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Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

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Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#251

Post by dang »

Ok, I've finally had a chance to look at this properly. It's clear that putting noreferrer on sites selectively was bad, and I'm sorry. This should have been obvious beforehand, and I just missed that.

The OP is incorrect that we did this for just one site. We did it for several sites—all the sites we knew about which were punishing HN referrers and which users had complained to us about.

The consensus in the current thread, as well as in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36249414 and emails, is that a better approach is simply to put noreferrer on outgoing links in general. I've made that change now.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#252

Post by josephcsible »

dang wrote: post #251

Ok, I've finally had a chance to look at this properly. It's clear that putting noreferrer on sites selectively was bad, and I'm sorry. This should have been obvious beforehand, and I just missed that. The OP is incorrect that we did this for just one site. We did it for several sites—all the sites we knew about which were punishing HN referrers and which users had complained to us about. The consensus in the current…

Even though what you ended up doing wasn't my first choice, I'm way happier with it than I would have been with removing noreferrer from the abusive sites.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#253

Post by arp242 »

dang wrote: post #251

Ok, I've finally had a chance to look at this properly. It's clear that putting noreferrer on sites selectively was bad, and I'm sorry. This should have been obvious beforehand, and I just missed that. The OP is incorrect that we did this for just one site. We did it for several sites—all the sites we knew about which were punishing HN referrers and which users had complained to us about. The consensus in the current…

Most times I found out that one of my articles was on the HN frontpage was because I got a spike in traffic and news.ycombinator.com was the most common referrer; now it's "spike in traffic, maybe it's HN?" which isn't really an improvement. This applies even more to other authors who won't think "maybe it's HN?" and will never show up here as a result, which would be a loss IMO.

The Asahi people still won't be able to "soft block" HN, so nothing changes for them. It's punishing everyone because some people threw a hissy fit.

Lobsters has a "compromise approach", where it sends referrers for the first hour after posting and then stops sending them [1] (not sure if it really helps to "disincentivize content marketers" as the comment says; they generally don't seem to care as long as they can spam out their links), but that may be a more complex change to make. This is how I discovered that Lobsters exists a few years ago: somone people posted my article and I "found" it in the refers, so I asked for an invite and replied to some comments.

[1]: https://github.com/lobsters/lobsters/blob/2981689c26a1bd2461...

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#254

Post by CuriousCosmic »

gaius_baltar wrote: post #196
solarkraft wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone sensitive to this kind of thing may already perceive this comment as offensive (because it contains an arguably overreaching suggestion and a hint of disgust), which seems like a good explanation for the strong response. Because I'm not directly emotionally involved I can make the following response: > he should probably just own it if it is indeed him Well, maybe, but consider that he may just not want to. T…

One question however: would Linus accept merging the commits signed by a pseudonym? Or Asahi patches would not be upstreamed due to this?

At least initially they need someone else signing off with them and potentially even submitting on their behalf. But as it is now, it looks like if you submit high quality contributions for a sustained duration, they can eventually submit as just themselves.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#255

Post by dang »

arp242 wrote: post #253
dang wrote: post #251

Ok, I've finally had a chance to look at this properly. It's clear that putting noreferrer on sites selectively was bad, and I'm sorry. This should have been obvious beforehand, and I just missed that. The OP is incorrect that we did this for just one site. We did it for several sites—all the sites we knew about which were punishing HN referrers and which users had complained to us about. The consensus in the current…

Most times I found out that one of my articles was on the HN frontpage was because I got a spike in traffic and news.ycombinator.com was the most common referrer; now it's "spike in traffic, maybe it's HN?" which isn't really an improvement. This applies even more to other authors who won't think "maybe it's HN?" and will never show up here as a result, which would be a loss IMO. The Asahi people still won't be able…

It's true that some people discover HN through referers. In fact, one of the best contributors I know found Hacker News that way.

Perhaps we should go back to the status quo ante. To be honest I'm not sure what to do.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#256

Post by arp242 »

dang wrote: post #255
arp242 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most times I found out that one of my articles was on the HN frontpage was because I got a spike in traffic and news.ycombinator.com was the most common referrer; now it's "spike in traffic, maybe it's HN?" which isn't really an improvement. This applies even more to other authors who won't think "maybe it's HN?" and will never show up here as a result, which would be a loss IMO. The Asahi people still won't be able…

It's true that some people discover HN through referers. In fact, one of the best contributors I know found Hacker News that way. Perhaps we should go back to the status quo ante. To be honest I'm not sure what to do.

It seems to me that:

1. Don't send referrers at all because some sites pick up on them.

2. Don't send referrers for specific sites because we know they pick up on them.

Are essentially the same, except that with (1) you're also losing all the benefits.

Or maybe HN just shouldn't muck about with referrers at all. IMHO the entire thing seems petty and childish from the Asahi people (and also jwz and others), but they have a right to be that. Then again, you'll end up with lots of confusion in the comments and the work-arounds are trivial (see: all the archive links to bypass paywalls).

The Lobsters "compromise solution" will result in links working for some and then not for others, which would be very confusing.

I don't envy your position, but but adding noreferrer to everything seems like the worst option.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#257

Post by zen_1 »

000ooo000 wrote: post #183
0_____0 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My opinion: HN has a particular culture and attitude to discussion that can be grating for non-users. One example: HNers tend to approach topics as if they have a solid grasp on the context of a matter, and are often negative, hence dang's plea against 'middlebrow dismissal.' Another example: the common practice of leading rebuttals to a comment with "No. \n" While that's OK here, there are a lot of people who would…

I use that leading "No" as a marker for comments I can safely ignore. I think there's a fair chance the author lacks enough humility for an honest reflection on their position if they think it's appropriate to start their contribution to a discussion with a single paragraph of "No." It's somehow a more grating version of "well ackshually".

No.

;)

I tend to agree with you (finding the leading No\n grating when it's used as a "well actually" replacement) but ime its sometimes used by people from cultural backgrounds where the standard for communication is more direct than what the English-speaking world is used to, and not intended to come across as smug or know-it-all, and I don't mind it as much in those cases.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#258

Post by Veen »

bitwize wrote: post #250
Veen wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So your solution is to ban everyone who disagrees with you? In fact, your solution is to ask HN to take an explicitly political position of no relevance to its intended purpose, and then ban everyone who objects to that?

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#259

Post by 000ooo000 »

zen_1 wrote: post #257
000ooo000 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use that leading "No" as a marker for comments I can safely ignore. I think there's a fair chance the author lacks enough humility for an honest reflection on their position if they think it's appropriate to start their contribution to a discussion with a single paragraph of "No." It's somehow a more grating version of "well ackshually".

No. ;) I tend to agree with you (finding the leading No\n grating when it's used as a "well actually" replacement) but ime its sometimes used by people from cultural backgrounds where the standard for communication is more direct than what the English-speaking world is used to, and not intended to come across as smug or know-it-all, and I don't mind it as much in those cases.

That's an interesting angle that I had not considered - cheers for sharing.

Re: Hacker News evading criticism by selectively adding noreferrer to certain links

#260

Post by ezekg »

dang wrote: post #255
arp242 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most times I found out that one of my articles was on the HN frontpage was because I got a spike in traffic and news.ycombinator.com was the most common referrer; now it's "spike in traffic, maybe it's HN?" which isn't really an improvement. This applies even more to other authors who won't think "maybe it's HN?" and will never show up here as a result, which would be a loss IMO. The Asahi people still won't be able…

It's true that some people discover HN through referers. In fact, one of the best contributors I know found Hacker News that way. Perhaps we should go back to the status quo ante. To be honest I'm not sure what to do.

FWIW, I had a hard time determining the source of a spike of traffic today because it had no referrer. It ended up being from HN, coming from some auxiliary discussion happening on a run-of-the-mill comment I made. I saw the rel=noreferrer on my link and was curious if it was new (because I had always remembered seeing HN referrals), and it was.

I personally like the referrer. People will always complain, and you shouldn't feel too inclined to please or slight people like this who are openly hostile to the HN community.

But you do what you think is best for HN, of course. Just my $0.2.

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