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

Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

arthurcnops.blog

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 455 posts

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#191

Post by righthand »

foxmoss wrote: post #152
marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I don't actually mind AI-aided development, a tool is a tool and should be used if you find it useful, but I think the vibe coded show HN projects are overall pretty boring. They generally don't have a lot of work put into them, and as a result, the author (pilot?) hasn't generally thought too much about the problem space, and so there isn't really much of a discussion to be had. The cool part about pre-AI show HN is…

As someone who posts blogs and projects out of my own enjoyment, no AI for code generation, handed edited blog, I still have no idea how to signal to people that I actually know what I’m talking about. Every step of the process could’ve been done by an LLM, albeit worse, so I don’t have a way of signifying my projects as something different. Considering putting a “No LLMs used in this project” tag at the start but th…

You’re not actually at risk of being labeled as LLM user until someone comes and make that claim about your work. So my advice is to not try to fight a preemptive battle on your tone and adjust when/if that day comes.

Side note: I’d think installing Anubis over your work would go a long way to signaling that but ymmv.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#192

Post by password4321 »

dang wrote: post #177

Yes, we need to do something about this and tomhow and I are talking about it - it's not clear yet what. Raising the quality bar would likely cut down on quantity as a side effect, and that would be a nice solution. One idea that a user proposed is a review queue where experienced HN users would help new Show HN submitters craft their posts to be more interesting and fit HN's conventions more.

I recommend making "What are you working on [this weekend/weekly]" official like whoishiring and encouraging pre-Show HN comments there. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47041973#47043174 "what's the right venue for sharing [LLM-built side projects]")

Also requiring disclosure of the use of AI in repos and especially (or perhaps specifically discouraging its use) when responding with comments to HN feedback.

I'll take this opportunity to strongly encourage sharing prompts (the newest tier of software source code) as the logical progression of OSS adding additional value to Show HN.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#194

Post by righthand »

wreath wrote: post #182
onetimeusename wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a fear I have about AI for programming (and I use them). So let's say we have a generation of people who use AI tools to code and no one really thinks hard about solving problems in niche spaces. Though we can build commercial products quickly and easily, no one really writes code for difficult problem spaces so no one builds up expertise in important subdomains for a generation. Then what will AI be t…

> Then what will AI be trained on in let's say 20-30 years? Old code? It's own AI developed code for vibe coded projects? I’ve seen variation of this question since first few weeks /months after the release of ChatGPT and I havent seen an answer to this from leading figures in the AI coding space, whats the general answer or point of view on this?

The general answer is what they’re already doing: ignoring the facts and riding the wave.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#195

Post by PaulHoule »

majicDave wrote: post #185
jstrieb wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If those announcement posts don't take off, how do you end up finding a community of users/players?

It’s different every time, but basically “marketing”. No matter where you are showing your stuff, it’s in a subset of the population, chances are HN won’t be buying your app subscription. You need to get it in front of your actual audience.

See also "Product Hunt". Oddly it's been about a year since I've noticed anybody who mistakes a Product Hunt launch for a marketing plan but that used to be endemic.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#196

Post by Retr0id »

2001zhaozhao wrote: post #164

This is part of a bigger problem with vibe coding IMO. It's not just Show HN but signaling credentials in general. How would you signal that you actually put effort into your project on a resume or social event/presentation when others could just vibe-code some good looking but nonetheless unusable projects and show that off instead?

I've thought about this. Even in the pre-LLM era, projects were rarely judged by the quality of their source code. READMEs and slick demos were the focus. So in some sense nothing has changed.

The difference now is that there is even less correlation between "good readme" and "thoughtful project".

I think that if your goal is to signal credentials/effort in 2026 (which is not everyone's goal), a better approach is to write about your motivations and process rather than the artefact itself - tell a story.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#197

Post by jebarker »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I don't actually mind AI-aided development, a tool is a tool and should be used if you find it useful, but I think the vibe coded show HN projects are overall pretty boring. They generally don't have a lot of work put into them, and as a result, the author (pilot?) hasn't generally thought too much about the problem space, and so there isn't really much of a discussion to be had. The cool part about pre-AI show HN is…

> a tool is a tool

> author (pilot?) hasn't generally thought too much about the problem space

I’ve stopped saying that “AI is just a tool” to justify/defend its use precisely because of this loss of thought you highlight. I now believe the appropriate analogy is “AI is delegation”.

So talking to the vibe coder that’s used AI is like talking to a high level manager rather than the engineer for human written code

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#198

Post by carabiner »

phaser wrote: post #52

I launched an idea 75 days ago, here as Show HN. It snowballed into a little community and a game that now sells every day. Maybe not an overnight sensation but the encouragement I found in the community was the motivation that i needed to take it further to a bigger audience. It was not just a product launch for me. I was, sort-of in a crisis. I had just turned 40 and had dark thoughts about not being young, creativ…

Your site https://microlandia.city and OP blog https://www.arthurcnops.blog/death-of-show-hn/ as well as most personal sites posted on HN are almost always inaccessible via my corporate job's firewall. Does anyone know why this is? Something with security certificate? They're not explicitly blocked, because you get a "this is blocked" page in that case. With these sites they just show a "can't connect" error.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#199

Post by vitaflo »

SCdF wrote: post #178
yoyohello13 wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a sci-fi series I've followed religiously for probably 10 years now. It's called the 'Undying Mercenaries' series. The author is prolific, like he's been putting out a book in this series every 6 months since 2011. I'm sure he has used ghost writers in the past, but the books were always generally a good time. Last year though I purchased the next book in the series and I am 99% sure it was AI generated. None…

Yes, I have not bought a few books after reading their free chapters and getting suspicious. Honestly: there is SO much media, certainly for entertainment. I may just pretend nothing after 2022 exists.

When I do YouTube searches I tend to limit the search to video’s prior to 2022 for this reason.

Re: Is Show HN dead? No, but it's drowning

#200

Post by co_king_5 »

airstrike wrote: post #59
marginalia_nu wrote: post #10

I don't actually mind AI-aided development, a tool is a tool and should be used if you find it useful, but I think the vibe coded show HN projects are overall pretty boring. They generally don't have a lot of work put into them, and as a result, the author (pilot?) hasn't generally thought too much about the problem space, and so there isn't really much of a discussion to be had. The cool part about pre-AI show HN is…

we need a Vibe HN

[dead]
Post reply on HN