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Can we also skip the submissions asking people not to post things instead of just letting the community decide the same way it's been done for years?
No. See: http://ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html. In particular "The worst thing to post or upvote is something that's intensely but shallowly interesting."
Oops. I submitted mine then saw this request. In hindsight I see this is a horrible thing to do and is not in line with the seriousness we face in the world today. I will stop writing humorous posts and go back to watching the price of silver and purchase a the fresh water tanks I've been thinking about. Looking for a way to vote down submissions...
"Life is a piece of shit, when you look at it
Life is a laugh & death´s a joke, it is true
You will see its all a show, keep em laughin as you go
Just remember that the last laugh is on you"
P.S. I am still trying to figure out which one of you is Tyler Durden.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess it's something to complain about. It might be best for some to remember: Hacker News is not work. Reading is a supplement to work. If the Jokes bug you, maybe you can take the day off and get something done. Furthermore, if it was work, if you can't take 1 day away from it to have a little fun, you are going to going to beat the rest of us into a pine box. Life isn't about what you get - it's about enjoying w…
Life isn't about what you get - it's about enjoying what you get. This is a superb axiom to live by.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Meta-discussions can be tiresome, but communities die if content is chosen strictly by popularity. Some moderation must be applied, and the most important things to moderate are the things that are popular but subtly undermine the site's purpose. In this particular case the poster is being very reasonable: no lame submissions. "Joel on Coal" is a good example. That might have been funny as h*ll back when Joel was blo…
> no lame submissions Why not? What's so bad about them? A submission is are only annoying if it is upvoted often enough, but then, there are obviously enough people out there who don't find it "lame". So saying "don't post lame submissions" is essentially the same as saying "don't post submissions which I personally don't like".
I don't think that I'm asking people not to post stuff I don't like. For one think I like some of the stuff I'm asking people not to post. Yes, I like lame jokes. I don't think "lame" and "dislike" are strongly correlated. If people upvote something, it could be popular yet lame in some way. And if people don't want to see it on HN, they might still like it.
Here's an example. I like puns. I especially like spur of the moment puns. But quite honestly, puns are usually a fairly low form of joke. They rarely have any kind of serious insight into the human condition. I don't mull over puns and repeat them as anecdotes years later.
So, I can tell you that something to do with a pun would be (a) enjoyable to me, but (b) lame, therefore (c) I wouldn't submit it to HN, I'd probably tweet it.
We aren't really discussing puns, but i use them to try to illustrate the idea that there are things that I might like or you might like that are funny and fun and worth repeating, but they don't necessarily belong on HN. I don't blame you for liking such things, just as I'm not ashamed of enjoying a pun.
So perhaps "lame" is a bad word, because it is pejorative. Perhaps the suggestion might be "Don't post April Fool stories that lack any real insight or clever prank that takes you in." Lame might be the wrong word.
But I think the idea is worth discussion, the question of whether there are things someone likes that shouldn't be on HN. I agree that the rule "Don't post stuff I don't like" is wrong, as is any proxy for that idea.
And thank you for raising an interesting question.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Life isn't about what you get - it's about enjoying what you get. This is a superb axiom to live by.
It's also very unambitious. Life's also about working to get what you want, then enjoying what you wanted so much, then realizing that you wanted something more, and then working harder to get that as well.
+1. I'm just going to start replying to the April Fool's articles as though they are serious, annoying the submitters who will have to reply to me. Someone is wrong on the Internet! (Wow, xkcd is 3d today!)