, but it is virtually impossible to separate it from some of the politics and social values involvde. It's pretty much baked to the motivations behind many proponents as well as the people directly working on the tech.

Thorentis 4y ago

I think HN needs to figure out how to expand the moderation team in a transparent way. The risk of course is introducing all the reddit-esque drama around moderator selection, abuse etc. Stackoverflow has had similar issues, though somehow stumbles along better than reddit. Regardless, there have been some huge thread recently that would have benefited from moderation.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
Arrivest 4y ago
Stackoverflow is completely different. It prioritizes the experience of readers over posters - being the one who asks a question is not a good experience at all, but being the one who searches and finds an answer is really good. What they do have worked really well for this goal, and I have great respect for their initial decision.

InCityDreams 4y ago

I rarely read the articles, but thoroughly enjoy...even the occasional slightly ott political comments...and certainly all of the others. Sometimes i feel it's a shame that the USA is so predominantly: choose 1 or 0, there is no nuance; whatever you criticise means you're 100% for the other. But then again, that's all part of the deal, and I'm grateful for it, not against it.

shreyshnaccount 4y ago

I like how HN walks the fine line between moderation and censorship really well.

epolanski 4y ago

ineedasername 4y ago

On the other hand: >anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. That casts a wide net, and something that a segment of HN would find intellectually gratifying and produce good conversation shouldn't be avoided just because traditional media happened to stumble on it too. I try to keep in mind the "probably" modifier, and that other people may be gratified by different content. Generally speaking I only flag clickbait or things that are divisively partisan and probably won't produce any actual conversation. Then on things like politics... Well, just consider this headline currently on the front page: "Crypto, the Left & Technofeudalism" Crypto is a massive bit of emerging technology, but it is virtually impossible to separate it from some of the politics and social values involvde. It's pretty much baked to the motivations behind many proponents as well as the people directly working on the tech.