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Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

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Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#1

Post by sw007 »

I joined Hacker News around 5 years ago. I used to wake up and do the grim commute each morning to London from my home and the only thing that made it vaguely ok was Hacker News. It was a great place to go and find interesting articles from genuinely passionate people. It also used to be a really safe place to launch a startup that you'd spent days, weeks, years on - your project. It was a place where you could launch your startup and know you'd get great constructive feedback. People may not necessarily like your site but they'd admire you for having the balls to launch it, for spending time developing something that you hoped could benefit people in some way. They'd want you to succeed and they'd try and help you succeed with feedback that would ultimately help you. Unfortunately, today's Hacker News audience is no longer the same. Today's Hacker News is a place where users want to snipe at other users and find negative aspects to anything thing submitted. No longer does someone say 'This and this I like but this needs work'. Oh no, now the response is 'Hate this, hate that, this is pointless.'. Hacker News now is about correcting grammar and points scoring. It is pointing out anything negative at all that anyone has done, has said. It is no longer a safe place. It has fast become an acidic forum.

I've launched 2 projects (11kclub and Favilous) on here over the last year - both got a similar response. There was nothing constructive, it was just sniping - they saw someone had put themselves up there and they just shot them down. It's a real shame. I hope one day the site returns with the kind of audience it once had. Until that happens, I won't be going on my favourite site anymore - the commute just got a whole lot longer.

For now I wish you all the best...

Thanks

Steve

Re: Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#3

Post by bhousel »

What projects are you working on now?

If you're still stuck with a long commute and you are looking for something to build, you could try your hand at a Hacker News replacement. There are certainly enough people here jaded by the toxicity that would make the jump someplace new.

My only piece of advice, if you decide do this, don't post it as a "Show HN". Reach out to smart people privately to beta test it.

Re: Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#4

Post by untog »

Sigh.

Personally, I don't have a problem with people being negative. 99% of startups fail, and I think it's worthwhile reminding people of that every now and then. Hacker News shouldn't live in some magical land where everyone is going to make the next billion dollar company.

If you truly, genuinely, believe in your idea then you can take the negativity in your stride. There will be plenty of constructive feedback buried in there somewhere. If you can't take a little negativity directed towards your project, then maybe you're in the wrong business. And maybe it is a bad idea. Sometimes it's best to find that out and move onto a new idea, rather than bathe in the vague compliments of your peers.

Re: Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#7

Post by petercooper »

bhousel wrote: post #3

What projects are you working on now? If you're still stuck with a long commute and you are looking for something to build, you could try your hand at a Hacker News replacement. There are certainly enough people here jaded by the toxicity that would make the jump someplace new. My only piece of advice, if you decide do this, don't post it as a "Show HN". Reach out to smart people privately to beta test it.

Still somewhat under the radar (and it's not mine, nor am I even a user) but https://lobste.rs/ seems to be something along those lines.

Re: Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#9

Post by AznHisoka »

untog wrote: post #4

Sigh. Personally, I don't have a problem with people being negative. 99% of startups fail, and I think it's worthwhile reminding people of that every now and then. Hacker News shouldn't live in some magical land where everyone is going to make the next billion dollar company. If you truly, genuinely, believe in your idea then you can take the negativity in your stride. There will be plenty of constructive feedback bu…

I agree. Perhaps ppl need to preface their posts by saying they're doing a project for fun, and not to make money. That would soften some of the comments. But if ppl really think a project is doomed as a business, I'd prefer it they tell me the truth, even if it hurts.

If anything, the quality of the posts here are starting to suck because very few actually help you make money. I don't care about the latest PhantomJS technology, etc. There needs to be more ppl like patio11.

Re: Why I now, unfortunately, hate Hacker News..

#10

Post by tokenadult »

Steve, I wish you all the best for your project. Could you please tell us more about your latest project?

(A thought: if you launch a public-facing project and announce it here on Hacker News, most of the reactions you get will be like reactions from the general public. If your code base is not exposed to view of hackers, as it would be as a GitHub submission, many of us will only be able to comment on, for example, whether or not we see typos in the copy on your public-facing Web pages, and not on how cool your technical solutions are. That probably generates mostly negative--or at least, consumer-oriented--feedback, rather than hacker feedback, but maybe that is helpful too. I can say as someone who has written for a living in a journalistic organization and also has worked as an editor that every writer needs an editor, because every writer overlooks some of his or her own mistakes, if only because of being busy and tired.)

For what it's worth, I continue to find interesting (and uplifting) things to read here on HN after 1369 days here. But I don't read every thread here. I don't suppose that anyone reads HN exhaustively anymore. Maybe reading a different sample of threads here will help you get more enjoyment and encouragement out of HN again. Good luck.

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