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Quiet Hacker News

quiethn.com

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Re: Quiet Hacker News

#31

Post by unkown-unknowns »

faitswulff wrote: post #17
unkown-unknowns wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, are you being facetious or did you not catch on to the fact that the comments not being included is what makes it "quiet HN"?

Your comment reminds me why "No Feigned Surprise" is a virtue ( https://www.recurse.com/manual#no-feigned-surprise ). Yes, it is entirely possible to miss the tiny link at the bottom that says "What is this?" and even then still possible to skim or dismiss it thereafter.

I was asking genuinely because I could not tell whether the person I was replying to was being sarcastic about the idea of not having comments or if they just didn't make the connection between "quiet" and "no comments".

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#33

Post by krapp »

jessriedel wrote: post #9
gus_massa wrote: post #2

Don't forget to read the about page: http://tomspeak.co.uk/posts/quiet-hacker-news I somewhat agree. For example I try to avoid discussion with more than 100 comments. Usually the small discussions are more technical and have a better signal to noise ratio.

Agreed, but I wish HN would experiment more with new technical tools to improve civility. For all its flaws, HN is still home to some of the very best discussion, and there's no reason to throw up one's hands. For instance, removing public vote counts seems to have been a net positive (although I mistakenly opposed it at the time). Even a small nudge to get people to vote based on constructiveness rather than agree/d…

I'm not certain there is a technical solution to incivility, or at least, I suspect that technical solutions can only go so far.

Incivility is a social problem, and that requires community involvement and reinforcement of accepted norms, not attempts at operant conditioning through the UI.

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#34

Post by krapp »

gkya wrote: post #7
gus_massa wrote: post #2

Don't forget to read the about page: http://tomspeak.co.uk/posts/quiet-hacker-news I somewhat agree. For example I try to avoid discussion with more than 100 comments. Usually the small discussions are more technical and have a better signal to noise ratio.

The collapsing feature is helpful, usually longer threads wane into an infinite stream of increasingly off-topic rants. But because it happens after when the page is loaded, it messes up the feature where when you navigate history it jumps to where you left, and with collapsed comments it scrolls past there.

Long threads are paginated too, now. I wonder how long that's been a thing.

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#35

Post by cyberferret »

Nice idea, but I must admit though, that I often look at the comments first to ascertain the quality of the article posted. If I see civil, structured discussion, then I am more likely to visit the link afterwards.

However, if I see off topic rants and arguments, then I tend to dismiss the article as an opinion or puff piece.

Generally like that the comments on here tend to stay on topic and thoughtful, although I am disappointed that some of my posts on here lately, which have merely been questions about aspects of the article, have been downvoted. Hope HN doesn't turn into another StackOverflow imitating over-moderated "that doesn't belong here" type site.

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#37

Post by ue_ »

DarkTree wrote: post #19

Yeah I can understand the motivation for creating this. When I first started browsing HN, I couldn't believe how supplemental, civil and noiseless the comments were. However, after several years, I've started to jump straight to the comments, especially when I have a vague clue about what the article is about. That's when I don't feel the incentive to actually read and create my own opinions. I've also started to vie…

I would love to agree that comments on HN can be substantive and civil, but the downvote power afforeded to 'elite' users is horrible, leaving a comment which is perhaps a little challenging to a charged view or commonly held belief is often simply downvoted without explanation, usually once but sometimes up to thrice. Downvoting on HN serves the ingenious function of signalling to others "This comment isn't worth reading", by making is appear gray, similar to the site's background. It is only one step above Reddit in which comments are hidden completely (though that appears to happen here too sometimes).

Edit: Good to know the system works?

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#38

Post by AgentME »

polote wrote: post #26
samat wrote: post #20

document.querySelectorAll("td.subtext").forEach( function(currentValue, currentIndex, listObj) { currentValue.hidden = true; } );

you can't use forEach with a NodeList ;)

Easiest solution is to wrap the NodeList with Array.from(...) first. Just wanted to point out how handy that function is.

Also if we're going to make a snazzy one-liner, let's cut out the unused arguments:

  Array.from(document.querySelectorAll("td.subtext")).forEach(currentValue => { currentValue.hidden = true; });

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#39

Post by elorant »

This contradicts the very essence of HN. Personally I come here mostly for the comments. Regardless of how good (or bad) a story is, the comments are what give it value because you get to read educated opinions that make remarks even the original article doesn't. HN is the only place in the web where you can see such quality in comments. Remove them and then everything becomes blunt.

Re: Quiet Hacker News

#40

Post by lhuser123 »

justboxing wrote: post #21

I would likely never use this. I'm almost always here for the comments on the Show HN & Ask HNs as well as the Stories. The comments on the Ask HN, Show HN are usually very informative, and have helped me a lot in my own side projects and entrepreneurial pursuits. The comments on stories (for me) act as a curation tool, and based on what I read, I actually decide to either read the posted story, or pass on it. W.r.t.…

Couldn't agree more. So many times I have searched if something was discussed in HN, just to read the comments.
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