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Stop Acting Like You're Famous

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Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#161

Post by xoac »

brabel wrote: post #150
lapcat wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The comments are often better than the articles. I disagree.

Same here. The top comment we're discussing is a good example of comments I really dislike :/ people think that only things they find interesting should be upvoted by everyone else :D that kind of thinking, which is very common in HN comments, shows just how much one can lack understanding of others, their motivations, how people's tastes/objectives/world views can be completely and utterly different than their own.

I agree with the top comment but it's not for lack of understanding but for a lamentation of how this place is similar to any other social network like internet place overwhelmed with solipsistic banality.

Just look at how many comments around the site are personal anecdotes tangentially related to whatever the post is.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#162

Post by whereismyacc »

pat64 wrote: post #17

I’m going to hard disagree with this. A lot of the enjoyment I get from creation is the process of others enjoying what I’ve built. Further more, building for others is great for building out areas you’re weak or inexperienced in. Like, I was poor on the accessibility front until I found the thing I created resonated with the visually impaired folk.

I was going to say something similar, but the blog is tagged with something like 'notes for myself' which is fair.

I do enjoy writing and editing.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#163

Post by mlrtime »

lapcat wrote: post #140
rogual wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And to read the opinions that other HNers spout. The comments are often better than the articles. Also, I know I'll be able to read them without fending off popups and dark patterns.

> The comments are often better than the articles. I disagree.

"Better" is subjective...

We can debate if comments are more informative than articles and sometimes they are. Many times they are not, especially if you happen to be a SME.

Sometimes I wonder why I continue to read reddit, the signal/noise raise is very low, but when you get that 1 informative or insightful comments out of a sea of garbage, it keeps you going for awhile.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#164

Post by rsp1984 »

It really boils down to what you define as "leisure activities" and everyone is different and often multi-faceted in that regard. So this certainly fails as a one-size-fits-all advice.

There are hobbies we do out of pure enjoyment. E.g. for me personally this is (choir-)singing. I know so many people who are better singers than I am (or ever will be) yet I couldn't care less. I am 100% happy with my skill level. If anyone else comes to the conclusion that somebody else is a better singer than I, they're probably right!

Then there are hobbies we do b/c we like the skill itself or b/c we want to have what comes with it. E.g. when I do a SW or HW side-project I really do want to create the best product (as niche-y as it might be) and yes, I do care a great deal about whether others like it or not. Put simply I want to be the best b/c I can be the best. I couldn't imagine doing this just for fun. TBH the whole idea of just-for-fun side projects sounds absurd to me.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#165

Post by dgellow »

keiferski wrote: post #87
dgellow wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can make a really ugly, low quality change to a language, wait for a new generation to grow up with it and it will now be accepted as perfectly fine. There isn’t any objective notion of quality here

That doesn’t imply it’s perfectly fine, it might just mean that the arbiters have lost their ability to detect quality. Which is exactly what I think has happened.

What you call signs of quality are cultural signifiers. My native language is French, a language that has an actual gatekeeping administration (English doesn’t). The french I grew up with(not in the country of France) may be considered lower quality by some people because they aren’t used to it, but really what they mean is that I express a different set of cultural signifiers they are used to.

Unsurprisingly signs of language qualities have a tendency to reinforce the language spoken by people in power.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#166

Post by another2another »

lapcat wrote: post #134
mapreduce wrote: post #110

Why is it so that every so often one of these feel-good LinkedIn-style posts make it to the front page? Is there so much demand for banality on this site? I come here to read good tech articles or articles that stimulate my curiosity and it is sad to see these articles upvoted to the top when so many other good articles at https://news.ycombinator.com/newest continue to languish.

HN is a comment site masquerading as a news site. A large percentage of commenters go directly to the comments without ever reading the article. They just want an excuse to spout their opinions.

Well, there was the Great Slashdot Influx of 2010, where not reading TFA before commenting was a badge of honour.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#167

Post by dghughes »

lapcat wrote: post #134
mapreduce wrote: post #110

Why is it so that every so often one of these feel-good LinkedIn-style posts make it to the front page? Is there so much demand for banality on this site? I come here to read good tech articles or articles that stimulate my curiosity and it is sad to see these articles upvoted to the top when so many other good articles at https://news.ycombinator.com/newest continue to languish.

HN is a comment site masquerading as a news site. A large percentage of commenters go directly to the comments without ever reading the article. They just want an excuse to spout their opinions.

Funny you say that. I do often go to the comments because some of the people commenting here on HN are famous. If not famous they are more involved in IT or other industries at a high level.

I know I'm a nobody but it's interesting to read comments some are better than the linked articles.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#168

Post by glandium »

sph wrote: post #133
curtisblaine wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which is what bugs me about native grammar mistakes: only native people make them Why does it bug you? They are different classes of mistakes but both have driven the language over the centuries. Why are native mistakes wrong but immigrant mistakes good?

Because in my limited experience (I am fluent in only two other languages apart from English), "native grammar mistakes" only happen to native English speakers. For example, I know Italian and French, yet I cannot think of any weird misspelling only native Italian or French speakers do. I always wondered if it's because of education or how grammar is taught in Anglosaxon countries that is ultimately the root cause of…

I'm French. I can't list them off the top of my head right this moment, but there definitely are annoying errors that natives do that are in the same category as "could of".

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#169

Post by vjk800 »

iamben wrote: post #142
mapreduce wrote: post #110

Why is it so that every so often one of these feel-good LinkedIn-style posts make it to the front page? Is there so much demand for banality on this site? I come here to read good tech articles or articles that stimulate my curiosity and it is sad to see these articles upvoted to the top when so many other good articles at https://news.ycombinator.com/newest continue to languish.

I think it's similar to a well shared meme, or a self help book. Sometimes something (simple/banal(!)) just encapsulates the way a lot of people are thinking or feeling but haven't managed to verbalise. You read it and think "huh, that's very true," come back to HN and vote it up. The fact other people are doing the same is a nice justification that you're not alone in feeling that way, particularly in the midst of a…

Indeed. I think it fulfills some sort of social need to read/hear back my own thinking in slightly different and often more coherent words. It gives me a feeling of being understood, which is of course sort of artificial when writer of the text is someone who doesn't even know who I am.

It feels sort of related to the technique therapists seem to use; based on patient's rambling stories, they summarize how they feel in much more succinct way than they themselves would have been able to, which makes them feel like they are finally being understood, which often results in tears.

Re: Stop Acting Like You're Famous

#170

Post by Retric »

apples_oranges wrote: post #144
mapreduce wrote: post #110

Why is it so that every so often one of these feel-good LinkedIn-style posts make it to the front page? Is there so much demand for banality on this site? I come here to read good tech articles or articles that stimulate my curiosity and it is sad to see these articles upvoted to the top when so many other good articles at https://news.ycombinator.com/newest continue to languish.

HN is too popular, too many users water it down. I hope I will soon discover what the next place like this used to be, is now

I think the tech industry has also changed over time. I joined just as the iPhone and thus smartphone apps became a thing, but we just haven’t seen shakeups like social media, cloud computing, web frameworks, etc recently.

Crypto is effectively dead, LLM’s ended up mostly hype with limited utility, so what’s there to talk about? Random interesting side projects, retro technology, random science stuff, a bit of news, etc and that’s what HN front page looks like.

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