Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

Post by mursu » Tue, Mar 10, 2026, 11:03 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #539

mursu wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Greetings. Don't mean to come across as disrespectful. May I ask, have you decided on the criteria for new users to unlock restrictions? I apologize if it was already conveyed, but being new, I find myself a bit lost. I have read the guidelines and wanted to post in Show HN but then I got a message that stated that I do not have the clearance to do that yet. I must add I totally understand. I did not know about Hacke…

The problem is that there are now so many attempts to get "real quality feedback" that the entire system is in danger of collapsing. Imagine how you'd feel if Gemini pointed the rest of the internet at your inbox! Or a thousand people showed up in your garden, all wanting your attention. This isn't so far from that; HN is not so big a place, and there are only two of us supporting it. What would be best is for you to…

Post by solaire_oa » Wed, Mar 11, 2026, 5:38 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #199

dextrous wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way that I could imagine a human-only HN could evolve in the coming AI wasteland: motivated individuals join small local groups and are validated face-to-face at meet-ups. Local trusted leads gatekeep their chapter’s posts, and this scalable moderation works up the tree. Bad leaves get culled out reasonably fast, maybe there’s some controls at the top level that let you see more content “lower down the tree” if y…

In my recent experience, local meetups and groups are unexpectedly more prone to self promotion and low effort spamming. Local groups have a problem where members admit their friends or pressure others into inviting their friends who are not a net positive, but it feels too impolite to refuse or to kick someone out. Meeting someone in person also develops a sense of a social bond that makes it harder to downvote or f…

Post by TZubiri » Wed, Mar 11, 2026, 7:40 PM UTC

mosura wrote: post #515

TZubiri wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No software can do everything, Good software makes concessions. More concretely the ideal software would require a volume and speed of user input that is unfeasible, and the size and complexity of such software would balloon such that development and maintenance costs would be unfeasible, furthermore the more features, the more customization users want, so customization is an additional dimension. But sure, go make a…

This comment may yet motivate me to actually build the system in question so I can avoid having to read ones like it in future.

Post by TheChelsUK » Wed, Mar 11, 2026, 8:54 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #34

We're going to at least restrict Show HNs for a while. I do think this is relevant though: "HN can't be immune from macro trends" - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Post by dang » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 5:26 AM UTC

TheChelsUK wrote: post #547

dang wrote: post #34

We're going to at least restrict Show HNs for a while. I do think this is relevant though: "HN can't be immune from macro trends" - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Please don’t forget that some AI generated posts are helpful for those of us with disabilities who can hope to keep an online presence via a pos dictated to an agent, or need help formulating sentences. By focusing or restricting human only use you risk dehumanising those he need technological support.