Ask HN: Do you think that Hacker News has gotten much worse lately? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Do you think that Hacker News has gotten much worse lately?

6 pointsst1x712 comments

Interesting links, good questions, quality of discussion - it seems like the level has really dropped over the past few months.

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Depends on what you mean by lately, past few years? Yeah a bit. Past few months? Not particularly.

Don't particularly like it here but it remains one the only good places to find and discuss good tech / hacker type stuff (r/programming seems to have much of the same stuff as HN a week later and with much lazier discussion)

I think coronavirus may have reduced the seasonal swell of new user posts/comments/questions--better when distributed throughout the year.

I have been actively reading HN for almost 10 years with different accounts. Trust me, this question has been asked umpteen number of times, and the answer has always been no.

There is always a steady flow of good, interesting technical posts that keep you hooked.

Not to mention ASK HN and recently added Show HN and PAST.

And they always keep adding new features to the site.

So, no it still remains the one of the go to places on internet for me.

Why use different accounts?

I notice OP has only been active for 50 days, so I assume they have either read for many years but not signed up until then or they use multiple accounts. Why?

I understand there a non-nefarious reasons for this, but just curious behind the reasoning.

I am using HN for a few months now and have dropped reddit altogether, since there was just so much wasted time.

I notice some similiar behaviour in the comments, but all in all this site is the only social one on the internet i use and enjoy.

Every day i keep up to date with newish technologies and trends here and can enjoy obsure information i would usually not see anywhere else. I can excuse the occasional standard politics repost as long as it does not go overboard :)

For reasons related to work, I went from daily visits here to occasional visits (about once a week) over the past 2 years. Meanwhile, I'd become more active on some Reddit subs and noticed some patterns in the discourse and vocabulary there.

Now when I visit HN, I notice some of the same patterns here. I feel there are many more snarky politically polarizing comments nowadays and see heavier downvoting of reasonable if unpopular tech opinions. I don't see any difference in links or questions or Show HN though. It's just the discussions that, I felt, have degraded.

There is a [past] link at the top of the page. It's a really useful (and I suspect under-used) feature to see what was on HN in the past. Here are the front pages for this day each year:

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2019-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2018-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2017-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2016-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2015-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2014-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2013-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2012-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2011-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2010-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2009-11-09

https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2008-11-09