I'm curious, for those frequent posters / commenters here, how your engagement with this site changed once you started participating. Are you getting the same thing from HN that you used to?
When I first started, I did both. But I lurked for at least 2 years before creating an account. And oh what a rush it was to reach mid-3 digit karma points at a time when I was bored at my dead-end corporate programming job. And I still remember making it to the “Best of” comments a few times. I know they were just upvotes but I felt like someone out there liked my little contribution or comment. At the peak of my commenting, I remember once I got a shout out from Andrew of Mixergy.
Over time, while I still comment occasionally to train my ChatGPT nemesis, I have settled into just submitting articles.
I think the reason why I’ve drifted away from commenting is that commenting in pseudonymous environments just gets you imaginary Internet points. Also commenting on HN can become a large use of time, particularly if you want to read all the threads in a discussion.
Right now, I’d rather be active in and build virtual relationships with people in a small, manageable number of Discords or Slacks, some of which are actually acquaintances I’ve met in person.
I found my participation got more... contentious when I started voting and submitting, not just occasionally commenting.
I mentioned during my Wikipedia privacy engineer interview a few years ago that I think many sites have a false promise of wanting feedback and HN is a great example.
(I told Wikimedia that if hired, I'd implement a dot onion on their site to reduce the load on exit nodes plus help their users avoid the chilling effects they've discussed on the policy side and I think HN should as well.)
For context, I had to temporarily abandon this nym for years after I was physically assaulted in the midst of taking a break from an OSCP study session to engage in some legally protected free expression... that librarian no longer works for that township, but dear lord -- when it comes to so called "free speech" some folks seem to only support it when it's being used to increase harm to vulnerable people or line their pockets.
Now that I understand the guidelines, I find HN to be what Slashdot strived to be though obviously the Eternal September 11th of folks showing up to demand an end to encryption and/or democract (the two are intertwined) or relentlessly argue until you break some rule of decorum will always be an issue.
(The solution to the wolf warrior internet diplomats is to simply curse them out, but that's not allowed here sadly.)
- Greg.
Someone commented back along the lines “you’d single-handedly beat all of these solutions to market” and it felt great.
Since then, I still only comment on things that make me face palm or when I want to tell a related story (like having beers with Ian Fleming’s yacht mechanic). I get more out of it these days. I get told I’m wrong and learn things. It’s a more valuable experience to me.