How much of HN is AI? • Hacker News Board

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#191

Post by otherayden » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 5:53 PM UTC

sph wrote: post #179

yndoendo wrote: post #81

AI has turned me away from HN more and more. Most of the content is about using some data center based ML provider. My view is how so many ignore the environmental harm these constructs are doing; increasing ambient temperatures, inducing heavy metals into the water table, decreasing the access to water for human consumption in numerous drought areas, hostel ambient noise ... The wealth who are the majority finical b…

> AI has turned me away from HN more and more. AI has made me aware how opening a tab to HN is a compulsion I no longer truly enjoy. Especially after having made the conscious choice of leaving software engineering as a career, my time here is a mildly negative experience hoping for the random chance of finding a deeply technical post that is not about LLMs, or whose discussion does not devolve into discussion with J…

Consider trying https://unslop.news/ , I tried to solve this exact problem by classifying post title and webpage contents as AI or not and filtering out the AI stuff. Also, tangentially, if you're looking for a really impressive technical writeup I recently enjoyed this one :) https://philo.gay/linecam/

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#192

Post by otherayden » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 5:59 PM UTC

yndoendo wrote: post #81

AI has turned me away from HN more and more. Most of the content is about using some data center based ML provider. My view is how so many ignore the environmental harm these constructs are doing; increasing ambient temperatures, inducing heavy metals into the water table, decreasing the access to water for human consumption in numerous drought areas, hostel ambient noise ... The wealth who are the majority finical b…

I appreciate the way you sum up the ML vs traditional software appeal and I think it's helped me articulate why ML is so unappealing to me. The power of software has very little to do with the power of the machine it's run on (with some obvious exceptions like games and physics sims) which made it very exciting to me when I was learning to code. The same cannot be said about deep learning where more data and more compute means more power.

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#193

Post by conductr » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 5:59 PM UTC

runarberg wrote: post #185

conductr wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I joined in 2008, that was even after lurking for a while, and it’s almost unrecognizable now in comparison has been for many years. Was mostly entrepreneurship, tech was present but was a means to an end. It wasn’t tech for the sake of tech, which is what it feels like in the recent past. The discussion on entrepreneurship topics seems to have an employee mindset more so than an owner mindset. I find it similar to h…

I specifically remember there being a similar complaint about bitcoin back in the day, and I think somebody even SHOW HN-ed an HN front page without news about bitcoin (I went searching but failed... instead I found these two ASK HNs: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20385116 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5601876 ). As for the employee-vs-employer. I am for sure part of the problem there. When I joined I i…

I am part of the problem in the first. It's because early HNer's were early Bitcoin users and adopters and I feel we (I) had a hope that it could take hold as an actual currency (I no longer feel that). But, we were so early I can say my first Bitcoin purchase was for I put my Bitcoin on ice, refused to sell it, my initial investment thesis was "what happens to the price when all Bitcoin is mined", given the supply is fixed, the price should surge, was my thought. I think they have or will find a way to alter the algo so that even more can be mined. But once I made that decision, it became difficult to see all the Bitcoin related news. I wanted to just not think about it. Daily reminder that I could sell today at a crazy high gain is tempting. I don't even know if that thesis makes sense given the projection of when that last coin will mine. Those projections didn't exist when I put this into place. So I hodl for no reason probably.

In terms of the posting and ethos, it was really all the non-Bitcoin crypto crap that came afterwards that I got super tired of. But I am older and know it was just the current hype cycle, just like AI today, something else will come tomorrow. Although AI is kind of a big one, it's both massively hyped and useful too. It's also moving faster than I can keep up with, so I just learn to dabble where I have interest. I'm not trying to be a creator of AI or start an AI startup, it's just tinkering and when it comes to tech as a means to an end, it allows me to move faster. But it's also given everyone my superpower. Kind of a net zero with extra steps. It feels like my beloved woodworking hobby has been changed to IKEA furniture assembly which is not fun at all.

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#194

Post by otherayden » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:03 PM UTC

Legend2440 wrote: post #148

yndoendo wrote: post #81

AI has turned me away from HN more and more. Most of the content is about using some data center based ML provider. My view is how so many ignore the environmental harm these constructs are doing; increasing ambient temperatures, inducing heavy metals into the water table, decreasing the access to water for human consumption in numerous drought areas, hostel ambient noise ... The wealth who are the majority finical b…

A lot of those environmental claims are not accurate, or substantially overblown. Heavy metals in the water table is a new one I haven't heard before, and I'm skeptical. Most of this is motivated reasoning by people who don't like AI for other reasons and are just looking for justifications to shut it down.

Although there is some irrational hysteria about the whole "chatgpt is drinking all our water" thing, to me the biggest issue (other than the mass piracy) is local energy bills going up without contributing to the local economy. Seems like it would do more harm than good for all but the owners of the datacenters.

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#195

Post by redsocksfan45 » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:04 PM UTC

CoastalCoder wrote: post #139

my-next-account wrote: post #22

I swear that the amount of astroturfing in the comment field by AI bots being positive towards AI is at an all time high as well.

I'm not sure I'd be able to (confidently) tell the difference between human and SOTA bot comments. Is there something trick to it?

[dead]

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#196

Post by archagon » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:08 PM UTC

Night_Thastus wrote: post #109

yndoendo wrote: post #81

AI has turned me away from HN more and more. Most of the content is about using some data center based ML provider. My view is how so many ignore the environmental harm these constructs are doing; increasing ambient temperatures, inducing heavy metals into the water table, decreasing the access to water for human consumption in numerous drought areas, hostel ambient noise ... The wealth who are the majority finical b…

I really wish there was a way to filter out discussions about AI on HN. It feels like lately they take up a good 1/3 of posts on the front page. I don't want to hear about some new AI startup.

1/3? Try 2/3 or more. And the technical articles I used to enjoy reading are outright gone.

This is an entirely different site from what it was just a few years ago, even if the orange tint remains the same.

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#197

Post by andrehacker » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:10 PM UTC

mgl wrote: post #14

Democratization of access has its victims. I miss the old newsgroups. I wish we could land again in that weird, colorful oceans of geeky individuals with their quirks and interesting nerdy takes. 15 years ago, HN was about bootstrapping and early YC stars. 10 years ago, HN was in full VC-enterprise sauce. 5 years ago, it was crypto and NFTs, and how I switch jobs every quarter. Now it is a blurry view into the future…

Is that really the problem, though, or has the audience simply changed? It seems to me that the thoughtful deep dives of years past are still being produced, but they're buried under a much larger volume of lighter content. More importantly, many of the people working at the forefront of technology and product development appear to have moved to private communities such as Discord, Slack, and similar groups, perhaps in part because of NDAs.

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#198

Post by 16bitvoid » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:12 PM UTC

pbronez wrote: post #172

recursive wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I might migrate if I could could an invite, but I haven't been able to find anyone on the inside. Edit: Thank you kind stranger. I'm in.

I got you - invite sent to the email on your HN profile.

If you got any more, I'd appreciate one too. My email is my username at 'pm' dot 'me'

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#199

Post by dgellow » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:17 PM UTC

1dom wrote: post #157

dgellow wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW I’ve seen people complaining of the exact opposite. Difficult to say without measuring

This makes no sense to me - what's the opposite of AI astroturfing? Why are people complaining about it? Ironically, your comment could easily be a failed comment from an astroturfing LLM tasked with criticising/disagreeing with people calling out LLMs. FWIW, I checked your profile, I don't really think you're an LLM. The internet is hard now - sorry :(

I’m indeed a fleshy human :)

What I meant is that I’ve seen people complaining that the negativity towards AI on HN is manufactured and astroturfed. So we have people complaining on both ends of the debate.

I would bet that the AI booster side is way more astroturfed, but I’m very likely biased (I see genAI as a horrible mistake for human societies)

Re: How much of HN is AI?

#200

Post by FLeXMurphy » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 6:18 PM UTC

archagon wrote: post #196

Night_Thastus wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really wish there was a way to filter out discussions about AI on HN. It feels like lately they take up a good 1/3 of posts on the front page. I don't want to hear about some new AI startup.

1/3? Try 2/3 or more. And the technical articles I used to enjoy reading are outright gone. This is an entirely different site from what it was just a few years ago, even if the orange tint remains the same.

But you still have the downvotes and the flagging in case you fall out of line. Oh, and the "You're posting too fast, please slow down."