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Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
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Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#12Respectfully, i think you maybe misframing the problem.
The problem is that your emotional state and your brain is literally under the control of shit you read on the internet. So now you're asking for different shit to read. It's basically a TV addict asking for a better channel. Maybe stop watching TV all day? Unplug, meditate, reclaim your brain.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#13No post body was provided.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#14I always go back to the Dwarf Fortress forums from time to time [1]. It has the downsides of old school forums including no mobile support and limited threading. But it's often worth it.
Other complex gaming forums are great too - Paradox, Aurora 4X. Lots of hobbyist forums are great too, as long as they're not too 'normie', but discovering them has become more difficult with Reddit dominating search results.
The diversity in these places are a lot better too. It's not just tech bros, there are those who work blue collar jobs and those who work different fields, come from different countries.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#15https://lobste.rs/about is smaller but very much alike. Not sure you can consider it less cynical, but the small community seems to result in less dynamic comment sections.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#16I'm so long on hn now I get more the feeling that I'm seeing less and less really new things.
Doesn't mean it's bad it's just less interesting than it was 5 years ago.
Another startup idea from a person who just want to have a startup/unicorn.
Another hack.
Another blog article about security deep dive.
Another retro post of someone doing something like running win95 somewhere or doom running on a pregnancy test.
There are articles which I accept that I will read them but understood the basics very fast but I will not retain all those details because either you would need to learn them like you do with vocabulary or something else long lasting.
So I have to accept that it becomes casual reading
News basically.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#17You would like to find a community where cynicism is banned? I think your perspective is flawed. In tech, being correct or incorrect matters much more than optimism or cynicism. The best optimism is the kind that can withstand critical thinking. When someone says "that's not possible" it's a challenge for you to prove otherwise not a discouragement to give up. Adversarial thinking is a fundamental component of critic…
Sam Altman wrote a post on this and HN: https://www.ycombinator.com/blog/new-hacker-news-guideline "Critical thinking is good; shallow cynicism, on the other hand, adds nothing of value to the community. It is unpleasant to read and detracts from actual work. If you have something important but negative to say, that’s fine, but say it in a respectful way. Negativity isn’t the problem–gratuitous negativity is. By that…
Well I don't see what part of my post disagrees with that. You don't need to lack manners or be unconstructive to offer critical or adversarial input. negativity without merit is hostility with extra steps. That said, if negative comments lack substance, I think it should be easy to call them out and discredit them.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#18Perhaps tags would help. If each post had one or two tags, we could filter what we see by the presence or absence of certain tags.
Even so, as others have noted, simply ignoring the comment section on most posts will keep the mood less negative. Then when you see a post about something you’re really interested in, dive into the comments after reading the main content.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#19Cynicism is good for building a startup. You really have to understand how the world works in order to deliver something of value which people will accept and you can’t ride on optimism alone.
Most of the tech startups you see have one happy consumer facing side and then a messy and sometimes ugly underbelly where they really make their money.
Re: Ask HN: Similar communities to HN that are less cynical?
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sam Altman wrote a post on this and HN: https://www.ycombinator.com/blog/new-hacker-news-guideline "Critical thinking is good; shallow cynicism, on the other hand, adds nothing of value to the community. It is unpleasant to read and detracts from actual work. If you have something important but negative to say, that’s fine, but say it in a respectful way. Negativity isn’t the problem–gratuitous negativity is. By that…
Well I don't see what part of my post disagrees with that. You don't need to lack manners or be unconstructive to offer critical or adversarial input. negativity without merit is hostility with extra steps. That said, if negative comments lack substance, I think it should be easy to call them out and discredit them.
You seem to be addressing a different type of cynicism. Sam's post appears to be talking about the exact same thing as OP, but articulated better.
The problem OP speaks of is probably more accurately stated as "gratituous negativity". Not simply being critical, adversarial, or negative, but indulging in it. When people find satisfaction is seeing others fail, it biases discussions towards false negatives.
HN tried to make gratituous negativity bannable. I don't know how that turned out but it's not in the guidelines anymore.