http://hckrnews.com/ to avoid the 'never made it to front page' problem.
Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
41–50 of 116 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#42[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#43Look at the new page instead of the main page.
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#44The thing with HN is that there are a lot of interesting threads that get increasingly drowned in "drama" contents: stuff about politics, the NSA, silicon valley drama... See the G+ outrage lately: there are three articles about that at the top of the frontpage that say exactly the same thing with exactly the same comments. It's reddit/4chan tier "pitchforking". The problem seems to be that the community is growing q…
I think you proposal is good.
One option would be to give out some of the data that is behind HN, namely the information about who has upvoted which article. This should make it possible to create mashup which would try to learn whose thoughts about interesting arcticles match mine.
(No need to disclose the actual usernames, some anonymous identifier would be enough)
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#45Techmeme river: http://www.techmeme.com/river
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
MetaFilter has remained pleasant for years. Turns out $5 is a big enough hurdle to keep it sane.
It's the same with The Something Awful Forums. It is $10 to join, and it really helps keep the trolls out. One of the best communities on the web.
What? SA has possibly the worst community on the web. It keeps people out alright, but not trolls.
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#47The thing with HN is that there are a lot of interesting threads that get increasingly drowned in "drama" contents: stuff about politics, the NSA, silicon valley drama... See the G+ outrage lately: there are three articles about that at the top of the frontpage that say exactly the same thing with exactly the same comments. It's reddit/4chan tier "pitchforking". The problem seems to be that the community is growing q…
I like the idea of having a single thread for all related stories. That way if a particular story was generating a lot of noise it would just be one line on the front page and very easy to ignore. It would be a bit like subreddits but more dynamic, the subreddits would flit in and out of existence. Everone would still share the same front page, perhaps each line would be something like "NSA: latest story headline". The question is, what would be the best way to do the grouping?
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#48The thing with HN is that there are a lot of interesting threads that get increasingly drowned in "drama" contents: stuff about politics, the NSA, silicon valley drama... See the G+ outrage lately: there are three articles about that at the top of the frontpage that say exactly the same thing with exactly the same comments. It's reddit/4chan tier "pitchforking". The problem seems to be that the community is growing q…
Alternatively, only activate voting on comments when new users reach a certain karma threshold (does this exist already?), and only activate voting on stories when users reach a certain higher karma threshold.
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#49The thing with HN is that there are a lot of interesting threads that get increasingly drowned in "drama" contents: stuff about politics, the NSA, silicon valley drama... See the G+ outrage lately: there are three articles about that at the top of the frontpage that say exactly the same thing with exactly the same comments. It's reddit/4chan tier "pitchforking". The problem seems to be that the community is growing q…
there are three articles about that at the top of the frontpage that say exactly the same thing with exactly the same comments.
Worse, two were based on the same guy at G+ raving about the whole thing.[1]
I'm a little curious about how the stories hit the front page and have stayed up so long. I don't know if it's fully organic, if Google's reputation has really suffered that much, if it's specific to the HN community, or if someone at WaggEd[2] woke up Saturday morning, glanced at HN's submission queue, and decided they needed some nudging. Or Apple, or Oracle, or Facebook, or even some of the privacy rights groups (though Google's slightly late-to-the-game but strident opposition to NSA/PRISM surveillance seems commendable).
But by HN's metric of what's worthy of consideration[3], the story seems to resonate. And I have to say for myself, having worked in the tech field for a few decades and watched data, surveillance, and analytic capabilities mushroom, I think it's a damned good thing for people to be questioning.
That said: I'm partial to Reddit myself, if you find the right subs. And if you're into the whole drama thing, their personal information policy ain't bad either.
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Notes:
1. I happen to be that guy. And I'm pretty much just as amazed as anyone.
2. Microsoft's PR firm. Or whomever they use for online reputation management.
3. That being: stuff which makes the front page.
Re: Ask HN: What are some good alternatives to HN?
#50Reddit has gotten better recently, as long as you stay off the popular subreddits. Pick your 10 favorite hobbies or interests, and subscribe to those subreddits. It's got to be specific: not programming, but programming in Java; not electronics, but amateur radio; etc. (I will admit I enjoy r/AskReddit, which is where people write short stories in response to a prompt in the form of a loaded question. Ask Metafilter…
In my experience, any sub-reddits in my interests are filled with incredibly shallow or meme-filled posts. Never have I once thought to myself 'This subreddit is way better than [established forum/community] for this'. Maybe it's the short lifespan of posts, or voting style that promotes snark/pandering type posts, but I have yet to come across an awesome subreddit. Also, I agree with you that the more specific you g…
That's where the reddit enhancement suite comes in. I use it to hide any post that links to most image hosting sites like imgur.com and it makes all the stupid meme posts go away.