3 ms·

When I read those summaries I feel like I'm reading HN's equivalent of "first post." They also often read less like true summaries and more like one sentence ne

by ja2ke 18y ago

When I read those summaries I feel like I'm reading HN's equivalent of "first post." They also often read less like true summaries and more like one sentence newspaper movie reviews, which, coupled with the "first post" feeling, makes me question people's motivation for posting them.

albertcardona 18y ago
I wanted to encourage people to read a well-thought blog post on job interviews and the meaning of free advice given there. And yes: I posted a comment because without comments I wouldn't read a link in the first place, and others may think likewise. So that's my motivation.
- ja2ke 18y ago
  That's fine. So many of the one sentence summaries (including the one for this article) read to me as being very dismissive, or as if the author hopes that their comment will encapsulate so much that you can glean the information or "learn the lesson" of the parent article through the summary, and now don't need to bother reading the post. If that wasn't your intent, then awesome, points to you. It is definitely how they almost always read in my mind, though. I know the HN community is growing and the spread of topics pushed to the front page is expanding, but the original point of letting a user type in a headline and then letting the community vote up interesting ones should in theory at least alleviate the need for a summary. I compared the summaries to "first post" because they often feel like someone is posting them simply to post. On HN you obviously couldn't "post for the sake of posting" with an actual First Post, but typing up a sentence summarizing the first or last paragraph of the post is probably close to the bottom of an innocuous "post just because you can" contribution.
mechanical_fish 18y ago
First: Obviously even a one-sentence capsule review contains far more relevant information than the words "first post". They are not at all the same thing. Second: If 200 new movies came out every day, the one-sentence newspaper movie review would be a much more highly respected genre. Third: What does motivation have to do with it? If a cult of Cthulhu worshipers arrives on the site and tells me that their god demands that they provide neat capsule summaries of content as a guide for those of us who are deciding what to read, why should I care what their motivation is? Unless it turns out that reading their prose brings me face to face with a hitherto nameless existential dread that will haunt me throughout my days, in which case I'll probably downmod them. [1] Finally: If someone posts an inaccurate capsule summary, rebut it. Such an exchange could end up being more interesting than the article itself. The reason I come to HN is to watch HN community members react to things. --- [1] It is also important that no goats be harmed in the making of Hacker News. Their blood donations must be strictly monitored by ASPCA veterinarians.

by ja2ke 18y ago

albertcardona 18y ago

I wanted to encourage people to read a well-thought blog post on job interviews and the meaning of free advice given there. And yes: I posted a comment because without comments I wouldn't read a link in the first place, and others may think likewise. So that's my motivation.

ja2ke 18y ago
That's fine. So many of the one sentence summaries (including the one for this article) read to me as being very dismissive, or as if the author hopes that their comment will encapsulate so much that you can glean the information or "learn the lesson" of the parent article through the summary, and now don't need to bother reading the post. If that wasn't your intent, then awesome, points to you. It is definitely how they almost always read in my mind, though. I know the HN community is growing and the spread of topics pushed to the front page is expanding, but the original point of letting a user type in a headline and then letting the community vote up interesting ones should in theory at least alleviate the need for a summary. I compared the summaries to "first post" because they often feel like someone is posting them simply to post. On HN you obviously couldn't "post for the sake of posting" with an actual First Post, but typing up a sentence summarizing the first or last paragraph of the post is probably close to the bottom of an innocuous "post just because you can" contribution.

mechanical_fish 18y ago

First: Obviously even a one-sentence capsule review contains far more relevant information than the words "first post". They are not at all the same thing. Second: If 200 new movies came out every day, the one-sentence newspaper movie review would be a much more highly respected genre. Third: What does motivation have to do with it? If a cult of Cthulhu worshipers arrives on the site and tells me that their god demands that they provide neat capsule summaries of content as a guide for those of us who are deciding what to read, why should I care what their motivation is? Unless it turns out that reading their prose brings me face to face with a hitherto nameless existential dread that will haunt me throughout my days, in which case I'll probably downmod them. [1] Finally: If someone posts an inaccurate capsule summary, rebut it. Such an exchange could end up being more interesting than the article itself. The reason I come to HN is to watch HN community members react to things. --- [1] It is also important that no goats be harmed in the making of Hacker News. Their blood donations must be strictly monitored by ASPCA veterinarians.