Thanks!
Partly it's because of the format and the platform. Instead of seeking out the information yourself, you're feed bits of it before moving on to the next bit. It works great for news, commentary, as entertainment or a starting guide to startups. But less so for actually acquiring and/or exchanging information.
The main irritant is that so many of them are nitpicky and/or snarky.
Anyone else noticed this?
A flame is a long impassioned harangue or rant.
For anything "opinion" related, the conversation will go to hell very quickly. Read snippets and ignore.
For anything "knowledge" related, this place is phenomenal. Much to learn from the giants amongst us.
Opinion and knowledge are two different axes and I really enjoy reading the opinions of those who know a lot about a topic I don't know. Opinions about topics such as economics are best avoided.
If you think this could be true, simply focus on those discussions that elicit expert knowledge and opinion, rather than those that anyone can contribute to. Er, like this one. Bye.
Then again, you're still relying on the crowd and its whims. But it'll be consistent!
I can't tell the difference between which type a thread is without reading the comments or article.
I'm not sure that HN has dramatically improved my writing so much as it has gotten me in the habit of only posting when I have something worthwhile to add to a conversation. I appreciate how many users seem to follow this rule of thumb on HN.
HN employs anonymous, unaccountable, unnecessary, possibly automated and most definitely counter-productive hell bans.
And with that any level of decency becomes quite irrelevant. I implore you to turn on "show dead" and gaze upon our "shadow people", check their comment history and notice about half of them got hell banned for some rather petty reason, and are currently being made to waste hours of their time writing comments before realizing nobody reads them. The other half might have actually deserved some sort of disciplinary action, but a hellban is actually less effective than a regular one except in some quite rare situations[1].
If [the unseen mods of] HN believe that's what it takes, I'll gladly deal with some more Fuckwads. (though the more probable reason is that none of them seems to want, or is able to bugfix the modding code)
[1] http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2011/06/suspension-ban-or-h...
No, because HN commenter's favourite pastime, Reddit-bashing, is too scary if not done behind their backs and from a safe distance.
He waited for a while until someone came by. The passerby extended his hand and said "Your hand. Give me!" The mullah angrily told him "Move along. You are not one of our people!"
Some more hours passed while the scholar stood knee deep in foul matter, until another man passed by. He said to him "Here my hand. Take!" Again, the scholar glared "Move along! You are not one of us!"
So this went on for few hours until, finally, the scholar's nephew happened to pass by and saw his uncle in that filthy ditch. He cried out "O dear uncle! Here, take my hand!". The scholar said, "Yes. You are one of us!" and reach[ed] out to his nephew.
But the nephew was weak and he too fell in the hole.
[As related by Mowlana Shamsud'din Tabrizi.]
This needs to be corrected. The story is called the "blind grammarian" and naturally far more robust in the original by Shams (as translated into English) than my recollection above. There is also a second part to it that has been omitted.
My comment was not intended as sarcasm, nor was I asserting sarcasm in comments by others.
I wont question if it's true or false. But the mere repetition makes what the grandparent says true: this is not a site full of smart people.
Or at least: this is not a site full of smart people _above_ repeating for the nth time the same tired internet flames.
The piracy thing seems like a silly semantic issue on the face of it but the semantics strike at the heart of the issue.
And that is why we need to broaden software patent laws to also include Internet arguments: patent trolling to counter actual trolling.
(BRB, patenting this idea)
The biggest problem i'm noticing now is verb agreement. I'll rewrite parts of a sentence and fix all the things i break. If only there was a typechecker to warn me of those silly mistakes.
I'll have to agree. HN, as well as r/Foodforthought, are the most stimulating I've found thus far.
As a consequence, I've had to work on being concise enough that people read me, yet detailed enough that people understand me. Learning to balance those two things has made a tremendous difference in my career!
Quick caveat - being concise is something I've always struggled with. Therefore, I think I took inappropriate shortcuts to try and become concise.