21–30 of 177 posts
I have a somewhat radical, sadly not novel suggestion: build what you're looking for. I now have a semi-private "HN Reader" which has completely broken my HN habit while still feeding me stuff I might be interested in. Because I built it, I can make it do anything I want. I've started to turn it into a slightly broader search engine so that I can find the things that I'm looking for; I got sick of seeing search engin…
1-There is bound to be heated arguments whenever two rational people with different circumstances & a different thought process are asked to opine on any issue with less than an obvious resolution. If you're uncomfortable watching a rigorous back & forth. Try North Korea.
2- You do realize you're asking a question of a social nature. you're contributing to making HN less of a technical forum.
3- Nobody forces you to read comments. The community does a pretty good job both down-voting comments rife with negativity or without any value. (maybe even this one)
I'm sorry, but it seems to me you're trolling.
To me, all they needed were a small handful of dedicated posters/commenters (and to be open, i'm looking at you lobste.rs) to start to catch on; i'm very much reminded of the story of the reddit founders sockpuppeting to make the site not look like a ghost town; this kind of 'forced' activity doesn't seem to be necessary for long until the site would take on it's own life.
I have a somewhat radical, sadly not novel suggestion: build what you're looking for. I now have a semi-private "HN Reader" which has completely broken my HN habit while still feeding me stuff I might be interested in. Because I built it, I can make it do anything I want. I've started to turn it into a slightly broader search engine so that I can find the things that I'm looking for; I got sick of seeing search engin…
And if you build the next HN, please add an API
>Heated arguments that make me feel bad after reading the comments instead of enlightened 1-There is bound to be heated arguments whenever two rational people with different circumstances & a different thought process are asked to opine on any issue with less than an obvious resolution. If you're uncomfortable watching a rigorous back & forth. Try North Korea. 2- You do realize you're asking a question of a social na…
1) There is a very big difference between a heated argument and an argument. Maybe it's just a side effect of the medium we are using, but everyone seems to have so much trouble being civil. For example, instead of suggesting that OP go look to North Korea, you could have said "For me, the heated discussions are a good thing" or something similar.
2) OP realizes that HN isn't a technical forum, and isn't asking for it to change.
3) Comments are a massive part of the value that HN provides, and even if OP were to stop reading the comments, he'll still see the same mix of articles on the front page.
What you're looking for can be found in HN, and is appreciated by many people, but does perhaps need a bit of support and encouragement.
I'm sad this part of the net has been fading into obscurity the last ten years especially since its alternatives have proven to be inadequate. Its greatest power was it being decentralised and thus couldn't be policed by anyone, the variety and custom readers.
Its greatest weak point was perhaps the trolls. Maybe others can supply more weaknesses?
Really, what does Hackernews as a website have over f.e. a newsgroup alt.news.hackers?