A Pre-History of Slashdot • Hacker News Board

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#71

Post by 300bps » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:23 PM UTC

MattGrommes wrote: post #45

Slashdot user #578 here. :) Besides pre-web stuff like Usenet and BBS boards /. was the first place I really felt like part of a community. I still remember fondly the times that stuff I submitted made it to the front page (like the story announcing the title of Star Wars Episode 1), like I was now "famous" with a bunch of people I really wanted to impress. Like most of us, I drifted away a long time ago but I'm alwa…

Like most of us, I drifted away a long time ago

I just checked and was shocked I remembered my password there.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#72

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:24 PM UTC

KGIII wrote: post #31

conesus wrote: post #11

I never publicly announced this but I loved Slashdot’s friend/foe system so much that I built it as a cross browser extension for Hacker News. It’s called Hacker Smacker and it’s on GitHub. https://github.com/samuelclay/hackersmacker Supports not only friends and foes but also friends of friends and foes of friends. Makes it easy to scan the HN homepage and comment threads and see what’s good. Much like how Slashdot’…

I have wanted HN to have a friend/foe system since I first found the site. I'd also like it to have the ability to make notes, like 'farkies' from Fark. On Slashdot, you simply add them to a friend or for list. On Fark, you get to flag them in certai colors and then leave yourself a note (other people can't see it but admins probably can) that I use to remind me of why I put them on the list. I'd like a combination o…

[deleted]

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#73

Post by soulskill » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:25 PM UTC

I was with Slashdot for 8 years. There are a lot of memories I could share, but the thing I appreciated most about my time there was just how much Rob (and the core team of engineers and editors) really cared about the site and its users. It's rare to see such conviction from tech companies or leaders of large, user-centric websites.

I'm not sure Slashdot's users ever really understood how much time and energy Rob expended defending the site from user-hostile changes tossed without concern from the upper echelons of the org chart.

Thanks Rob.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#74

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:26 PM UTC

KGIII wrote: post #31

conesus wrote: post #11

I never publicly announced this but I loved Slashdot’s friend/foe system so much that I built it as a cross browser extension for Hacker News. It’s called Hacker Smacker and it’s on GitHub. https://github.com/samuelclay/hackersmacker Supports not only friends and foes but also friends of friends and foes of friends. Makes it easy to scan the HN homepage and comment threads and see what’s good. Much like how Slashdot’…

I have wanted HN to have a friend/foe system since I first found the site. I'd also like it to have the ability to make notes, like 'farkies' from Fark. On Slashdot, you simply add them to a friend or for list. On Fark, you get to flag them in certai colors and then leave yourself a note (other people can't see it but admins probably can) that I use to remind me of why I put them on the list. I'd like a combination o…

[deleted]

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#75

Post by geezerjay » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:28 PM UTC

moxious wrote: post #58

zokier wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everyone (who was someone) read Slashdot Yeah, they had good concentration of people "who were someone". HN had similar thing going on too; I wonder what's the next one is going to be...

There's not going to be a next one, there's going to be 10. 20 years ago the web was a much smaller place, and a few billion people currently online weren't even aware that the place existed. Now, the population has exploded and there will be lots of different sites, all good in different ways, to "nurture the next generation of nerds". In different languages, too. Growth, evolution -- all good.

> There's not going to be a next one, there's going to be 10.

I don't agree. People tent to congregate on online forums that achieved critical mass, and tend to flock where everyone already is. Plenty of slashdot alternatives, including slashdot clones, were already launched across the ages, and they never succeeded attracting the same level of content and same sort of community. Well, except HN which, at least to me, represents a far improvement.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#76

Post by peter303 » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:28 PM UTC

Five digit slashdot here and star post name, but I have most switched to Hacker news. HN updates immediately, raises highest voted topics to top. I notice both cover the same articles. The slashdot ads are a lttle annoying.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#77

Post by johansch » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:28 PM UTC

Ahh, memories. (I'm slashdot user #9784.)

I remember when our tiny company (with a 2 Mbit/s uplink, iirc) was slashdotted:

https://ask.slashdot.org/story/00/05/27/2227209/thoughts-on-...

I was running (our homebrew) web server with debug output in an xterm (with timing details for every request served) throughout this ordeal, just to be sure it didn't screw up. (We didn't really have a thorough testing regime, ahem.)

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#78

Post by delinka » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:28 PM UTC

Has someone yet curated a list of All Slashdot Polls Concerning or Mentioning Cowboy Neal?

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#79

Post by AndrewStephens » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:34 PM UTC

I remember the early days of slashdot fondly, although I didn't actually make an account until a few years later. It was such an interesting mix of serious discussion, in-jokes, and amusing trolls (even the infamous goatsx troll that I fell for more than once.)

I still think that the moderation and meta-moderation was one of the most interesting experiments in a self-governing commenting system, even though it was clear that it was mostly a failure in the long run. My conclusion is that a site needs hands-on human moderation to maintain quality.

Slashdot is also a perfect example of the general life-cycle of cool social site. Humble beginnings -> lots of interesting people -> own little subculture -> lots of interesting content with some impenetrable in-jokes -> existing userbase ages out as they get jobs or have kids -> less interesting content, more in-jokes -> owners sell -> dry husk of a site remains.

Re: A Pre-History of Slashdot

#80

Post by Isamu » Thu, Oct 05, 2017, 5:34 PM UTC

chrissnell wrote: post #68

User #5825 here. Here are a few of my favorites: The whole anti-Microsoft movement on /. Thy were the evil empire and Google was saintly. It’s funny how times change. The weather station we sent you in hopes of doing a promotion for our weather equipment site, weathertools.com. OOG THE CAVEMAN. He was DevOpsBorat at least a decade before Twitter. The launch of Mac OS X and the launch of the first titanium PowerBook.…

> That CPU startup that Linus was a part of. Most disappointing build-up ever. LOL

Yeah, Transmeta. That whole "stealth mode" startup mystery kept the buzz going.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmeta

Re Microsoft the evil empire: it was deserved at the time. But it's nice to see they have a better reputation these days.