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Comment by danenania | Hacker News Reader

The problem is that the crew who reflexively post negative comments on Show/Launch HNs are mostly a loud (and smug) but unrepresentative minority with idiosyncratic tastes. Sure, you can learn something from any feedback, but most products would be made worse if the creators took these comments too much to heart, especially when it comes to pricing.

That said, you can obviously get a lot of great feedback on HN too! But no one grumbling about $15/mo being too much to pay for X or subscriptions in general being bad is likely to be very helpful.

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Best cure for that is "treat others as you would want yourself to be treated". In this case I would really appreciate it if someone told me that my idea wasn't novel at all, sucked or that I was charging exorbitant fees for some minor improvement of my productivity.

A lot of times in life, kindness doesn't look like kindness.

"Someone told me my idea sucked" is not in and of itself any more of a useful signal than "someone told me my idea is brilliant"; one person's opinion is, well, one person's opinion. Who that person is makes a difference. In the case of SigmaOS here, the "(YC S21)" suggests that they've had at least one very positive signal: YCombinator accepted them. "The most famous seed funding group in the tech world likes us enough to work with us" is probably more of a meaningful signal than "SnarkyTechGuy1337 left us a cutting comment on Hacker News".

"In this case I would really appreciate it if someone told me that my idea wasn't novel at all, sucked or that I was charging exorbitant fees for some minor improvement of my productivity."

Ok, but if the reason you think something "sucks" is because of an uncommon opinion that you hold, like a good UI isn't important or worth paying extra for, then your comment isn't very helpful to the creator. It says much more about you than the product.

Similarly, most people in tech/knowledge work would not consider $15 per month for software that makes them more productive to be "exorbitant", and I think we all know that. If you feel that way, fine, but it's not relevant to the discussion.

Almost every Show/Launch HN post that has a slightly abrasive comment (which is not the same thing as negative or nonconstructive) gets a few comments in the same vein from the "people are negative" to the "people are toxic" kinds, which honestly speaking appears way more smug to me.

It's not just about being abrasive. It's about posting negative comments when you have nothing to offer. If your reaction to something new is that you have absolutely no interest or wouldn't pay a few cappuccinos per month for it then guess what: no one cares. You're just polluting the thread with noise.

Helpful: this is interesting, but I tried it and it's missing these features that I would need to consider paying for it.

Not helpful: subscriptions are the devil!

The comment all this is under is not just "subscriptions are the devil!". Some responses seem more "reflexively negative" (against any criticism) than the comments they respond to.

you don't seem to offer much value over free competitors and why should we trust you might be hard points to address, but are important.

"you don't seem to offer much value over free competitors and why should we trust you might be hard points to address, but are important."

I agree with you on those points. But dismissing improved UI/UX as "makeup" is not helpful.

> But dismissing improved UI/UX as "makeup" is not helpful.

It would be if the UI/UX is presented as a feature. I agree with you about the style but I disagree that this is dismissive, it's constructive but coarse.

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