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I don't think this post is a violation of "the rules." HN is not supposed to be just about hacking, but about anything interesting to hackers-- anything intere

by pg 18y ago

I don't think this post is a violation of "the rules." HN is not supposed to be just about hacking, but about anything interesting to hackers-- anything interesting to the intellectually curious. There is not necessarily zero overlap between that and Reddit. E.g. Reddit users probably started posting earlier about the present recession, but when the matter became serious enough we started to have some stories about it here too. As for the claim that this should be killed because it's a crap link, it definitely seems over the threshold for that. It's not just a bunch of random, biased bystanders who are making this accusation, but the UN (http://blog.wired.com/defense/2009/01/yesterday-david.html http://blog.wired.com/defense/2009/01/yesterday-david.html). So it is at least something that has to be taken seriously.

palish 18y ago
Okay. Thank you for taking the time to convey your reasoning. It's valid, and you care a lot about the issues in Gaza. I'm just concerned that newer users may use this to justify their own bad behavior, but I suppose that can be dealt with.
- davi 18y ago
  "... and you care a lot about the issues in Gaza." I care a lot about certain political issues but I would not try to talk about them on HN, and I bet you wouldn't either. It seems weird -- almost sycophantic -- to so readily apply a different standard to Paul Graham. The only way I think one can attempt to justify a different standard for him is by invoking the American (only?) expression, 'his house, his rules'. In this way of thinking, he built the site, and we are his guests. But even this seems like a pretty attenuated rationale, to me.
  - palish 18y ago
    Yeah, there's an element of 'his house, his rules'. But mostly it's just too taxing to continue caring. If he wants one high-quality political article on the site, fine, it doesn't really matter. The site didn't explode as a result. And there are a lot of interesting things to do besides trying to win a debate. Right now, you could be conversing with someone through a Mac Mini: http://coworkthailand.com/say/ http://coworkthailand.com/say/ I'm also tired of coming off sounding like a negative person. "you support a political submission!" "stop group-downvoting this guy for his opinion!" "we can't click through a killed submission!" "you disabled someone's account for possibly dubious reasons!" -- these are not my issues, and it's hard to feel like any of them actually matter in the big picture, and if they don't matter, why care? And it feels against my character to speak like that anyway. So I've decided to find out where the site will steer us rather than wrestling to steer the site.
davi 18y ago
There's a difference between things that are interesting to the intellectually curious, and things that are interesting to hackers. This topic provides a good example. The economony is a big, somewhat hackable system. We elect representatives to steer it and shape it. When a big, important system's performance starts to degrade, that attracts the attention of hackers. The Israel/Gaza war is much less hackable seeming. Important, appalling events are occurring, but to my mind they are not hacker news. It's a subjective call. This is your site, and of course you are entitled to decide what is Hacker News. [edit] Politics and wars are also hackable, in some sense, so maybe this distinction is less crisp than one would like. But there does seem to be a difference between using this site to talk about economics, and using it to talk about conflicts between nations or political parties. In the case of entrenched conflicts, discussion is very unlikely to change anyone's model of how the world works. The thing I like about discussion here is reading it and participating in it supports the evolution and refinement of my model of how the world works.
ntoshev 18y ago
This is politics, and it is not even news. Israel has been accused of using such weapons a couple of years ago: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_phosphorus#2006_Israel-Lebanon_conflict http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_phosphorus#2006_Israel-Le... Clearly it is not more important now than it was then. I am all for a broad spectrum of topics covered here on HN, but this is just a controversial topic that is useless to discuss here.
- chaostheory 18y ago
  HN has had plenty of political posts in the past without complaint regarding issues such as privacy and net-neutrality.

by pg 18y ago

palish 18y ago

Okay. Thank you for taking the time to convey your reasoning. It's valid, and you care a lot about the issues in Gaza. I'm just concerned that newer users may use this to justify their own bad behavior, but I suppose that can be dealt with.

davi 18y ago
"... and you care a lot about the issues in Gaza." I care a lot about certain political issues but I would not try to talk about them on HN, and I bet you wouldn't either. It seems weird -- almost sycophantic -- to so readily apply a different standard to Paul Graham. The only way I think one can attempt to justify a different standard for him is by invoking the American (only?) expression, 'his house, his rules'. In this way of thinking, he built the site, and we are his guests. But even this seems like a pretty attenuated rationale, to me.
- palish 18y ago
  Yeah, there's an element of 'his house, his rules'. But mostly it's just too taxing to continue caring. If he wants one high-quality political article on the site, fine, it doesn't really matter. The site didn't explode as a result. And there are a lot of interesting things to do besides trying to win a debate. Right now, you could be conversing with someone through a Mac Mini: http://coworkthailand.com/say/ http://coworkthailand.com/say/ I'm also tired of coming off sounding like a negative person. "you support a political submission!" "stop group-downvoting this guy for his opinion!" "we can't click through a killed submission!" "you disabled someone's account for possibly dubious reasons!" -- these are not my issues, and it's hard to feel like any of them actually matter in the big picture, and if they don't matter, why care? And it feels against my character to speak like that anyway. So I've decided to find out where the site will steer us rather than wrestling to steer the site.

davi 18y ago

There's a difference between things that are interesting to the intellectually curious, and things that are interesting to hackers. This topic provides a good example. The economony is a big, somewhat hackable system. We elect representatives to steer it and shape it. When a big, important system's performance starts to degrade, that attracts the attention of hackers. The Israel/Gaza war is much less hackable seeming. Important, appalling events are occurring, but to my mind they are not hacker news. It's a subjective call. This is your site, and of course you are entitled to decide what is Hacker News. [edit] Politics and wars are also hackable, in some sense, so maybe this distinction is less crisp than one would like. But there does seem to be a difference between using this site to talk about economics, and using it to talk about conflicts between nations or political parties. In the case of entrenched conflicts, discussion is very unlikely to change anyone's model of how the world works. The thing I like about discussion here is reading it and participating in it supports the evolution and refinement of my model of how the world works.

ntoshev 18y ago

This is politics, and it is not even news. Israel has been accused of using such weapons a couple of years ago: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_phosphorus#2006_Israel-Lebanon_conflict http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_phosphorus#2006_Israel-Le... Clearly it is not more important now than it was then. I am all for a broad spectrum of topics covered here on HN, but this is just a controversial topic that is useless to discuss here.

chaostheory 18y ago
HN has had plenty of political posts in the past without complaint regarding issues such as privacy and net-neutrality.