4 ms·

I think this lays the real issue out but buries it: > The only way to guarantee any visibility is to time very carefully using HNPickup, be a celebrity like Jo

I think this lays the real issue out but buries it: > The only way to guarantee any visibility is to time very carefully using HNPickup, be a celebrity like John Gruber or Dustin Curtis, organize an up vote cabal, or write sensationalist content. HN has become mainstream and it's subject to all the spam, pandering, submission strategies, power users and all the other bullshit that comes with that territory. I'd start by getting rid of every user who's submission to comments ratio is ridiculous and every website that would be better suited to digg or reddit.

ninetax 14y ago
Sorry, for clarification, do you mean get rid of users who have a high submission/comment ratio, or low?
- hypnocode 14y ago
  I'm guessing high, comments suggest involvement in the community.
  - benologist 14y ago
    Yes high submissions with no or low involvement in the community. Either they really, really, really, really love submission karma or they're here to exploit the site.
    - GnarlinBrando 14y ago
      That makes sense to me, but maybe this is just another place votes can be weighted, outright 'getting rid of' or banning seems excessive to me.
    - ams6110 14y ago
      Average votes/submission seems a better gauge than raw number of submissions. Maybe there are people who are just really good an finding and posting a lot of stuff that's interesting.
    - aidenn0 14y ago
      Wouldn't that just cause a lot of spam comments?
      - franzus 14y ago
        It should be pretty hard to automate spam comments (without the comments getting downvoted to hell). Whereas automated submission of stories is super trivial.
zalew 14y ago
> spam, pandering, submission strategies, power users and all the other bullshit that comes with that territory. that's actually what bothers me more about current HN state than the 'harsh comments' everybody complains about. and one another thing: I remember when the frontpage was full of business and tech advice from experienced people who shared valuable knowledge hard to obtain on my own. now I wonder how many more git and fabric tutorials do we need, or why should I care what every blogger on the planet thinks of twitter.
- wisty 14y ago
  Dude, I'm happy when I see a git / fabric tutorials. I'm always looking for new tips. Looking at the current front page, the lonely VIM tutorial is literally the only thing a programmer is going to find useful right now. Oh, there's also a PCA overview using mostly Excel (two lines of actual code - from matplotlib.mlab import PCA; pca = PCA(x)), something about a new editor called "Lighttable" and a few sciency things, but mostly the submissions wouldn't even be worthy of Slashdot.
  - zalew 14y ago
    when it comes to technical knowledge on HN, I'm happy when I see a talk f.ex. how huge companies solve tech problems, or conference talks around specific technologies, because it's knowledge very hard or sometimes even impossible to acquire on my own - no matter how hard I would try, I won't have a clue how facebook handles massive deployments or how twitter scales unless somebody from the company publishes it and the community shares it. there is a vast ammount of technical advice/news to share, but toolset tutorials are one google search away, you don't need hn support for that, rtfm.
    - cstejerean 14y ago
      You don't need HN to find out how Facebook handles massive deployments either. https://www.google.com/search?q=how+facebook+handles+massive+deployments https://www.google.com/search?q=how+facebook+handles+massive...
- 14y ago
tankbot 14y ago
> HN has become mainstream and it's subject to all the spam, pandering, submission strategies, power users and all the other bullshit that comes with that territory. I think this article falls exactly under the heading of a pandering submission strategy. It's link bait. It's a semi-controversial topic trending on HN, better jump in and vomit up a blog entry to get some traffic! Nevermind that it says nothing at all. Here's a thought for improving your image of HN: Read less of it. Read a few submissions with interesting titles, post a comment or two and go back to doing something worthwhile. I know I waste too much time on HN as it is but many HN'ers spend way more time on here than me. With some topics pushing 200+ comments who has the free time to read everything? Don't. You'll have less noise to signal. You also won't get so emotionally caught up in the drama that inevitably accompanies human interaction. Stop crying. HN is fine. EDIT: 'Stop crying.' isn't directed at Benologist. Just realized it may come off that way.

ninetax 14y ago

Sorry, for clarification, do you mean get rid of users who have a high submission/comment ratio, or low?

hypnocode 14y ago
I'm guessing high, comments suggest involvement in the community.
- benologist 14y ago
  Yes high submissions with no or low involvement in the community. Either they really, really, really, really love submission karma or they're here to exploit the site.
  - GnarlinBrando 14y ago
    That makes sense to me, but maybe this is just another place votes can be weighted, outright 'getting rid of' or banning seems excessive to me.
  - ams6110 14y ago
    Average votes/submission seems a better gauge than raw number of submissions. Maybe there are people who are just really good an finding and posting a lot of stuff that's interesting.
  - aidenn0 14y ago
    Wouldn't that just cause a lot of spam comments?
    - franzus 14y ago
      It should be pretty hard to automate spam comments (without the comments getting downvoted to hell). Whereas automated submission of stories is super trivial.

zalew 14y ago

> spam, pandering, submission strategies, power users and all the other bullshit that comes with that territory. that's actually what bothers me more about current HN state than the 'harsh comments' everybody complains about. and one another thing: I remember when the frontpage was full of business and tech advice from experienced people who shared valuable knowledge hard to obtain on my own. now I wonder how many more git and fabric tutorials do we need, or why should I care what every blogger on the planet thinks of twitter.

wisty 14y ago
Dude, I'm happy when I see a git / fabric tutorials. I'm always looking for new tips. Looking at the current front page, the lonely VIM tutorial is literally the only thing a programmer is going to find useful right now. Oh, there's also a PCA overview using mostly Excel (two lines of actual code - from matplotlib.mlab import PCA; pca = PCA(x)), something about a new editor called "Lighttable" and a few sciency things, but mostly the submissions wouldn't even be worthy of Slashdot.
- zalew 14y ago
  when it comes to technical knowledge on HN, I'm happy when I see a talk f.ex. how huge companies solve tech problems, or conference talks around specific technologies, because it's knowledge very hard or sometimes even impossible to acquire on my own - no matter how hard I would try, I won't have a clue how facebook handles massive deployments or how twitter scales unless somebody from the company publishes it and the community shares it. there is a vast ammount of technical advice/news to share, but toolset tutorials are one google search away, you don't need hn support for that, rtfm.
  - cstejerean 14y ago
    You don't need HN to find out how Facebook handles massive deployments either. https://www.google.com/search?q=how+facebook+handles+massive+deployments https://www.google.com/search?q=how+facebook+handles+massive...
14y ago

tankbot 14y ago

> HN has become mainstream and it's subject to all the spam, pandering, submission strategies, power users and all the other bullshit that comes with that territory. I think this article falls exactly under the heading of a pandering submission strategy. It's link bait. It's a semi-controversial topic trending on HN, better jump in and vomit up a blog entry to get some traffic! Nevermind that it says nothing at all. Here's a thought for improving your image of HN: Read less of it. Read a few submissions with interesting titles, post a comment or two and go back to doing something worthwhile. I know I waste too much time on HN as it is but many HN'ers spend way more time on here than me. With some topics pushing 200+ comments who has the free time to read everything? Don't. You'll have less noise to signal. You also won't get so emotionally caught up in the drama that inevitably accompanies human interaction. Stop crying. HN is fine. EDIT: 'Stop crying.' isn't directed at Benologist. Just realized it may come off that way.