16 ms·

Svbtle is probably one of the most misunderstood companies we've funded. Partly because what they're doing is hard to understand, and partly because Dustin has

by pg 14y ago

Svbtle is probably one of the most misunderstood companies we've funded. Partly because what they're doing is hard to understand, and partly because Dustin has alienated a few people along the way, who now in the usual way with haters want to misunderstand what Svbtle is. One of the reasons Svbtle is hard to understand is that it's a work in progress. At its current fairly fuzzy resolution, it's what I'd guess a traditional magazine evolves into when it hits the Internet: a loose confederation of lightly edited writers with their own individual reputations. Beyond that few of the details are figured out. But costs are low and traffic is growing steeply, so although in most cases I'd be nagging founders to figure out more details, in this case I've advised Dustin to let this grow and see what it turns into. I encourage neutral observers to do the same: let's see what this turns into. And as for the haters, it's fine with me if you want to keep hating. Though this was not a deliberate strategy by Dustin (he is actually confused and hurt by all the hate), being controversial is actually a good thing for a publication.

oinksoft 14y ago
Can we all agree to stop calling critics "haters"?
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- glomph 14y ago
  Especially when many of them are making quite long and thought out points. Haters seems appropriate to me only when applied to the most vacuous of comments. Real points deserve real responses or at least the respect of being called comments or criticisms not hate.
  - nchlswu 14y ago
    That's fair, but I feel like the majority of comments I've read through appear that the poster cannot separate the prospects of Svbtle with their perception of Dustin and his brand. Those aren't critics. They're haters.
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    - Avshalom 14y ago
      The prospects of Svbtle are directly related to the brand of the people involved though.
      - nchlswu 14y ago
        If I understand you correctly, you're saying Dustin's reputation can negatively affect the prospects of Svbtle. While Dustin's brand own brand spills over into Svbtle's, I think the network's prospects can be sufficiently differentiated from Dustin's brand. Seems to me that the network is becoming large enough where the "tech blog" echo chamber opinion (about one individual) is inconsequential to Svbtle's fate
        alexqgb 14y ago
        That also suggests that if Svbtle were to find its way into something good, Curtis may not be seen as essential to ongoing success, whatever that may be. It's founder as catalyst, rather than architect, making it more like Twitter, less like Apple.
- geuis 14y ago
  @teej No, but it makes you into one too.
- kmfrk 14y ago
  It's just baffling to see a public response so low on the taxonomic scale of debate. I couldn't agree more. It reminds me of pg's response to the Airbnb case.
  - lobster_johnson 14y ago
    I must have missed that, what as "the Airbnb case"?
    - kmfrk 14y ago
      I'm away from my desktop computer (and Opera's bookmark sync doesn't work on my MacBook Air, the PoS), but these two articles seem to capture the imbroglio well enough: - http://www.pehub.com/114113/what-not-to-do-in-a-crisis-%E2%80%93-lessons-from-the-airbnb-fiasco/ http://www.pehub.com/114113/what-not-to-do-in-a-crisis-%E2%8... - http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/30/how-the-hell-is-this-my-fault/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/30/how-the-hell-is-this-my-fau...
      - lobster_johnson 14y ago
        Thanks!
- pg 14y ago
  I think not. Haters are distinctive enough that it would make the language less expressive to discard the word and merge it into "critic." I'm slow to adopt new words, but I think "hater" is a useful addition to the language, and not simply a pejorative version of "critic." The difference is that a critic is what you're called as a byproduct of being critical in a particular instance, whereas being a hater is an ongoing state of mind. So for example it is reasonable to say "he was sometimes a critic of the administration's policy" but not to say "he was sometimes a hater of the administration's policy." "Hater" is not a pejorative version of "critic" so much as a negative version of "fan." In fact the distinctive thing about a hater is how uncritical his responses are.
  - diminish 14y ago
    but 'hater' smells like a categorical ad hominem attack which may kill any critical thinking against someone 'you' like. neither 'i hate', nore 'you are hater' belong to a mindful discussion where experiences and reasonings collide, imho. edit: despite saying that, i am indeed a curious follower of dustin curtis, which i learned during recent discussions, he was fiercely and mostly wrongly criticized. (namely, i have personal positive impression in my limbic system for him).
  - waterlesscloud 14y ago
    Then isn't the word "haters" misapplied here? What I've seen in this thread is that people have reasons for disliking Dustin, some of which directly relate to Svbtle. To the extent that they don't directly relate, though, people are quite explicitly saying they evaluate Svbtle separate from Dustin. And by far the most common reaction expressed is a lack of understanding any valid business model for the network, which in your op you say is quite understandable. What I don't see in this thread is any willful misconstruing of the project. Which seems to be the requirement for a "hater".
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    - pg 14y ago
      HN users are sophisticated enough not to simply post comments saying "I hate Dustin Curtis." Here they resort to something more akin to concern trolling. The way you can tell something is amiss is the volume of commenters who seem worried about e.g. how Dustin is going to make money. If most startups issued such a bland funding announcement, it would sink beneath the surface of HN with barely a ripple of comment.
- readymade 14y ago
  Perhaps instead of treating "haters" as a pejorative term one should feel inclined to stand by it. I don't see what's so odious about wanting to see assholes fail. If there's any justice or karma in the world, I'd expect it.
sharkweek 14y ago
I can appreciate an organic ecosystem, and the exclusivity of writing for Svbtle sure has an appeal, but monetization on something like this seems incredibly difficult. Do they take it a full WordPress direction with hosting, etc? Or does it fully flesh out into a reputable online magazine with ads and the like. Maybe I'm not creative enough to see another viable option, but either way, I still think it's a cool project. shrug
nodesocket 14y ago
> being controversial is actually a good thing for a publication. Very true. I am sure Dustin has a vision which obviously we don't fully see yet. Still, it seems a bit absurd for a blog to raise. But hey, let's all wait and see what comes. After all, the investment was probably in Dustin and team, and not necessary in Svbtle.
jspthrowaway2 14y ago
I don't like Dustin Curtis as a person, based on prior history (i.e., American Airlines, presumption in his articles bordering on know-it-all after accomplishing little, and so on). You might find that the majority of the haters you're talking about feel the same; there's been discussion about this recently linked elsewhere in the thread that I won't rehash here. If he's genuinely confused by the hate, that'd be surprising to me. I'm willing to be corrected on my opinion and come around, for what it's worth. That said, I couldn't care less about Svbtle, frankly, though I certainly understand what it is. Good luck with Y Combinator's investment is my sole commentary on this news: I'm smart enough to divide between Dustin Curtis and Svbtle and realize that my thoughts on and the trajectory of one don't necessarily impact the other.
- batgaijin 14y ago
  I think he's a bit of a d too, but I never heard about the AA story and just looked it up[1]. I assumed someone got fired because he was whining, but it seems AA fired someone for breaking their NDA to talk about why the website was so crappy. So, to me the story is more AA being the asshole in that story. [1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/6531610/American-Airlines-worker-fired-for-replying-to-web-user-complaint.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/6531610/America...
  - jspthrowaway2 14y ago
    When classifying assholes, there's no rule that states only one party can come out the asshole. Nobody won in that situation.
    - lucisferre 14y ago
      I'm not sure how anything Dustin did there would classify him as an asshole. Maybe I'm missing something. He blogged about not liking the aesthetics of a website, sparked a discussion with on of the designers of that site and then AA fired the guy and Dustin said that he was "horrified" that it happened. What's missing?
- 14y ago
kami8845 14y ago
I think a lot of the initial dislike stems from the svbtle/obtvse thing, where Dustin went into all-out-rage because someone cloned what amounted to not-much-more than a Wordpress theme. That and the air of superiority within the announcement: svbtle would only be used by people who are "intelligent and witty" implying that everyone who couldn't, wasn't.
- nchlswu 14y ago
  It definitely stems from both factors you mentioned. No one really knows who Dustin is and he's established a brand as a person who aspires for the best and is very opinionated. For better or for worse, most commenters only really know that about him. His response to the Svbtle clones on top of the personality he added to the Svbtle announement really acted as a tipping point for most peoples' perceptions about him. Unfortunately, like you allude to, most people also saw his reaction simply to being a stolen theme, and don't appreciate that it was intended to be much more than that. The network's introduction introduced Dustin's concept and site. If you ever visited his blog before that, it's clear he was building the site before. Part of the introduction was sharing a novel approach to the blogging workflow and get a glimpse of the CMS. If it's "just a theme," you'd imagine that people would steal some of the more interesting things, like his approach to editing, or build on it. Instead, people insisted on duplicating the theme -- some just to spite Dustin. Dustin was explicit about his goals in the beginning - to create a great publishing/blogging network. If yoiu look at how it's panned out, people are making Svbtle their personal blogs and the theme is the differentiator. writers were willing to forego a complete branding of their website and demonstrated they were willing to accept this brand. When you're working to build a brand and key piece is plagiarized (and subsequently insulted by people who don't understand the work that goes behind it), the reaction is a bit more understandable. I'm being polite. I recognize that it interpretations may differ
  - nchlswu 14y ago
    I've exceeded my editing time window, but asterisks are located before and after the italicized text. They were intended as footnotes, but I forgot I was writing in markdown
oh_sigh 14y ago
So it is huffington post with a focus on tech/startups?
huhtenberg 14y ago
> hate I suspect that a good chunk of hate comes from that Kudos widget not having an Undo. It comes across as cocky, hence the backlash.
- hornbaker 14y ago
  It has an undo, but it could be more discoverable. Click and hold on the Kudos button for a couple of seconds, then release, and the count will go back down. Works on Chrome and iOS Safari for me.
- pclark 14y ago
  Hacker News doesn't have an undo button for upvotes and no one seems to care.
  - jspthrowaway2 14y ago
    Every now and then someone will complain about it, usually after fat fingering on an iPhone.
  - jerrya 14y ago
    Yeah, but 1) there's no down-kudo, and 2) kudos are mysterious, what's a kudo, and then SURPRISE, it's a 0-click rollover vote. I find kudos deceptive for both those reasons. That's not what subtle should mean.
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  - thristian 14y ago
    I've seen a few social media sites before, and HN's upvote button looks how I expect an upvote button to look, and it's positioned where I expect an upvote button to be (next to a corresponding downvote button). Most importantly, it only activates with a mouse-click, which is the conventional way for a user to request some kind of state-change on the web. By contrast, the kudos widget looks like nothing in particular, its location doesn't correspond to any convention I'm aware of, and mild curiosity (mouseover) is taken to mean enthusiastic support. To me, the kudos widget makes me feel like somebody took advantage of me in an unguarded moment and stole a dollar. It's not much, in the grand scheme of things, but rubs me the wrong way.
beefman 14y ago
I haven't followed the Dustin-drama. In fact I don't know anything about it, but that something happened one day and he changed his tag line from "hero" to "villain". But I've followed more than a few links from Hacker News to articles on Svbtle over the past months and came away with the strong sense that they're of unusually low quality. Maybe I'm just not the target audience, but the articles I've seen have been vacuous without exception. I went to the home page just now and scrolled down and found more of the same. Having been the editor of a print magazine in a past life, I'm a fan of the curated approach, and I like much of the front-page content on Hacker News, so this surprised me. It looks like saved stories aren't public here, so I can't use them as a constructive example of content I think is good. But I use reddit for similar purposes http://www.reddit.com/user/clumma/liked/ http://www.reddit.com/user/clumma/liked/ and here are my Google +1s (from Reader) https://plus.google.com/115045287509032322837/plusones https://plus.google.com/115045287509032322837/plusones If I had to describe the Svbtle content direction, I'd say it's like somebody is randomly scraping longer comments off of TechCrunch articles and putting them into a blogging system.
- ImprovedSilence 14y ago
  >> came away with the strong sense that they're of unusually low quality I couldn't agree more. I guess I'm out of the loop of the drama involved, but every article I've read seems very light/thin, and had no real substance, outside of the standard SV gossip. I actually kinda go out of my way to avoid reading them when I see a svtle link on HN...
iuguy 14y ago
How does Svbtle distinguish itself from any of the other blogging networks that emerged towards the end of the last decade? Looking at the front page and at Ethan Kaplan's posts in an unscientific way it appears as though everyones posts on Svbtle make the front page (although I could be wrong and if so please say so - I didn't take a particularly large sample). I'm not sure where the curation is. It seems that anyone can apply to join svbtle, but it's not clear why they'd choose to versus hosting their own blog or writing online for traditional print outlets. Is there an editorial process for posts on Svbtle? I ask this because I want to get my head around what makes it special compared to other blog networks. I don't really care who Dustin is (one of the benefits of not being in the valley I guess) or what he's done/not done.
tomkin 14y ago
I think most people separate Svbtle from Dustin, although I don't think Dustin necessary is advocating for this separation himself. You can see this in the comments. When people are being critical, it generally leans towards Dustin and not the product. When people are boasting Svtble, they rarely mention Dustin. There's a reason for that. It was clear to most that Dustin was expecting adoration and when that didn't happen, the conversation changed. I don't know how many tweets, posts and "thoughts" I read where Dustin was "abandoning HN" or laying claim to "the downfall of HN"[2], only to end up back here posting some other ego-laden[3] dribble. "You're welcome", I believe is what used to be on the footer of Svtble. Really gets me thinking about how modest he is. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3749035 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3749035 [2] https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/182986897444966402 https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/182986897444966402 [3] https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/183394426914217984 https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/183394426914217984
- notatoad 14y ago
  I don't see how anybody can separate Svbtle from Dustin. The whole selling point is that it is curated by him. It's a collection of blogs from authors that he likes. The product here is Dustin Curtis's opinion, not the content or the platform. Blog posts and blogging platforms are a dime a dozen, the only differentiating factor of Svbtle is Dustin Curtis's curation.
  - tomkin 14y ago
    > The whole selling point is that it is curated by him. I disagree. I doubt Subtle is getting funded because of Dustin Curtis' audience. For funding, the conversation of "market" had to come up and if the answer to "market" was "Dustin Curtis' fanbase", the investors would have had to be nuts to proceed. How big is the "Dustin Curtis" following? Hundred? Several hundred? A few thousand? I don't think so.
    - jm3 14y ago
      At least 40,000 if Twitter followers are anything to judge by: https://twitter.com/dcurtis https://twitter.com/dcurtis
jerrya 14y ago
Congratulations to Svtble for their funding. I am curious as to what their business plan is, especially for a blog network that strives to minimalism, having an ad presence would seem anathema. And to that end, I am curious why anyone would fund them -- what is it that they offer in terms of being able to generate income that makes them more viable than say, any old "webring" that uses the same CSS? Or makes them different from various other focused blogging sites: science 2.0, freethoughtblogs, pjmedia, etc., none of which seem to be doing especially well as far as I know. My problem with svbtle is that unlike Salon/The Atlantic/ArsTechnica/JUST ABOUT EVERYONE ELSE/ since there is no masthead, or links from one svtble writer to another, so at this moment, I don't see a real difference between svbtle the company, and svtble the CSS design sheet. So I don't see how they build up brand, or how they build on top of network effects since they don't link from one author to another. (And should ads be added and mastheads and footers added well will social toolbars and unother unsubtle widgets be far behind?) And while I read svbtle when I come across it, I find their content not much better, not much worse than anyone elses. (I will say, I am much less put off by svtble writers once I had adblock plus block their 0-click kudos.)
- bpatrianakos 14y ago
  My thoughts exactly. But now you're a hater and you just don't get it. It's okay though because I'm there with you. In the end a lot of us will be searching for the answer to the question "why is this so special" and the reason we're so baffled is because we assume that the simplest answer can't be right. But I think it is! THe answer is that this is nothing more than a regular blog network with a minimalist theme and a well known SV insider. It's about the feeling and not what it actually is. Simple as that. But you know, there's really nothing wrong with that! The problem I have is that so many want to pass this off like it's something new and special when really it's the same old shit with a new name. Maybe if someone would just say "yeah, DCurtis is creating a blog network and it's cool because of who he is, who he knows, and the stylesheet" then I'd be happy and say "cool, I'll read it".
bpatrianakos 14y ago
That sounds like a wonderful idea until you take a step back and realize it's not all that profound or even interesting. I get it but at the same time it doesn't make sense. What I see is a guy who is playing kingmaker by "giving people the tools" to blog and all writing under the same banner. There's nothing to this and it basically already exists in every other blog network ever. It seems we're somehow to believe the minimalist theme and the fact that it's SV-in-crowd Dustin Curtis orchestrating this thing with fellow SV-in-crowd pals makes this something other than an ordinary blog network. On one level I get it. It's not about what it actually is, it's about the feeling, the aura, this attitude about it that makes it feel special. On the other hand, it's just another blog network. To me, I see it as the difference between Newsweek and the New Yorker. It's all about the public sentiment. Or maybe I missed the mark completely but when I hear things along the lines of "well people are haters and it's kinda hard to get but you'll see" they seem kind of like cop-outs to me. There's nothing wrong with Suvbtle at all though. No one should have a problem with the basic idea. What I, and I think others, have a problem with is the sneaky feeling that this is just another blog network and we're being told it's somehow more and special. Like we're being served hamburger but someone's calling it filet mignon. I've eaten my share of beef and I've read the Svbtle network blogs and I know when I'm being fed ground beef.
FredBrach 14y ago
What is the (unique) feature of Svbtel?

by pg 14y ago

oinksoft 14y ago

Can we all agree to stop calling critics "haters"?

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glomph 14y ago
Especially when many of them are making quite long and thought out points. Haters seems appropriate to me only when applied to the most vacuous of comments. Real points deserve real responses or at least the respect of being called comments or criticisms not hate.
- nchlswu 14y ago
  That's fair, but I feel like the majority of comments I've read through appear that the poster cannot separate the prospects of Svbtle with their perception of Dustin and his brand. Those aren't critics. They're haters.
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  - Avshalom 14y ago
    The prospects of Svbtle are directly related to the brand of the people involved though.
    - nchlswu 14y ago
      If I understand you correctly, you're saying Dustin's reputation can negatively affect the prospects of Svbtle. While Dustin's brand own brand spills over into Svbtle's, I think the network's prospects can be sufficiently differentiated from Dustin's brand. Seems to me that the network is becoming large enough where the "tech blog" echo chamber opinion (about one individual) is inconsequential to Svbtle's fate
      - alexqgb 14y ago
        That also suggests that if Svbtle were to find its way into something good, Curtis may not be seen as essential to ongoing success, whatever that may be. It's founder as catalyst, rather than architect, making it more like Twitter, less like Apple.
geuis 14y ago
@teej No, but it makes you into one too.
kmfrk 14y ago
It's just baffling to see a public response so low on the taxonomic scale of debate. I couldn't agree more. It reminds me of pg's response to the Airbnb case.
- lobster_johnson 14y ago
  I must have missed that, what as "the Airbnb case"?
  - kmfrk 14y ago
    I'm away from my desktop computer (and Opera's bookmark sync doesn't work on my MacBook Air, the PoS), but these two articles seem to capture the imbroglio well enough: - http://www.pehub.com/114113/what-not-to-do-in-a-crisis-%E2%80%93-lessons-from-the-airbnb-fiasco/ http://www.pehub.com/114113/what-not-to-do-in-a-crisis-%E2%8... - http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/30/how-the-hell-is-this-my-fault/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/30/how-the-hell-is-this-my-fau...
    - lobster_johnson 14y ago
      Thanks!
pg 14y ago
I think not. Haters are distinctive enough that it would make the language less expressive to discard the word and merge it into "critic." I'm slow to adopt new words, but I think "hater" is a useful addition to the language, and not simply a pejorative version of "critic." The difference is that a critic is what you're called as a byproduct of being critical in a particular instance, whereas being a hater is an ongoing state of mind. So for example it is reasonable to say "he was sometimes a critic of the administration's policy" but not to say "he was sometimes a hater of the administration's policy." "Hater" is not a pejorative version of "critic" so much as a negative version of "fan." In fact the distinctive thing about a hater is how uncritical his responses are.
- diminish 14y ago
  but 'hater' smells like a categorical ad hominem attack which may kill any critical thinking against someone 'you' like. neither 'i hate', nore 'you are hater' belong to a mindful discussion where experiences and reasonings collide, imho. edit: despite saying that, i am indeed a curious follower of dustin curtis, which i learned during recent discussions, he was fiercely and mostly wrongly criticized. (namely, i have personal positive impression in my limbic system for him).
- waterlesscloud 14y ago
  Then isn't the word "haters" misapplied here? What I've seen in this thread is that people have reasons for disliking Dustin, some of which directly relate to Svbtle. To the extent that they don't directly relate, though, people are quite explicitly saying they evaluate Svbtle separate from Dustin. And by far the most common reaction expressed is a lack of understanding any valid business model for the network, which in your op you say is quite understandable. What I don't see in this thread is any willful misconstruing of the project. Which seems to be the requirement for a "hater".
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  - pg 14y ago
    HN users are sophisticated enough not to simply post comments saying "I hate Dustin Curtis." Here they resort to something more akin to concern trolling. The way you can tell something is amiss is the volume of commenters who seem worried about e.g. how Dustin is going to make money. If most startups issued such a bland funding announcement, it would sink beneath the surface of HN with barely a ripple of comment.
readymade 14y ago
Perhaps instead of treating "haters" as a pejorative term one should feel inclined to stand by it. I don't see what's so odious about wanting to see assholes fail. If there's any justice or karma in the world, I'd expect it.

sharkweek 14y ago

I can appreciate an organic ecosystem, and the exclusivity of writing for Svbtle sure has an appeal, but monetization on something like this seems incredibly difficult. Do they take it a full WordPress direction with hosting, etc? Or does it fully flesh out into a reputable online magazine with ads and the like. Maybe I'm not creative enough to see another viable option, but either way, I still think it's a cool project. shrug

nodesocket 14y ago

> being controversial is actually a good thing for a publication. Very true. I am sure Dustin has a vision which obviously we don't fully see yet. Still, it seems a bit absurd for a blog to raise. But hey, let's all wait and see what comes. After all, the investment was probably in Dustin and team, and not necessary in Svbtle.

jspthrowaway2 14y ago

I don't like Dustin Curtis as a person, based on prior history (i.e., American Airlines, presumption in his articles bordering on know-it-all after accomplishing little, and so on). You might find that the majority of the haters you're talking about feel the same; there's been discussion about this recently linked elsewhere in the thread that I won't rehash here. If he's genuinely confused by the hate, that'd be surprising to me. I'm willing to be corrected on my opinion and come around, for what it's worth. That said, I couldn't care less about Svbtle, frankly, though I certainly understand what it is. Good luck with Y Combinator's investment is my sole commentary on this news: I'm smart enough to divide between Dustin Curtis and Svbtle and realize that my thoughts on and the trajectory of one don't necessarily impact the other.

batgaijin 14y ago
I think he's a bit of a d too, but I never heard about the AA story and just looked it up[1]. I assumed someone got fired because he was whining, but it seems AA fired someone for breaking their NDA to talk about why the website was so crappy. So, to me the story is more AA being the asshole in that story. [1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/6531610/American-Airlines-worker-fired-for-replying-to-web-user-complaint.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/6531610/America...
- jspthrowaway2 14y ago
  When classifying assholes, there's no rule that states only one party can come out the asshole. Nobody won in that situation.
  - lucisferre 14y ago
    I'm not sure how anything Dustin did there would classify him as an asshole. Maybe I'm missing something. He blogged about not liking the aesthetics of a website, sparked a discussion with on of the designers of that site and then AA fired the guy and Dustin said that he was "horrified" that it happened. What's missing?
14y ago

kami8845 14y ago

I think a lot of the initial dislike stems from the svbtle/obtvse thing, where Dustin went into all-out-rage because someone cloned what amounted to not-much-more than a Wordpress theme. That and the air of superiority within the announcement: svbtle would only be used by people who are "intelligent and witty" implying that everyone who couldn't, wasn't.

nchlswu 14y ago
It definitely stems from both factors you mentioned. No one really knows who Dustin is and he's established a brand as a person who aspires for the best and is very opinionated. For better or for worse, most commenters only really know that about him. His response to the Svbtle clones on top of the personality he added to the Svbtle announement really acted as a tipping point for most peoples' perceptions about him. Unfortunately, like you allude to, most people also saw his reaction simply to being a stolen theme, and don't appreciate that it was intended to be much more than that. The network's introduction introduced Dustin's concept and site. If you ever visited his blog before that, it's clear he was building the site before. Part of the introduction was sharing a novel approach to the blogging workflow and get a glimpse of the CMS. If it's "just a theme," you'd imagine that people would steal some of the more interesting things, like his approach to editing, or build on it. Instead, people insisted on duplicating the theme -- some just to spite Dustin. Dustin was explicit about his goals in the beginning - to create a great publishing/blogging network. If yoiu look at how it's panned out, people are making Svbtle their personal blogs and the theme is the differentiator. writers were willing to forego a complete branding of their website and demonstrated they were willing to accept this brand. When you're working to build a brand and key piece is plagiarized (and subsequently insulted by people who don't understand the work that goes behind it), the reaction is a bit more understandable. I'm being polite. I recognize that it interpretations may differ
- nchlswu 14y ago
  I've exceeded my editing time window, but asterisks are located before and after the italicized text. They were intended as footnotes, but I forgot I was writing in markdown

oh_sigh 14y ago

So it is huffington post with a focus on tech/startups?

huhtenberg 14y ago

> hate I suspect that a good chunk of hate comes from that Kudos widget not having an Undo. It comes across as cocky, hence the backlash.

hornbaker 14y ago
It has an undo, but it could be more discoverable. Click and hold on the Kudos button for a couple of seconds, then release, and the count will go back down. Works on Chrome and iOS Safari for me.
pclark 14y ago
Hacker News doesn't have an undo button for upvotes and no one seems to care.
- jspthrowaway2 14y ago
  Every now and then someone will complain about it, usually after fat fingering on an iPhone.
- jerrya 14y ago
  Yeah, but 1) there's no down-kudo, and 2) kudos are mysterious, what's a kudo, and then SURPRISE, it's a 0-click rollover vote. I find kudos deceptive for both those reasons. That's not what subtle should mean.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
- thristian 14y ago
  I've seen a few social media sites before, and HN's upvote button looks how I expect an upvote button to look, and it's positioned where I expect an upvote button to be (next to a corresponding downvote button). Most importantly, it only activates with a mouse-click, which is the conventional way for a user to request some kind of state-change on the web. By contrast, the kudos widget looks like nothing in particular, its location doesn't correspond to any convention I'm aware of, and mild curiosity (mouseover) is taken to mean enthusiastic support. To me, the kudos widget makes me feel like somebody took advantage of me in an unguarded moment and stole a dollar. It's not much, in the grand scheme of things, but rubs me the wrong way.

beefman 14y ago

I haven't followed the Dustin-drama. In fact I don't know anything about it, but that something happened one day and he changed his tag line from "hero" to "villain". But I've followed more than a few links from Hacker News to articles on Svbtle over the past months and came away with the strong sense that they're of unusually low quality. Maybe I'm just not the target audience, but the articles I've seen have been vacuous without exception. I went to the home page just now and scrolled down and found more of the same. Having been the editor of a print magazine in a past life, I'm a fan of the curated approach, and I like much of the front-page content on Hacker News, so this surprised me. It looks like saved stories aren't public here, so I can't use them as a constructive example of content I think is good. But I use reddit for similar purposes http://www.reddit.com/user/clumma/liked/ http://www.reddit.com/user/clumma/liked/ and here are my Google +1s (from Reader) https://plus.google.com/115045287509032322837/plusones https://plus.google.com/115045287509032322837/plusones If I had to describe the Svbtle content direction, I'd say it's like somebody is randomly scraping longer comments off of TechCrunch articles and putting them into a blogging system.

ImprovedSilence 14y ago
>> came away with the strong sense that they're of unusually low quality I couldn't agree more. I guess I'm out of the loop of the drama involved, but every article I've read seems very light/thin, and had no real substance, outside of the standard SV gossip. I actually kinda go out of my way to avoid reading them when I see a svtle link on HN...

iuguy 14y ago

How does Svbtle distinguish itself from any of the other blogging networks that emerged towards the end of the last decade? Looking at the front page and at Ethan Kaplan's posts in an unscientific way it appears as though everyones posts on Svbtle make the front page (although I could be wrong and if so please say so - I didn't take a particularly large sample). I'm not sure where the curation is. It seems that anyone can apply to join svbtle, but it's not clear why they'd choose to versus hosting their own blog or writing online for traditional print outlets. Is there an editorial process for posts on Svbtle? I ask this because I want to get my head around what makes it special compared to other blog networks. I don't really care who Dustin is (one of the benefits of not being in the valley I guess) or what he's done/not done.

tomkin 14y ago

I think most people separate Svbtle from Dustin, although I don't think Dustin necessary is advocating for this separation himself. You can see this in the comments. When people are being critical, it generally leans towards Dustin and not the product. When people are boasting Svtble, they rarely mention Dustin. There's a reason for that. It was clear to most that Dustin was expecting adoration and when that didn't happen, the conversation changed. I don't know how many tweets, posts and "thoughts" I read where Dustin was "abandoning HN" or laying claim to "the downfall of HN"[2], only to end up back here posting some other ego-laden[3] dribble. "You're welcome", I believe is what used to be on the footer of Svtble. Really gets me thinking about how modest he is. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3749035 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3749035 [2] https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/182986897444966402 https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/182986897444966402 [3] https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/183394426914217984 https://twitter.com/dcurtis/status/183394426914217984

notatoad 14y ago
I don't see how anybody can separate Svbtle from Dustin. The whole selling point is that it is curated by him. It's a collection of blogs from authors that he likes. The product here is Dustin Curtis's opinion, not the content or the platform. Blog posts and blogging platforms are a dime a dozen, the only differentiating factor of Svbtle is Dustin Curtis's curation.
- tomkin 14y ago
  > The whole selling point is that it is curated by him. I disagree. I doubt Subtle is getting funded because of Dustin Curtis' audience. For funding, the conversation of "market" had to come up and if the answer to "market" was "Dustin Curtis' fanbase", the investors would have had to be nuts to proceed. How big is the "Dustin Curtis" following? Hundred? Several hundred? A few thousand? I don't think so.
  - jm3 14y ago
    At least 40,000 if Twitter followers are anything to judge by: https://twitter.com/dcurtis https://twitter.com/dcurtis

jerrya 14y ago

Congratulations to Svtble for their funding. I am curious as to what their business plan is, especially for a blog network that strives to minimalism, having an ad presence would seem anathema. And to that end, I am curious why anyone would fund them -- what is it that they offer in terms of being able to generate income that makes them more viable than say, any old "webring" that uses the same CSS? Or makes them different from various other focused blogging sites: science 2.0, freethoughtblogs, pjmedia, etc., none of which seem to be doing especially well as far as I know. My problem with svbtle is that unlike Salon/The Atlantic/ArsTechnica/JUST ABOUT EVERYONE ELSE/ since there is no masthead, or links from one svtble writer to another, so at this moment, I don't see a real difference between svbtle the company, and svtble the CSS design sheet. So I don't see how they build up brand, or how they build on top of network effects since they don't link from one author to another. (And should ads be added and mastheads and footers added well will social toolbars and unother unsubtle widgets be far behind?) And while I read svbtle when I come across it, I find their content not much better, not much worse than anyone elses. (I will say, I am much less put off by svtble writers once I had adblock plus block their 0-click kudos.)

bpatrianakos 14y ago
My thoughts exactly. But now you're a hater and you just don't get it. It's okay though because I'm there with you. In the end a lot of us will be searching for the answer to the question "why is this so special" and the reason we're so baffled is because we assume that the simplest answer can't be right. But I think it is! THe answer is that this is nothing more than a regular blog network with a minimalist theme and a well known SV insider. It's about the feeling and not what it actually is. Simple as that. But you know, there's really nothing wrong with that! The problem I have is that so many want to pass this off like it's something new and special when really it's the same old shit with a new name. Maybe if someone would just say "yeah, DCurtis is creating a blog network and it's cool because of who he is, who he knows, and the stylesheet" then I'd be happy and say "cool, I'll read it".

bpatrianakos 14y ago

That sounds like a wonderful idea until you take a step back and realize it's not all that profound or even interesting. I get it but at the same time it doesn't make sense. What I see is a guy who is playing kingmaker by "giving people the tools" to blog and all writing under the same banner. There's nothing to this and it basically already exists in every other blog network ever. It seems we're somehow to believe the minimalist theme and the fact that it's SV-in-crowd Dustin Curtis orchestrating this thing with fellow SV-in-crowd pals makes this something other than an ordinary blog network. On one level I get it. It's not about what it actually is, it's about the feeling, the aura, this attitude about it that makes it feel special. On the other hand, it's just another blog network. To me, I see it as the difference between Newsweek and the New Yorker. It's all about the public sentiment. Or maybe I missed the mark completely but when I hear things along the lines of "well people are haters and it's kinda hard to get but you'll see" they seem kind of like cop-outs to me. There's nothing wrong with Suvbtle at all though. No one should have a problem with the basic idea. What I, and I think others, have a problem with is the sneaky feeling that this is just another blog network and we're being told it's somehow more and special. Like we're being served hamburger but someone's calling it filet mignon. I've eaten my share of beef and I've read the Svbtle network blogs and I know when I'm being fed ground beef.

FredBrach 14y ago

What is the (unique) feature of Svbtel?