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Comment by cratermoon | Hacker News Reader

Isn't posting and commenting on HN, at least in part, a product of longing to be part of an Inner Circle of hackers and Silicon Valley elites?

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No. I mean, maybe for some people. Some of us just enjoy talking about tech stuff online.

He named it, so is ever so slightly wrong - but all of us who have been around for a while and have participated semi-regularly in discussions without getting banned are in. Relative to the global online population this is still a very small group.

I don't think that's quite right. In Lewis's thesis, you only really encounter the in/out question by interacting with people who are in. By your definition, interacting on HN puts you in already. And "and have participated semi-regularly in discussions without getting banned" is a much lower bar than anything Lewis is talking about. You'd have a much better point w.r.t. lobste.rs or other invite-only forums, but the whole concept is dubious without private discussions.

The forum itself enforces a level of in/out. There's the green text for new users, then karma thresholds gating some actions.

Still a ludicrously low bar. Doesn't change much (again, compared to Lewis's inner ring).

Granted, but I'm not saying that just posting and commenting on HN, or passing the various gates, constitutes being 'in'. Even having high karma isn't 'in'. I don't know if I can articulate what counts as being 'in', but certainly participation in a YC round is part of it.

No, that actually kind of is what you were saying in your previous comment, about what "the forum itself enforces".

You could identify a set of people who are widely respected and listened to, but that's a different thing again from what Lewis is talking about. YC itself is arguably closer, but only tenuously connected in practice to HN social dynamics. I certainly couldn't tell you which members I pay attention to have been through YC (except for the ones who definitely haven't).

The latter quarter of the article goes into depth about how one can accidentally find oneself in an inner ring, but it is through a wholesome pursuit and no ulterior motive. The other reply to this comment gets it write: people here like interacting with the things on HN.

In other words, to comment on HN does not mean you are striving to be in the inner circle.

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