4 ms·
Ask HN: Can a domain be shadowbanned?
A couple of days ago, I posted this:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9393122
It got 4 upvotes in the first 20 minutes or so, presumably from people I work with because I'd shared it in a work chatroom. But it never appeared on the front page and sank off /newest pretty quickly. At the time, I saw something else on the front page that only had 3 upvotes.
I don't think I'm shadowbanned, because I've posted other stuff that people have responded to in the past. Hence the question; the domain is for my employer's dev blog so I just wanted to check. Could it be / is it shadowbanned?
- philbo 12y agoClickable: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9393122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9393122
- DanBC 12y agoHN has a number of protective mechanisms. No-one but HN staff knows exactly what these are. I think that sharing a post in a work chatroom - causing a rapid influx of upvotes - will trigger one of those mechanisms. Asking for upvotes is not allowed and that seems to be what you inadvertently did. There are domains that are banned on HN - submitting those will get you either a "try again" message, or will post an article that shows in your feed as dead. Your submission isn't either of those. It is a bit frustrating that good posts (like yours) are caught by the filters, especially when there are people who spew out two or three submissions a day to not particularly good articles or there are vote-rings who've learnt to stagger their upvotes over a few hours. EDIT: if you had noticed quickly and then emailed HN they may have been able to remove the penalty. I think they've said they will do that. It might be worth submitting the post again in a few days?
- staunch 12y agoYou most likely set off the voting ring detector which then penalized your post, making it drop off.