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Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

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Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#151

Post by dang »

ryandrake wrote: post #70
kibwen wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me, the worst thing is how few comments show up by default in the comments sections. As a moderator of a large subreddit, the new UI is unusable because I can't quickly glance over a massive thread, I'd have to click through to a hundred sub-pages. If they ever remove old.reddit.com, I don't know what I'd do. It's a shame, because the redesign has some actually useful tools that I'd like to be using, but the basi…

It's madness. Even old.reddit.com is littered with "load more comments" links that you have to keep clicking through to read. A comments section with 2000 comments should be easy to serve in a single static page. It's just text!

I agree and it will be a fine day when HN doesn't do that anymore.

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#152

Post by barbs »

tiotempestade wrote: post #75
kibwen wrote: post #15

As others will be quick to point out, HN does have ads in the form of job postings for YCombinator startups that are delivered inline with the links on the front page. That said, it's relatively unobtrusive. And of course, the existence of HN is a large part of the marketing for YCombinator itself. Personally, I'll commend dang for doing a high-effort job at moderation, and tolerating all the dunking on Paul Graham t…

> As others will be quick to point out, HN does have ads in the form of job postings for YCombinator startups that are delivered inline with the links on the front page. The way all ads should be? :) Succinct, relevant and unobtrusive

And non-tracking!

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#153

Post by asdff »

mostlysimilar wrote: post #54

Hot take: I think the lack of mobile support is a feature, not a bug. Mobile interfaces are responsible for much of the noise of mainstream social media, they encourage short form content creation because the interface is too simplistic and typing on a tiny touchscreen keyboard is unpleasant and error-prone. By making the only viable interface a desktop interface you put up an additional barrier to that type of noise…

The HN interface is mostly fine but the vote buttons certainly need to increase by 100% for mobile versions. I can't reliably hit them without zooming in quite a lot. It wouldn't dumb down the UI or anything to make the hitbox larger for these arrows if your viewport is so large.

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#154

Post by asdff »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #57
mostlysimilar wrote: post #54

Hot take: I think the lack of mobile support is a feature, not a bug. Mobile interfaces are responsible for much of the noise of mainstream social media, they encourage short form content creation because the interface is too simplistic and typing on a tiny touchscreen keyboard is unpleasant and error-prone. By making the only viable interface a desktop interface you put up an additional barrier to that type of noise…

I’m reading this on a phone, right now, and it’s perfectly usable.

OK now try and upvote this comment without missing the arrow. If you do, you have a lot more dexerity than I do at least. Its usable but certain elements are a little too small where it makes me misclick.

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#155

Post by asdff »

kzrdude wrote: post #47

Thank you HN for showing (essentially) the same list of stories on the front page for everyone. A shared display of common topics is a good foundation for a good forum.

OTOH it changes dramatically with time and certain topics seem to end up below the fold, even if its a couple hours old post with a lot of engagement. I wish there was a chronological sort with a threshold vote filter, I guess I can get that from hnrss though.

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#156

Post by SpeedilyDamage »

dang wrote: post #147
SpeedilyDamage wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a straightforward example of capitalism because it doesn't earn enough through its service to support itself, and must be propped up by an otherwise external entity. The concept of "private ownership" is not definitionally identical to the concept of "capitalism", I hope you realize...

That's an interesting question. It's true that HN doesn't earn revenue and that it could not stand on its own. But it's also true that YC is more valuable with HN than without it. I think you have to mark that in capitalism's column, even if it's a weird edge case. Maybe more companies should be more open to more weird edge cases and maybe that would make them richer and therefore more capitalist? I don't know.

My focus was on the word "straightforward" more so than trying to argue that HN isn't "capitalism".

It's definitely capitalism, and arguably highly effective at that, I just don't think it's "straightforward" is all.

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#157

Post by SpeedilyDamage »

smbullet wrote: post #148
SpeedilyDamage wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are free to finance whatever they want, I don't care, it's just not a "straightforward" example of capitalism when they do. Spend money to make a thing -> sell that thing for more than it cost to make it. That's not happening here.

That's an interesting misconception of what capitalism is. I had not seen that one before. Thank you for sharing.

For what it's worth, I Googled "Define: capitalism" and when I saw:

> an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit.

I synthesized this to what I wrote above. If you disagree that's fine, but I think "for profit" is a critical aspect of capitalism, and while it's arguably true that HN provides YC with "a profit" it's an intangible and indirect one, which to me is not "straightforwardly capitalistic".

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#159

Post by 93po »

kibwen wrote: post #15

As others will be quick to point out, HN does have ads in the form of job postings for YCombinator startups that are delivered inline with the links on the front page. That said, it's relatively unobtrusive. And of course, the existence of HN is a large part of the marketing for YCombinator itself. Personally, I'll commend dang for doing a high-effort job at moderation, and tolerating all the dunking on Paul Graham t…

I use hckrnews.com and everyone else should too. Not seeing those ads is a nice side effect

Re: Tell HN: Thank you for being fast, almost ad-free and text-only

#160

Post by 93po »

asdff wrote: post #155
kzrdude wrote: post #47

Thank you HN for showing (essentially) the same list of stories on the front page for everyone. A shared display of common topics is a good foundation for a good forum.

OTOH it changes dramatically with time and certain topics seem to end up below the fold, even if its a couple hours old post with a lot of engagement. I wish there was a chronological sort with a threshold vote filter, I guess I can get that from hnrss though.

hckrnews.com is exactly what you are asking for, I use it exclusively
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