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> Hacker News is awesome. It is probably my number one RSS feed right now. But it's getting too big. They've crossed the line that reddit crossed a long time ag

> Hacker News is awesome. It is probably my number one RSS feed right now. But it's getting too big. They've crossed the line that reddit crossed a long time ago. The value on reddit now is on the subreddits, not on the main page. Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. If I could just find someone who made a Hacker News digest, with the 10 best items from Hacker News, that would be a really good Slashdot. Interesting that even at the time he was completely wrong. He also seems to have had the weird notion that HN was rotating front page posts every five minutes so he would need to see the 10 best links every day. But I don’t recall that ever being the case, and it certainly is much less so these days. The only thing that has changed is that yes, many places (including HN itself) now aggregate popular stories into various formats but fundamentally, HN is exactly the same as it ever was.

jmclnx 3y ago
I thought that was a odd comment too. I think it is just fine. Maybe people with that concern can join ##hntop on liberachat to get a better feed.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  We kind of already have a "Top HN stories" list, and it's the hidden /active URL[1] which sorts by number of comments [made within N hours?]. Not everyone agrees with this. dang himself doesn't, and has said he thinks /active tends to end up with the threads that devolved into flamewars or got otherwise "too overheated." Fine, that's probably also true, but what News actually matters? Some package I've never heard of being ported to Rust? or some controversial event that broadly impacts the tech industry or computing, which yes happened to get a lot of "spirited" discussion? The main page tends to get some cool, oddball articles that you wouldn't otherwise see, but also gets clogged with very, very niche stuff that you're statistically unlikely to care about. Also, articles rise and fall from the main page too fast IMO, especially the ones that get overheated. If you visit HN once a day, and want to see the 10 articles that probably affect you in some way, you can't beat /active. Just put on your fireproof suit before visiting the comments. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/active https://news.ycombinator.com/active
  - bolasanibk 3y ago
    I use /front. It’s a day old, but good enough for me.
smitty1e 3y ago
> Interesting that even at the time he was completely wrong. No, I agree with Malda in general that people don't scale. A population larger that Dunbar's Number[1] acquires too much management scaffolding to retain Edenic charm. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number
- layer8 3y ago
  Didn’t Edenic charm already prove to fail at three (counting the snake)? ;)
- HarHarVeryFunny 3y ago
  I think the problem is that when a user base is small it tends to attract specialists who have sought out that content, and who's contributions make it useful/interesting to others. If the site becomes successful and more mainstream, then it will attract more and more non-specialists - the peanut gallery who have an opinion on everything and expertise on nothing. I have a 5-digit slashdot user id, and saw this play out over there. In the early days it was great, and (believe it nor not) highly technical - lots of subject matter experts in the comments. If you look at slashdot today it has become entirely useless. The same thing played out at Reddit on /r/machinelearning - it used to be frequented by researchers and experts, but as ML/AI became popular the crowds moved in and now that too is useless. I joined Hacker News in 2017, so have no idea how it was before then, but it doesn't seem to have changed much in that timespan, still attracting a mostly technical and intelligent crowd, at least if one ignores the lower rated comments.
  - Karrot_Kream 3y ago
    You can look at older HN threads since they're all still up. There's definitely been a "mean reversion" here as well, but it seems to vary per topic. I think the threads that have suffered the most are the ones about #dramaoftheweek which as you say tends to attract folks with opinions on everything and experience in nothing.
DamnInteresting 3y ago
I don't consume HN via RSS, so I am just speculating, but perhaps the RSS feed has a lot of turnover. HN on the web is nice because links stay on the front page for a while, but a chronological delivery such as RSS might be messier.
- the_third_wave 3y ago
  The "messy" nature of RSS feeds is an advantage when dealing with sites like HN since you're not affected by any type of ranking mechanism, i.e. you get to see those posts which for some reason or another are quickly moved off the front page.
nullindividual 3y ago
> Interesting that even at the time he was completely wrong. Within the past few months, I've started to see more low effort comment posting, submissions way outside of what many thing HN on-topic to be, and I've flagged more submissions/comments in the past handful of days than I ever have. HN is becoming something like a proto-popular reddit. EDIT: Since the above sounds like doom-and-gloom for HN, I want to say it's great that more people can enjoy HN. I hope it stays (close) to it's original intent.
- ajkjk 3y ago
  I feel like I've heard people saying that about HN every month for the past 8 years and I've never observed any real pattern. Think there's just some observation bias going on: a website always seems like it's recently been worse than you remember, at any point in time, because you remember recent bad things but not further back ones.
- ezekg 3y ago
  That was likely due to the Reddit blackout. I'd imagine a lot of those users will go back to Reddit since HN generally doesn't appreciate shitposting.
- Karrot_Kream 3y ago
  HN has had a huge influx in users since December, probably a result of the Twitter ownership transition and the Reddit blackout. I tend to agree that a lot of the worse elements of those posting cultures are starting to leak through here and HN is starting to feel more like a generic tech subreddit but I'm not sure whether that'll be sustained or not.
  - Noumenon72 3y ago
    How are you tracking the number of HN users over time?
    - Karrot_Kream 3y ago
      https://hackernews-insight.vercel.app/user-analysis https://hackernews-insight.vercel.app/user-analysis
Kiro 3y ago
How was he wrong?
- skilled 3y ago
  > Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. Clearly it's not. Not sure why I have to repeat myself though. ;-)
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - teolandon 3y ago
    Because you quoted a passage with about 5 statements that he could have been "wrong" about, and didn't specify which one you were talking about. (insert snarky emoticon here)
    - skilled 3y ago
      It was literally one statement. Please don't pull my leg like this because this site does have guidelines and it is very hard to obey by them when you're being challenged with ignorance.
      - teolandon 3y ago
        Not doing any leg-pulling. The passage you quoted is the following: > Hacker News is awesome. It is probably my number one RSS feed right now. But it's getting too big. They've crossed the line that reddit crossed a long time ago. The value on reddit now is on the subreddits, not on the main page. Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. If I could just find someone who made a Hacker News digest, with the 10 best items from Hacker News, that would be a really good Slashdot. The statements that could have been interpreted as the subject of your "at the time he was completely wrong" sentence: 1. Hacker News is awesome. 2. It's getting too big. 3. The value of reddit now is on the subreddits, not on the main page. 4. Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. 5 A digest of the 10 best items from Hacker News would be a really good Slashdot. Hey thanks for following the guidelines despite my "ignorance", but you're basically telling me that if you could, you would be insulting me right now. I'm not typing all of this to be snarky or to do a "technically..." gotcha. I also didn't know which statement you were actually talking about when I read your comment.
dasil003 3y ago
I've been here a while and I think the truth is somewhere in between. HN has grown and shifted somewhat in the process, but ultimately dodged the bullet of cancerous growth. My take is that because HN started as a side-project of a successful technologist and investor who made his money elsewhere, there was never the financial pressure that hits most online services. Couple that with shared interests, strong culture, and a healthy dose of even-handed and principled moderation (thank you Dang!), and HN ended up with way-above average sustainability.
- dr_dshiv 3y ago
  HN is such a great example for studies of social-capitalism.

jmclnx 3y ago

I thought that was a odd comment too. I think it is just fine. Maybe people with that concern can join ##hntop on liberachat to get a better feed.

ryandrake 3y ago
We kind of already have a "Top HN stories" list, and it's the hidden /active URL[1] which sorts by number of comments [made within N hours?]. Not everyone agrees with this. dang himself doesn't, and has said he thinks /active tends to end up with the threads that devolved into flamewars or got otherwise "too overheated." Fine, that's probably also true, but what News actually matters? Some package I've never heard of being ported to Rust? or some controversial event that broadly impacts the tech industry or computing, which yes happened to get a lot of "spirited" discussion? The main page tends to get some cool, oddball articles that you wouldn't otherwise see, but also gets clogged with very, very niche stuff that you're statistically unlikely to care about. Also, articles rise and fall from the main page too fast IMO, especially the ones that get overheated. If you visit HN once a day, and want to see the 10 articles that probably affect you in some way, you can't beat /active. Just put on your fireproof suit before visiting the comments. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/active https://news.ycombinator.com/active
- bolasanibk 3y ago
  I use /front. It’s a day old, but good enough for me.

smitty1e 3y ago

> Interesting that even at the time he was completely wrong. No, I agree with Malda in general that people don't scale. A population larger that Dunbar's Number[1] acquires too much management scaffolding to retain Edenic charm. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number

layer8 3y ago
Didn’t Edenic charm already prove to fail at three (counting the snake)? ;)
HarHarVeryFunny 3y ago
I think the problem is that when a user base is small it tends to attract specialists who have sought out that content, and who's contributions make it useful/interesting to others. If the site becomes successful and more mainstream, then it will attract more and more non-specialists - the peanut gallery who have an opinion on everything and expertise on nothing. I have a 5-digit slashdot user id, and saw this play out over there. In the early days it was great, and (believe it nor not) highly technical - lots of subject matter experts in the comments. If you look at slashdot today it has become entirely useless. The same thing played out at Reddit on /r/machinelearning - it used to be frequented by researchers and experts, but as ML/AI became popular the crowds moved in and now that too is useless. I joined Hacker News in 2017, so have no idea how it was before then, but it doesn't seem to have changed much in that timespan, still attracting a mostly technical and intelligent crowd, at least if one ignores the lower rated comments.
- Karrot_Kream 3y ago
  You can look at older HN threads since they're all still up. There's definitely been a "mean reversion" here as well, but it seems to vary per topic. I think the threads that have suffered the most are the ones about #dramaoftheweek which as you say tends to attract folks with opinions on everything and experience in nothing.

DamnInteresting 3y ago

I don't consume HN via RSS, so I am just speculating, but perhaps the RSS feed has a lot of turnover. HN on the web is nice because links stay on the front page for a while, but a chronological delivery such as RSS might be messier.

the_third_wave 3y ago
The "messy" nature of RSS feeds is an advantage when dealing with sites like HN since you're not affected by any type of ranking mechanism, i.e. you get to see those posts which for some reason or another are quickly moved off the front page.

nullindividual 3y ago

> Interesting that even at the time he was completely wrong. Within the past few months, I've started to see more low effort comment posting, submissions way outside of what many thing HN on-topic to be, and I've flagged more submissions/comments in the past handful of days than I ever have. HN is becoming something like a proto-popular reddit. EDIT: Since the above sounds like doom-and-gloom for HN, I want to say it's great that more people can enjoy HN. I hope it stays (close) to it's original intent.

ajkjk 3y ago
I feel like I've heard people saying that about HN every month for the past 8 years and I've never observed any real pattern. Think there's just some observation bias going on: a website always seems like it's recently been worse than you remember, at any point in time, because you remember recent bad things but not further back ones.
ezekg 3y ago
That was likely due to the Reddit blackout. I'd imagine a lot of those users will go back to Reddit since HN generally doesn't appreciate shitposting.
Karrot_Kream 3y ago
HN has had a huge influx in users since December, probably a result of the Twitter ownership transition and the Reddit blackout. I tend to agree that a lot of the worse elements of those posting cultures are starting to leak through here and HN is starting to feel more like a generic tech subreddit but I'm not sure whether that'll be sustained or not.
- Noumenon72 3y ago
  How are you tracking the number of HN users over time?
  - Karrot_Kream 3y ago
    https://hackernews-insight.vercel.app/user-analysis https://hackernews-insight.vercel.app/user-analysis

Kiro 3y ago

How was he wrong?

skilled 3y ago
> Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. Clearly it's not. Not sure why I have to repeat myself though. ;-)
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- teolandon 3y ago
  Because you quoted a passage with about 5 statements that he could have been "wrong" about, and didn't specify which one you were talking about. (insert snarky emoticon here)
  - skilled 3y ago
    It was literally one statement. Please don't pull my leg like this because this site does have guidelines and it is very hard to obey by them when you're being challenged with ignorance.
    - teolandon 3y ago
      Not doing any leg-pulling. The passage you quoted is the following: > Hacker News is awesome. It is probably my number one RSS feed right now. But it's getting too big. They've crossed the line that reddit crossed a long time ago. The value on reddit now is on the subreddits, not on the main page. Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. If I could just find someone who made a Hacker News digest, with the 10 best items from Hacker News, that would be a really good Slashdot. The statements that could have been interpreted as the subject of your "at the time he was completely wrong" sentence: 1. Hacker News is awesome. 2. It's getting too big. 3. The value of reddit now is on the subreddits, not on the main page. 4. Hacker News is wobbling on that space now. 5 A digest of the 10 best items from Hacker News would be a really good Slashdot. Hey thanks for following the guidelines despite my "ignorance", but you're basically telling me that if you could, you would be insulting me right now. I'm not typing all of this to be snarky or to do a "technically..." gotcha. I also didn't know which statement you were actually talking about when I read your comment.

dasil003 3y ago

I've been here a while and I think the truth is somewhere in between. HN has grown and shifted somewhat in the process, but ultimately dodged the bullet of cancerous growth. My take is that because HN started as a side-project of a successful technologist and investor who made his money elsewhere, there was never the financial pressure that hits most online services. Couple that with shared interests, strong culture, and a healthy dose of even-handed and principled moderation (thank you Dang!), and HN ended up with way-above average sustainability.

dr_dshiv 3y ago
HN is such a great example for studies of social-capitalism.