Hacker News Reader

Comment by Hnrobert42 | Hacker News Reader

Is it just me, or is the feel of the comment on this post different than other HN posts? There are a lot more snarky jokes. A little more combative. It feels like why I stopped reading Reddit. I hope it doesn’t metastasize to posts on other topics.

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> Please don't post comments saying that HN is turning into Reddit. It's a semi-noob[0] illusion[1], as[2] old[3] as[4] the[5] hills.[6] [7]

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=926703

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=633099

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=582513

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=289254

[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=253657

[5] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=66057

[6] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13852

[7] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Hacker News has always been reddit. All these comments are just people seeing through the matrix.

The overlap between HN and Reddit must be huge. Folks just take off their fedora and put on a panama hat.

Hacker News is Reddit with a thesaurus. This is only an insult to Hacker News if you think Reddit is bad, but they clearly share the same dynamic brought on by the perverse incentives of the "karma" system and individually threaded comments. Classic discussion forum interfaces (e.g. vBulletin or phpBB) allow for much richer and calmer communication.

The problem with the karma system is that it incentivizes simple comments and appealing to common human instincts. I often regret it when my score goes up drastically because I think that I made a low effort comment that exploits ingrained biases instead of actually contributing to the discussion.

I am personally not against the idea of sorting comments based on a score but the score itself shouldn't be visible to anyone.

I don't care at all about internet points, but I do get a chuckle when I notice my karma drop by double digits in a short time period because it means someone was mad enough at one of my comments that they went to my profile page and downvoted everything they could.

I think “Reddit but smarter” is a legitimate point of differentiation. I gave up Reddit for HN because despite all the issues you probably have in mind, the average quality of interaction and information is marginally better here.

Alternatively, reddit but nerdier and less fun. Granted I've only seen wallstreetbets which might not be entirely representative...

I know it's as "old as the hills", and so on, but this was the first time I was feeling it too. But I think it's because one satiric comment just got a lot of attention [1], then other people started to do a bit of satire as well. Which is why it feels Reddit like. Looking at the other comments and top child comments, I don't see it either.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26261247

Hacker News was never good.

It's funny to post that next to a junkchat thread started by one of the most famous redditors.

9 times out of 10 someone says this, they're taking one tiny interaction and making a huge stretch.

But this post definitely has a very bizarre comment section compared to most.

And not just any one comment, but almost every thread. Maybe it has to do with the "Gamestonks" moniker and what it entails

You missed the point of my post entirely. I said that the comments on this one post felt like Reddit. Specifically I noted that feels different from HN.

I noticed more snarky comments in general in the last 1-1.5 years. I just downvote/flag them and move on. If it some day becomes unbearable then I'll just click on the links and not read the comments anymore - which would be a shame because it's what most of the value of this site is about.

Maybe these are /r/wallstreetbets folks flocking in?

On a more serious note: I think the topic of stocks and getting rich real quick might generate that kind of feel, on any platform. Probably borderline for HN to have these discussions?

It's more the people who pay for the bloomberg terminal who can't handle the headline. The opposite crowd of /r/wallstreetbets.

No, half the sarcasm is at the expense of Bloomberg.

This is the people "sticking it to the hedge funds" pouring in.

I independently had the same thought.

As soon as someone started talking about swinging their big Bloomberg D, and going all alpha corporate overlord, the thread went to shite.

Bloomberg would be threatened by an alternative to their cash cow terminals

maybe it has something to do with the confidence of the posting: "no prob, I built the next best thing". Might come off as arrogant and that probably triggers people.

/r/LOLHackerNews

Welcome to the wonderful world of "Show HN"

I don’t get this same feeling on all ShowHN posts. Most of them, especially for individual projects like this, are supportive critiques of the thing being “shown”.

Says the man who's never posted a Show. You wouldn't know, bud, you wouldn't know. :D

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