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One of the other commenters brought up an interesting point: the audience for HN and the teams YC pick are completely different demographic groups. I don't thi

One of the other commenters brought up an interesting point: the audience for HN and the teams YC pick are completely different demographic groups. I don't think it started out that way; in fact I know it didn't. But over time we went from "watercooler for hackers" to "stuff that interests hackers" to "stuff that interests hacker wannabes" to something-else, not sure what to call it. Maybe "stuff that hacker wannabes like and most techies are interested in" That probably sounds overly-critical of HN, and I apologize if I could have said it better. I just don't think the comparison works the way this author intended it to. The key issue here is this: does HN have a progression? Is there some sort of goal where after consuming it for a while you become a better person or learn something useful about the world or yourself? (useful enough to offset the time you spend here) In YC there's a format, a goal, clear steps, and you're going somewhere. HN -- anymore? -- it's a hangout. A place you could spend all day picking up little shiny things. I believe it would be very easy to find more value added by HN, here and there. One guy learns how to program, one guy hooks up with a founder, one guy learns critical things about startups, and so on. And I think if you added up all of those cherry-picked cases, you'd probably end up with more value than YC (for some definition of the word "value"). As an aggregate, however, it's a no-brainer. YC wins. They teach teams to have a clearly-defined external goal and then teams begin a journey towards reaching that goal. (Note that you can't do this analysis with numbers. This is an entirely subjective question along the lines of "Do you like ice cream?" and should be treated as such)

eksith 14y ago
That's just par for the course with an evolving definition of "hacker". All forums change eventually. Sure, you can nudge it in this way or that, but there's no way to steer it in any particular direction completely so it will go wherever the crowd dictates. Think how many times you've thought about what you're about to write will be received. That hesitation is unfortunate.
blablabla123 14y ago
>I don't think it started out that way; in fact I know it didn't. But over time we went from "watercooler for hackers" to "stuff that interests hackers" to "stuff that interests hacker wannabes" to something-else, not sure what to call it. Maybe "stuff that hacker wannabes like and most techies are interested in" Can you put some more arguments behind that? Like: HN is having more/less articles about XYZ, therefore it's less interesting for real hackers. Also I am curious what your definition of hacker is. I have the impression that what you really mean is 'But over time we went from "watercooler for tech entrepreneurs" to "stuff that interests tech entrepreneurs" to "stuff that interests wannabe entrepreneurs" to something-else...' I was just looking at some screenshot of HN in 2008 and I have problems to see a great difference.
Udo 14y ago
Every time someone tries to assert that HN is by now a low-quality "hacker wannabe" hangout I can't help but feel offended. Probably like many of us here, I'm a hacker in the sense that I love writing code. I like to have stimulating discussions with smart, like-minded people who offer new perspectives. And while I'm at it, I like startups, too. While I have no personal connection to YC, I like hearing from their companies first hand because they are interesting. I think it's great that people doing startups (YC or not) sometimes post their demo online here on HN. I also love to hear from hackers who did nifty one-offs on the weekend. And open source projects. And in-depth discussions about programming. And hacker culture. The whole thing. I am also clearly not one of the Old Crew. You have been a fan of the band since before they became cool and I have not. I get it. But for all that talk about evaporative cooling, let's not forget that every community needs fresh blood to survive. More often than not, I feel I'm in the right place here. Even if that perception turns out to be false, there are countless other new users who definitely are enriching this community immensely. Could HN be improved? Absolutely. But every time someone like you suggests that this is a nearly meaningless and diluted forum where inane wannabes try to sell stuff to each other, I feel like you're attacking me and, more importantly, other users who provide exponentially more value than I do. If you want to "add value" to HN, excellent, please work on doing that. A first step would likely involve stopping to make it and its users look bad. What you are doing is simply sabotage from the inside and it's exacerbated by the fact that you are one of the most influential users around here. By making it appear desolate, you participate actively in dragging it down. We can agree on the need for continued improvement without suggesting that everyone but the Old Crew are idiots. There is something else in your comment that just rubs me the wrong way. It reminds me of that time-honored trick where someone first totally demolishes the worth of a person or company, only to portray themselves as seeing the hidden "potential" seconds later and then magnanimously suggest how they're going to rescue said person/company. I apologize if this is unjustified, but it is the impression I got from your post. By the way, I believe one of the easiest ways to improve something right now is by committing yourself to vote down snappy low quality one-liner comments that add nothing to the discussion.
- DanielBMarkham 14y ago
  I usually don't reply, but your comment seems heartfelt. 1. If you want to be offended, be offended. Can't help that. My statement was full of qualitative generalizations. Nobody meant you in particular, but you're welcome to feel that way if you like. 2. I never said HN was useless or should be avoided. In fact, I feel just the opposite: I like coming here and posting and commenting. Too much, in fact. 3. Things have good qualities and they have bad qualities. Simply because I like coming here doesn't make HN good, and simply because it has bad qualities doesn't make it not worth visiting. Look, I'm just calling it as I see it. I've spent a lot of time here - some useful and some wasted. I've thought long and hard about the role of technology and online communities in my life. These are the conclusions I've reached. As I said, this entire question is a value judgment about personal opinion. I like ice cream but parts of this ice cream suck. You love ice cream and love everything about this ice cream. It's silly to get emotional about discussions like this -- they are simply opinion questions. Thanks for your comment. Sorry if it rubbed you the wrong way. I should have been more diplomatic, but it's how I feel. ADD: "nearly meaningless and diluted forum where inane wannabes try to sell stuff to each other" -- I did not say this, and this is not how I feel. I simply said that participating in the community, where people find things of interest and share them can become something you do all of the time instead of doing something useful with your life. HN is not meaningless and does not exist to sell things to people, although it does look a bit like a platform for YC PR, which is fine with me. If you're interested in more of my premise, here you go: http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2009/02/technology_is_h.php http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2009/02/technology_is...
jiggy2011 14y ago
HN is far from perfect but it's hard to think of a better tech forum with such a broad scope. Most tech forums seem to devolve quickly into fanboy shit throwing fests (yes you can find that here but at least the shit tastes marginally better). Some of the most interesting posts here often seem to hang around the bottom third of the front page I find. I sometimes wonder if a small amount of categorisation might help though. For example: "General programming / computer science theory" , "practical platform specific development topics" , "startups specific news / advice" , "general tech news" , "other sciences and general interest"
- youngerdryas 14y ago
  Divisions will only dilute. Multiple threads on the same topic in different slightly overlapping categories etc. I don't use Scala but occasionally see something interesting that I read that I wouldn't otherwise. It is quite amazing that HN has held up as well as it has. I am of the opinion that the reason we don't have a mobile stylesheet is that pg is trying to subtley slow the site while still keeping it open to all.
onemorepassword 14y ago
I would say it is way more healthier if the community progresses and moves on to something else rather than HN changing. Successful platforms desperately trying to expand their usefulness or audience has rarely been a good thing. Which is what I like about HN. It's not the 800 pound gorilla in the hacker-community space, it's not desperately trying to find commercial success and it's not locking us in with value we cannot easily leave behind. There is room for someone else to come up with something better, and if we all move there I'm sure nobody at YC is going to lose any sleep over it.

eksith 14y ago

That's just par for the course with an evolving definition of "hacker". All forums change eventually. Sure, you can nudge it in this way or that, but there's no way to steer it in any particular direction completely so it will go wherever the crowd dictates. Think how many times you've thought about what you're about to write will be received. That hesitation is unfortunate.

blablabla123 14y ago

>I don't think it started out that way; in fact I know it didn't. But over time we went from "watercooler for hackers" to "stuff that interests hackers" to "stuff that interests hacker wannabes" to something-else, not sure what to call it. Maybe "stuff that hacker wannabes like and most techies are interested in" Can you put some more arguments behind that? Like: HN is having more/less articles about XYZ, therefore it's less interesting for real hackers. Also I am curious what your definition of hacker is. I have the impression that what you really mean is 'But over time we went from "watercooler for tech entrepreneurs" to "stuff that interests tech entrepreneurs" to "stuff that interests wannabe entrepreneurs" to something-else...' I was just looking at some screenshot of HN in 2008 and I have problems to see a great difference.

Udo 14y ago

Every time someone tries to assert that HN is by now a low-quality "hacker wannabe" hangout I can't help but feel offended. Probably like many of us here, I'm a hacker in the sense that I love writing code. I like to have stimulating discussions with smart, like-minded people who offer new perspectives. And while I'm at it, I like startups, too. While I have no personal connection to YC, I like hearing from their companies first hand because they are interesting. I think it's great that people doing startups (YC or not) sometimes post their demo online here on HN. I also love to hear from hackers who did nifty one-offs on the weekend. And open source projects. And in-depth discussions about programming. And hacker culture. The whole thing. I am also clearly not one of the Old Crew. You have been a fan of the band since before they became cool and I have not. I get it. But for all that talk about evaporative cooling, let's not forget that every community needs fresh blood to survive. More often than not, I feel I'm in the right place here. Even if that perception turns out to be false, there are countless other new users who definitely are enriching this community immensely. Could HN be improved? Absolutely. But every time someone like you suggests that this is a nearly meaningless and diluted forum where inane wannabes try to sell stuff to each other, I feel like you're attacking me and, more importantly, other users who provide exponentially more value than I do. If you want to "add value" to HN, excellent, please work on doing that. A first step would likely involve stopping to make it and its users look bad. What you are doing is simply sabotage from the inside and it's exacerbated by the fact that you are one of the most influential users around here. By making it appear desolate, you participate actively in dragging it down. We can agree on the need for continued improvement without suggesting that everyone but the Old Crew are idiots. There is something else in your comment that just rubs me the wrong way. It reminds me of that time-honored trick where someone first totally demolishes the worth of a person or company, only to portray themselves as seeing the hidden "potential" seconds later and then magnanimously suggest how they're going to rescue said person/company. I apologize if this is unjustified, but it is the impression I got from your post. By the way, I believe one of the easiest ways to improve something right now is by committing yourself to vote down snappy low quality one-liner comments that add nothing to the discussion.

DanielBMarkham 14y ago
I usually don't reply, but your comment seems heartfelt. 1. If you want to be offended, be offended. Can't help that. My statement was full of qualitative generalizations. Nobody meant you in particular, but you're welcome to feel that way if you like. 2. I never said HN was useless or should be avoided. In fact, I feel just the opposite: I like coming here and posting and commenting. Too much, in fact. 3. Things have good qualities and they have bad qualities. Simply because I like coming here doesn't make HN good, and simply because it has bad qualities doesn't make it not worth visiting. Look, I'm just calling it as I see it. I've spent a lot of time here - some useful and some wasted. I've thought long and hard about the role of technology and online communities in my life. These are the conclusions I've reached. As I said, this entire question is a value judgment about personal opinion. I like ice cream but parts of this ice cream suck. You love ice cream and love everything about this ice cream. It's silly to get emotional about discussions like this -- they are simply opinion questions. Thanks for your comment. Sorry if it rubbed you the wrong way. I should have been more diplomatic, but it's how I feel. ADD: "nearly meaningless and diluted forum where inane wannabes try to sell stuff to each other" -- I did not say this, and this is not how I feel. I simply said that participating in the community, where people find things of interest and share them can become something you do all of the time instead of doing something useful with your life. HN is not meaningless and does not exist to sell things to people, although it does look a bit like a platform for YC PR, which is fine with me. If you're interested in more of my premise, here you go: http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2009/02/technology_is_h.php http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2009/02/technology_is...

jiggy2011 14y ago

HN is far from perfect but it's hard to think of a better tech forum with such a broad scope. Most tech forums seem to devolve quickly into fanboy shit throwing fests (yes you can find that here but at least the shit tastes marginally better). Some of the most interesting posts here often seem to hang around the bottom third of the front page I find. I sometimes wonder if a small amount of categorisation might help though. For example: "General programming / computer science theory" , "practical platform specific development topics" , "startups specific news / advice" , "general tech news" , "other sciences and general interest"

youngerdryas 14y ago
Divisions will only dilute. Multiple threads on the same topic in different slightly overlapping categories etc. I don't use Scala but occasionally see something interesting that I read that I wouldn't otherwise. It is quite amazing that HN has held up as well as it has. I am of the opinion that the reason we don't have a mobile stylesheet is that pg is trying to subtley slow the site while still keeping it open to all.

onemorepassword 14y ago

I would say it is way more healthier if the community progresses and moves on to something else rather than HN changing. Successful platforms desperately trying to expand their usefulness or audience has rarely been a good thing. Which is what I like about HN. It's not the 800 pound gorilla in the hacker-community space, it's not desperately trying to find commercial success and it's not locking us in with value we cannot easily leave behind. There is room for someone else to come up with something better, and if we all move there I'm sure nobody at YC is going to lose any sleep over it.