Hacker News Reader

Comment by Nextgrid | Hacker News Reader

Feedback-wise, here's mine: I'm not sure this is a good idea, as it means discussion will be drowned out & mixed up if you combine multiple different startups into one thread.

I personally don't mind seeing more Launch HNs concurrently, as the voting system will quickly clear out the non-interesting ones. And if they are interesting, they why not? It's more interesting/insightful/thought-provoking content for the front page which fits the intent of the site, and comment threads are often a goldmine of information even if the startup of the post itself is irrelevant to you.

View on HN

I'm not sure it's a good idea either, for the reason you say. Actually it's a long-established principle that lists don't make great HN posts (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...). So we may well end up doing what you suggest—we'll have to see.

However, it would still leave open the problem of editing work, which is currently unsolved. I'm hoping that the Meet the Batch threads will involve much less of that per startup. Letting the startups present themselves unfiltered to HN is a really bad idea, because most founders don't understand the culture here and naively step into HN the same way they would, say, ProductHunt—or worse, repeat their Demo Day pitch. This is a very efficient way to get yourself flagged and flamed, and also is a risk for YC (imagine "I don't understand how YC can possibly fund such #@!&*" comments x 1000).

We explain the difference clearly enough at https://news.ycombinator.com/yli.html, but an explanation isn't enough. It needs collaborative work in practice. Personally I think not sounding like an ad and speaking as a person rather than a brand is good practice throughout life, not just Launch HNs, but I'll settle for getting Launch HNs right; that's turns out to be hard enough.

Perhaps this has been answered elsewhere but can you limit the top level comments to be startup introductions so that these introductions don’t get mixed with other comments at the top level?

That's the sort of thing we can do, but only if it turns out to be a problem. Good case of "I never write a line of code that isn't needed" --pg

I like the explanation you put into [4] in the OP (original post?). Is it possible (necessary?) you could provide some examples of what you mean so that the founders could see exactly how things did/didn't work out for others in the past?

It might save everyone a lot of time/effort. (Or I could be wrong)

It's on my list to do just that. I want a two-column page with lots of "don't do this" examples in the left column and "do this instead" in the right column. You're quite correct: if it's possible to teach this at all, it would be through examples.

> the problem of editing work, which is currently unsolved

Why not hire writers/editors to do it? Although you are currently doing a fantastic job at this, your limited time may be better spent training a team of paid editors rather than doing the editing yourself?

Dang could train the writers/editors but due to the way posts on HN need to be interesting dang might need to train the writer/editor a lot or find a rarer type of writer/editors which will probably cost more.

Writing/editing skills aren't enough. Just as important, maybe more important, is being steeped in HN culture—hence the analogy about being dipped in a vat. Or, here's another analogy: writing about your startup for HN is like walking through a minefield. There are a lot of ways to blow yourself up. Only some of those have to do with bad writing as such.

I get what you're saying, but professional editors, properly trained, would certainly grasp not only the style but the spirit of the HN community. Or you can hire HN members. And in any case you'd still have the final word.

> However, it would still leave open the problem of editing work

Quick thought: What happens if you only minimally edit the posts, but instead brand them as "sponsored?" Maybe even tweak the colors on the sponsored posts?

Perhaps start each post with some kind of boilerplate disclaimer. Something like, "Hacker News is sponsored by YCombinator. Every YCombinator startup gets an opportunity to have a 'Launch HN' post. Today, Hacker News is brought to you by..."

(And then timebox your editing to XX minutes / company.)

I think HN would "see through a cheap ploy like that", as Monty Python once said about God.

People come here for interesting things to read. The point of the editing is to make the Launch HN texts interesting rather than annoying*. Adding disclaimers wouldn't make ad copy less annoying, so I doubt it would help. It's a clever idea though.

* though a lot of commenters are saying they're too long ("longwinded" and "bedtime story" are two terms sticking in my mind)...maybe we've been trying too hard.

Could you have people volunteer to help startups with their Launch HN threads? Maybe it could be a "karma perk" like downvoting is?

Or maybe you've just been "doing things that don't scale" until it has no longer scaled, and now it's time to bring in some fresh blood to help share the load.

I'm sure that having somebody on payroll to help companies get in front of HN would be easy to justify in the budget. :)

It's not super sexy because it's not an automated solution, but sometimes automation just isn't the right answer.

I think you can keep it focused as long as there is good isolation between each startup. So, my thought is this:

- Make each startup have a top level comment.

- In the OP self text, include the company name, tagline, and intro paragraph. Below that, link to their top level comment.

- Each top level comment would have the same name, tagline, paragraph content, so you'd always have it available.

In the end, each startup would have a page laid out very similar to the usual Launch HN posts, but they wouldn't be drowned out by the sheer number of them on the front page.

Good idea!

I agree, I'm concerned that this will make the threads a bit of a mess...

As another (unsolicited) idea, how about having them overwhelm the main page and let the voting system sort it out -- but also add a top-level tab for "Meet the Batch" to give a bit more visibility and longevity. This seems like an appropriate use of HN for YC, and if anything increases the value given to the batch companies, rather than (slightly) diluting it.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com