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Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

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Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#31

Post by stephenr »

stuxnet79 wrote: post #15
kgraves wrote: post #4

Try lobsters and probably Reddit which have a hard stance against AI. You're right in HN heading down the path in favouring slop, constant posts and startups about AI with now 'influencers' (simonw in particular) aggressively posting and shilling AI. With the moderators knowing that these 'influencers' and their kind violate the HN guidelines every day by purposefully linking back to their site for farming backlinks.…

Lobste.rs has a hard stance against AI? This can't be true. I browse the front page every so often & there seems to be a fair amount of overlap between it and HN. At least for the upvoted articles.

There isn't a hard stance against it but it's generally not well received IMO and importantly, lobsters is written by people who understand other people have different needs and they provide the option to filter out articles by tags, rather than relying on a concept of "you will see everything or you will see what the crowd deems worthy".

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#32

Post by stephenr »

sph wrote: post #29
csomar wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lobsters stance is anti-AI and cautious at best. But plenty of AI-related articles there.

I like that for all the LLM/agentic news spam they apply the tag "vibecoding" (derogatory)

And more importantly users can hide articles by tag.

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#33

Post by the__alchemist »

PaulHoule wrote: post #3

If you are feeling overwhelmed with slop posts about ai, camp on the new page and upvote any halfway decent story about something else. Many of us would thank you if they knew.

This is roughly what I've been doing. I consider it a duty: Occasionally (once or more a day) review "new". Flag any spam articles, or generic LLM hype articles; update science or non-LLM-focused technology ones.

I even upvote AI or LLM-centered articles if they're not centered on "How agents and vibe coding have/haven't/will/will not changed everything about coding" - it's these that have grown intolerable in the past few weeks.

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#36

Post by kazinator »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #7

Asking to have a tech forum in 2026 that doesn’t discuss AI is about as much of a Luddite as asking about having tech forum anytime in the past 25 years that doesn’t discuss the internet or the 15 that doesn’t discuss mobile. Absolutely everything in tech is touched by AI/ML in 2026 except micro controllers/embedded systems On another note - YC 25 batch https://www.extruct.ai/data-room/ycombinator-companies-s25/ YC 2…

Touching on a subject doesn't make something directly topical.

Makefiles touch on C programming; they are not topical in a C language forum.

Most AI discussion as a tangent to another topic is utterly unproductive, uninteresting, repetitive and off-topic. The same half a dozen points are rehashed. Most of the commentary is someone's subjective experience which nobody else can exactly replicate.

Almost everything in tech runs on switching power supplies. That doesn't mean tech forums on all subjects should tolerate intruders incessantly blathering about power supplies.

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#38

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

kazinator wrote: post #36
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #7

Asking to have a tech forum in 2026 that doesn’t discuss AI is about as much of a Luddite as asking about having tech forum anytime in the past 25 years that doesn’t discuss the internet or the 15 that doesn’t discuss mobile. Absolutely everything in tech is touched by AI/ML in 2026 except micro controllers/embedded systems On another note - YC 25 batch https://www.extruct.ai/data-room/ycombinator-companies-s25/ YC 2…

Touching on a subject doesn't make something directly topical. Makefiles touch on C programming; they are not topical in a C language forum. Most AI discussion as a tangent to another topic is utterly unproductive, uninteresting, repetitive and off-topic. The same half a dozen points are rehashed. Most of the commentary is someone's subjective experience which nobody else can exactly replicate. Almost everything in t…

Actually, talking about power in the age of AI is a big deal. It will either drive up energy cost or drive down energy cost.

80% of the companies that YC funding are AI something or the other. If your career has anything to do with technology - you are or will be directly affected by AI.

Would you have felt the same way if people complained about all of the discussions about mobile around 2009-2010? People on Usenet complaining about the browser was going to usurp the need for Gopher servers?

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#39

Post by isbvhodnvemrwvn »

kgraves wrote: post #4

Try lobsters and probably Reddit which have a hard stance against AI. You're right in HN heading down the path in favouring slop, constant posts and startups about AI with now 'influencers' (simonw in particular) aggressively posting and shilling AI. With the moderators knowing that these 'influencers' and their kind violate the HN guidelines every day by purposefully linking back to their site for farming backlinks.…

For most reddit posts you can generate some rage bait against an llm using an llm, this way you cut the middle man out. Most subreddits eat that up without a second thought.

Re: Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

#40

Post by waldopat »

Honestly, you might want to step outside tech altogether. Join a local civic or neighborhood organization or volunteer with a nonprofit. There was a nice thread last year about libraries.

Channeling Steve Blank, get out of the building! You’ll run into real problems faced by real people who often have limited exposure to both AI and tech, but who can still benefit enormously. Listening and engaging is always a good first step before jumping in to suggestions.

In this space, needs are far more data and visualization driven, which are not strictly AI related. It may also be both a useful and humbling antidote to hype cycles.

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