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It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

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Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#91

Post by acjohnson55 »

concinds wrote: post #61

I think as reddit continued to decline, more people here became interested in debating politics, societal stuff since there was no other "serious" place for it. I wish some of that stuff wasn't here, since it takes away from discussions in other threads. But (and I hope dang sees this) occasionally when HN "strays" away from tech it's absolutely brilliant. There's tons of discussion here on some health issues, diets,…

I think it's almost the opposite. There are great subreddits for pretty much every niche in programming. HN is one size fits all, and a lot of content just never makes the front page, because of bad luck in the New queue, or it's too niche.

The front page is the way it is because the regulars and the regular content have reached an equilibrium.

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#93

Post by kwertyoowiyop »

GlennS wrote: post #83
concinds wrote: post #61

I think as reddit continued to decline, more people here became interested in debating politics, societal stuff since there was no other "serious" place for it. I wish some of that stuff wasn't here, since it takes away from discussions in other threads. But (and I hope dang sees this) occasionally when HN "strays" away from tech it's absolutely brilliant. There's tons of discussion here on some health issues, diets,…

I agree with your overall thrust, but I certainly wouldn't have picked those examples. The diet threads just make me roll my eyes and think "Californians will believe anything"! (Sorry California, I know you don't all fit the stereotype.)

Have you had avocado toast? It’ll rock your world, seriously.

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#94

Post by sneak »

wly_cdgr wrote: post #71

This is the social media arm of a for-profit startup incubator business. The "hacker" is just corny branding, man

Your first sentence is true and relevant. Your second is, in a certain light, false (and a bit mean). pg is definitely a hacker in the traditional sense, and much of the stuff posted here is on topic for hackers in the TMRC sense.

The shift in the last few decades is that hacking is now a thing that can result in becoming an accidental millionaire. That's going to have societal and cultural effects on the community, like it or not.

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#95

Post by thrower123 »

I find I have to flag/hide about a third of the front page every time I visit to filter out the really boring dreck. Most of it comes from a couple dozen of domains, like npr, guardian, washpost, nytimes, nature, cbc, cnbc, newyorker, atlantic, etc, which does make the filtering easier.

The biggest thing is just that after so many years here, there's very little new to discuss; most topics have been beaten to a bloody pulp, and you know what people are going to say before you even read the comments.

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#96

Post by lsiebert »

derefr wrote: post #77
lsiebert wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hackers have long been interested in politics/culture/public policy. There has always been a strong anti-authoritarian ethos to hacker culture, one where personal privacy and bodily autonomy and the right to encryption were intrinsically at odds with corporate and government attempts to control and surveil, and I hope that doesn't go away.

> Hackers have long been interested in politics/culture/public policy. Well, yes, but usually from an aesthetic perspective, rather than a moralistic one. E.g. bad laws and cronyism being seen as ugly hacks and misfeatures on what could be a beautiful and elegant system of law ; the cleverness of computer intrusion being more important than its consequences ; the Internet (Tor, cryptocurrency, whatever) "routing arou…

I mean there is and has been wide diversity in thought within the hacker community, so there's certainly people who view things only through asthetics.

But I don't think that erases the presence of explicitly moral/ethical thoughts within the hacker community. The philosophical and political manifest in the hacker community in many forms: anarchic, communal, utopian, anti authority, anti centralization, pro equality and merit, etc.

For example: From The Hacker Manifesto

"... You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're the criminals...."

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Hacker_Manifesto

also see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_wants_to_be_free https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#97

Post by drfxyjhdyfrhgc »

birtoise wrote: post #63
tomc1985 wrote: post #32

There is an alternate defintion of hacker, that of the "startup hacker" or "growth hacker," that this site seems to follow more closely. Disappointing, for sure.

Yeah. It is less of a “roots” definition of hacker and more of a “how can I hack the system to get rich with technology”.

>To the popular press, "hacker" means someone who breaks into computers. Among programmers it means a good programmer. But the two meanings are connected. To programmers, "hacker" connotes mastery in the most literal sense: someone who can make a computer do what he wants—whether the computer wants to or not. [0]

[0] http://www.paulgraham.com/gba.html

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#98

Post by cushychicken »

blondin wrote: post #52
cushychicken wrote: post #34

You might enjoy lobste.rs more for straight tech content.

you don't happen to have a spare invite? it still works on invite right?

Anyone can view. Need an invite to post. I just lurk.

Re: It's weird that most of “Hacker” news is dominated by business news

#100

Post by jolux »

LordDragonfang wrote: post #31
jolux wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really think it makes the site worse. I’m already an avid Twitter user, I come to Hacker News for discussions and content that I couldn’t find anywhere else. The political discourse on here is just lower-quality and less interesting than on Twitter.

If you think the discourse here is lower quality than on twitter, I'd really like to know how you're curating your twitter feed.

Aggressively. I'm constantly following new people and unfollowing loads of other people. I try to keep a good mix of tech, music, and philosophy in with all the policy and politics. I also liberally mute and block. Only way to make it usable, but the result is far better than political discourse on Hacker News.
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