Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 187 posts

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#151

Post by mindcrime »

icedog wrote: post #43

Bigger problem at hand: too much non-technology related articles are being posted on Hacker News.

It's not just "non technology" it's "non technology" AND "non useful startup / business" stuff. To me, those areas, and - most importantly - the intersection of those two areas, are the best part of HN. But articles that veer off into mainstream politics, and some of the vapid "startup lite" entreporn that get posted, seem to be rising in frequency here.

Or maybe it's just that my tastes have changed, but it does seem to me that things are already starting to get somewhat watered down. Given that, I think I should have voted "no" on this poll (I voted "maybe" because I wasn't really sure at first).

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#152

Post by [deleted] »

ruswick wrote: post #132
goblin89 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you wait for him to do an AMA, then? Can't we ask questions and get answers without the help of HN—say, via email?

Famous and quasi-famous people generally don't publish their primary email. The whole point of the AMA is that it offers a public forum in which anyone can ask anything to people with whom they generally wouldn't interact.

[deleted]

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#153

Post by saraid216 »

dfc wrote: post #137
antoko wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ELI5: what are the meta implications that amuse you - for someone that just had to google "ELI5" :) (explain like I'm 5)

I too had to lookup ELI5 and am at a complete loss regarding any implications, meta or otherwise.

The implication is that HNers are more interested in Q&A sessions over what amounts to a lecture. You could frame that as positively or negatively as you like: a fixation on fame and fortune over substance; a disinterest in having someone else explain what you could learn on your own; a preference for an interactive setting rather than a receptive one; etc.

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#154

Post by chrismarlow9 »

scythe wrote: post #90

Cheap content attracts cheap commenters. The comments and questions in AMAs rarely express novel insight -- usually, someone pipes up with a popular sentiment, like asking President Obama to stop using drone strikes. Commenting in such threads, which are inevitably mobbed, gives you the illusion of significance ("Wow, X answered my question!") or worse yet they give you actual significance ("Wow, it's X, he did an AM…

I'm afraid if it happens, HN will be crowded with people that just got their first job and want to know how to build a website on godaddy and sell it to google.

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#155

Post by chrismarlow9 »

There is a website for this. It is Quora. The people who are famous and great tech people pick the questions they want to answer. A specific thread dedicated to the person is a bad idea and draws unwanted users. Letting these people pick which threads they want to respond to is the way to do it, which is something HN/Reddit/and Quora are setup for.

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#158

Post by lessnonymous »

An AMA with people like these would be awesome! I wonder if we could get them into a forum where anyone from HN (and anyone who happens by) could ask them anything.

We could set up a whole site aimed at it. Maybe we could call it reddit.com/r/IAmA ????

It would be the perfect place for anyone from HN to ask these people questions!

(Seriously: why? If you want to ask these people questions, just ask them on Reddit. Unless you can offer a better experience or audience, there's no win here.)

Re: Poll: Would HN benefit from Reddit's AMA-style posts from technologists?

#160

Post by lessnonymous »

JacobAldridge wrote: post #128

As I write this, the Yes vote is clearly leading (~1350 v ~500) but the first page of comments are almost exclusively No. If that's indicative of who we are - those engaging in discussion say No and those happier to just answer a poll question say Yes - then I definitely hope the end result is No. Edit: FWIW, I've seen links to a few Reddit AMAs on the front page here, and clicked through to some as a result. There's…

My take on this:

* Those that put in enough to just 'click' say yes.

* Those who want to participate in the conversation say 'no'.

To commit at least one logical fallacy: Those who would participate in the AMA intelligently say 'no'.

Post reply on HN