Comment by DamnInteresting | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DamnInteresting | Hacker News Reader

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DamnInteresting

I started a website in 2005 that is still in operation today. We started out posting 1-2 articles per week, I had a lot of spare time then. But that rate was unsustainable with our small team and small budget, and we reached a point of burnout, and had to decide whether to slow down or shut down. After a hiatus to mentally recuperate, we opted to continue writing, though publishing less often and digging deeper into the stories.

The results of this change of format are mixed. On the one hand, it now feels like quite an accomplishment when we wrap up research, writing, fact-checking, recording (podcast version), sound design, illustrations, etc. And most readers/listeners seem happier than ever with the quality of the content. But on the other hand, our rankings in Google have fallen considerably to sites that post frequent, low-effort content. The gatekeepers seem to prefer the pap.

Additionally, there are a minority of readers/listeners who are outright hostile about our reduced output. Just as an example, I received this via email a few days ago:

You are the laziest website on the internet. If I was to succumb to your nag messages and give you money, you would just waste it. This isn't really a real website, and it has no reason to exist. Give up and shut down. A website isn't worth visiting if it looks the same every 6 months someone visits. Just put a bullet it in already and end its pain. You failed. Just call time-of-death, already. Or, whatever, die slowly of cancer... It's not like your life amounts to anything...

So, while I agree that deeper content is "better", it has its drawbacks.

It's tough to win the "I hope you die of cancer" demographic regardless of your actions, so why bother trying?

(I have particular interest in this because geeks often cite them as the rationale for why not to price aggressively, because they complain about prices at every price point, including free.)

many years ago in a an online disagreement someone wished testicular cancer upon me, which was flattering, because if he really wished ill upon me he would have hoped for something that is far worse like stomach cancer (few survive that).

It just tells you about demographic- that is, this is a person for whom orchiectomy is a fate worse than certain death.

My first reaction was, "wow, what an unbelievably terrible message to get about something you've invested time, effort and emotion into." That's a terrible message to receive and I'm sorry you have to deal with that level of hostility.

My next reaction was that those types of people exist and feel entitled to access content/entertainment. This should not be a deterrent from continuing to produce what you're already doing. If it is sustainable and you enjoy doing it, I hope you continue to.

What makes it worse is that the "nag" the sender refers to is our call for donations, which we use quite sparingly. It is only shown to readers after they have viewed 5 articles, and again at 10, 15, and so on....unless they click the "no" button, which mutes it for some time. So this is a person who has read at least 5 of our articles, and to me that means that they must be enjoying our work; why else would they keep reading after 1 or 2? Yet they go out of their way to deliver vitriol because they would prefer it if we published more often. It's quite odd.

Anyway, thanks.

I think it's the same entitlement mentality that leads to "I want to use my ad blocker but I also hate your paywall." Yeah, I get annoyed by ads too, which is why I pay a few subscriptions.

The New York Times concluded years ago that those people would never pay you anyway, so why bother giving them access?

>so why bother giving them access? //

Doing things for "exposure" is somewhat of a meme nowadays, but it can work. That's why people let Google past their paywalls. Mileage varies a lot of course.

One issue for a large media outlet is maintaining standing, cutting off all access to those who won't/can't pay means you're no longer the go to place for news (or whatever), that can have wider consequences.

I know it's hard, but I wouldn't worry about such comments. Those are clearly not about you, and about some other suffering that person is going through. It doesn't relate to your site at all.

I've gotten some angry comments on my blog but I've ignored them, and they go away. When you reach a large audience, there's always going to be some portion that is disturbed. That's just how the world is.

I would be so tempted to write back something like, "You deserve to live free of that kind of anger. If my website makes you that upset, please stop looking at it. I suggest incinerating your computer and stapling your eyes shut to ensure that it never happens again. Life is too short for anything else."

That would probably only bait the troll into doing something worse, though.

I wonder if it would be helpful/cathartic to have a central repository of hate mail that everyone could share their "fan" letters to.

You cannot rationalize with someone who is irrational.

Your comment on stapling their eyes shut made my day.

I'm deeply sorry, that you have to read those disgusting words in your mailbox. To be honest, it even hurts me.

There are tons of people like this, I observe this behavior more and more these days. Go and talk to a random youtuber/twitch streamer how much hate they have to deal with for their "free" content.

I once thought its the German culture (doing business and earning money is almost a nono-thing in Germany and makes you an easy target), but I guess some humans are just like that...

Google definitely prefers regular content over high depth, lengthier stuff. Honestly, I suspect all sites and services with algorithms do, there's a reason popular YouTube channels tend to have a very consistent schedule.

But hey, if you're writing more detailed content, then that's something I'm happy to see as a reader. The constant push for speed above everything else is exactly why so much content online is poorly researched and barely fact checked, and Google favouring quickly written stuff is likely a good reason why the media has fallen so far recently; everything's about trying to beat the curve on search engine results and social media sites.

Kudos for not going the same way.

Idea: a site that collects all the deep dive articles and groups them by topics/tags.

Why? Because when you are out researching the next piece, someone else's article is being read.

That way you build an audience.

Wait, you say. I don't want my content on someone else's platform?

That's okay, the "platform" just links back to the long form content. It can even have ratings, which are even more important in long form content.

The problems with rating systems for content is they can often lead to brigading to suppress/promote content. At which point, you're on an infinite whack-a-mole marathon to curb that sort of behavior.

That's a good point, but what about a rating system that isn't directly user generated? Imagine that information on the number of times an article/content is viewed, and the length of time that content is viewed was used to generate a rating for that piece of content. There could probably be other indirect factors for "content weight" that could go into the rating.

You've invented the "YouTube Algorithm". (because it's one monolithic thing, right?)

No one has ever taken issue with the YouTube Algorithm before.

I would prefer manual curation. That doesn't scale, I know. But for people to learn to do it efficiently together, they need to learn to do it individually first. And only, after we scaled it with humans, we could begin to think how to automate anything.

One notable result is that content gets padded to extract the longest possible attention, so now that 10s fix for an issue takes 2 minutes to find.

Not a problem platforms care about, probably helps them, sucks for users though -- it becomes 'how bad can we make things and still have people use our service'.

This already sort of happens. Many larger sites, places like HuffPo or TechCrunch, accept contributions from outside contributors. You get paid a tiny bit, and then you get to link back to your own site, so you get a little marketing juice too.

A platform would be interesting too, but it’d be hard to curate without all the standard race to the bottom tactics that people would use to exploit your page rank.

In some sense, you can’t avoid the need to commit to a brand and a voice. So the way to achieve what you want is by federating with other brands and voices, not dumping into an anonymous platform.

You've perfectly described Reddit.

That's email seems oddly targeted towards an insecurity that most trolls wouldn't bother poking at, and seems needlessly harsh to boot.

If this email is authentic, I suggest disregarding it. I know it's easier said than done, but, some people will never be happy. Invest your time and emotional bandwidth on causes that matter to you, or otherwise aren't lost.

Rationally I understand that people such as this sender are not representative; most individuals who bother to contact us have only kind and/or constructive things to say. But over the years these isolated haters have dumped a lot of their bile onto me, and it's hard to resist the corrosion indefinitely.

That being said, posting that nasty email here is part of my strategy for maintaining a rational view of it. It's less destructive out in the light.

Is anyone selling “hate mail as a service” yet? Because if there is a market for fake love (like-farms etc), surely there must be a market for fake hate. Maybe it’s just my misplaced faith in humanity, but couldn’t this sort of unreasonable hate be a product of dirty commercial tactics from your competitors?

The simpler explanation is the person is just in a bad mood. I know the internet can put me in a frustrated place where I get upset for silly reasons.

there are some dirty tricks like creating link-farms that link to a competitors’ website to hurt their rankings

Holy crap what a horrible email.

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