Ask HN: Does reading HN make you happy? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Does reading HN make you happy?

49 pointsyakattak39 comments

Times change, and as they change so do communities you interact with. I used to like coming to HN because the discussions were often far away from the stresses of the world (politics, local news tragedies, etc.)

Lately though its article after article on LLMs. Pro LLM or Anti LLM. These discussions come closer to the stresses of the world than the typical HN post did historically. Well, at least to me.

They often quickly become “AI is bad” or “AI is amazing” in the discussions. I want to mention, I’m not pro or against either way. There doesn’t need to be sides to pick.

Do these posts that dominate the top make you happy? For me it’s turned HN into a place that stresses.

PS. I’m not asking for coping mechanisms, I’ve already cut my time here reading down a bunch :)

View on HN

The most shocking thing about HN is how polite and and reasonable the people on here are compared to the other places I visit on the web.

Reasonable good faith debates are not normal on the internet!

I guess we have the moderators to thank for this.

Overall IQ of the crowd also helps.

And the ethos of the founder even if he's moved on to Xitter.

> The most shocking thing about HN is how polite and and reasonable the people on here are compared to the other places I visit on the web.

Well duh, when the HN team keeps censoring opinions they don't like. Is this your first day on the internet?

Which opinions, specifically, do you feel that we dislike and censor? Can you link to some cases?

This was removed by HN.

Is this an opinion that you dislike: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46459594

That one was killed by a software filter, for reasons having nothing to do with the content. I wouldn't say we dislike the opinion, or care either way, but the comment itself was pretty low-quality. Also, trollish usernames aren't allowed on HN (https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...)

Why the rude comment? I am more likely to be persuaded by your argument if you don't attach an insult to it.

Hi, yakattak. Like you, I also created my HN account in 2010.

Browsing HN stopped making me happy years ago.

Searching HN for individual comments that include jargon that is indicative of knowledge relating to my interests does make me happy. I search HN multiple times per day using a search shortcut that uses the following URL:

https://hn.algolia.com/?type=comment&sort=byDate&query=%s

I agree with you, in general this place doesn't increase my happiness but finding insights from the submissions and more often, well crafted comments, does. This is going into my browser search shortcut - thank you!

Overall HN is the best community I have found so far People over here are generally very helpful and always up for offering their own perspectives/advice and that's one of the reason I love HN

No, but unfortunately I'm addicted to dopamine hits and HN is the most "organic" one, compared to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, you get the idea. HN is the one makes me the least depressed.

Overall, HN is good.

Nowhere else really can you get that concentrated & large a place to weigh in on something and get (fairly) intelligent, (fairly) rapid, (fairly) reasonable, (fairly) fast feedback -- even if you don't agree with all of it.

Or, if you're not weighing in and getting responses, just to read the temperature on any discussion (of interest) and see reasonable views raised and discussed.

PG always said something like, if you want to see how silly some people are just read the bottom-ranked comments on HN.

Well maybe HN doesn't upvote the best. But hype gonna hype. It's the best we have AFAIK.

PG also always said huuuummmm

Partly agree. Most of the stuff posted here is either politics, or as you said, Pro/Anti AI.

Times change, indeed.

One thing a high school teacher told me and that I carry with me more and more nowadays is that you need to classify what you’re reading before you read it. Not everything is news. There’s always a mix of real information, FUD, and gossip. If you treat all of it the same, burnout is inevitable.

You need to train yourself to scan and decide which discussions are worth going into and which aren’t.

This applies to any kind of forum or group chat.

If I’m happy? I see HN less as a place for joy and more as a place to know what’s going on. It’s still useful. There’s a lot of BS mixed in, and that’s just part of the deal. It’s not a defining part of my happiness or my life, almost like a newspaper.

I just ignore the sloppy posts, be it AI or non-AI related.

I assumed your post was more generic and not specific about LLMs or AI.

Generally speaking, while the disucssions are 'better', they are not good. The comments themselves seldom add real value, discussions are not held with sources and if you start to have a discussion, the other person stops responding to your arguments.

Its 'fun' because i think i like to discuss but i have often than not the feeling i have to explain things

While you mentioned LLMs: I do think that simplifing what LLMs are to a statistical parrot, shows how little people on hn know about LLMs, at least the ones commenting on it and repeating this every time.

With the crypto garbage, i had plenty of people not responding to proper arguments from my side and it feels empty.

HN is seldom stress.

Happy? No. Unhappy? On occasion when I’m confronted with dystopia or bigotry.

Less bored on the toilet or in the waiting room? Absolutely.

Mostly I skip the front page and trawl for interesting articles to read under New. And sometimes dip into Ask to see if there are any interesting questions.

Yes, and I enjoy the LLM debates. There's the economic-political-cultural angle, and there's the philosophical and scientific angle, it's all very interesting. Certainly we go round in circles a lot, but I'm always tensely waiting for something new to happen, it feels like history unfolding. Nothing wrong with argument, don't stress.

HN spoiled me because in contrast discussions on other platforms like reddit and youtube really lack depth and constructivism.

I definitely love reading HN, especially for the comment debates which are more entertaining, thoughtful, and intellectual. It’s also interesting sometimes to look at what posts get to be top story and also what the top story is in the NYT. I love HN for book suggestions.

I'm finding it frustrating. I want to block hackernews but a lot of good discussion in searches for tech end up here. So i'm not sure how to square that. I should probably just block it and then use an LLM to ask 'what would HN say?'

Make "show HN" your landing page get back the hacker spirit, maybe?

The majority of HN participants are now, not founders themselves. Founders have to focus on signal over noise. People who are not founders focus on... whatever.

>Founders have to focus on signal over noise. People who are not founders focus on... whatever.

This perspective seems extremely close minded, almost as if suggesting those who are not 'founders' (of silicon valley startups?) are incapable of rational thought or action.

There are many executives who have never 'founded' a VC backed company who would heartily disagree, not to mention all of the humans with other credentials who process information, make decisions and create value.

I just meant founders of any company, not necessarily SV ones. Sorry if it came off as very reductionistic, but I was trying to phrase things quickly and simply. If you're not looking for real life tips on how to build products and gain traction and stuff, then any topic is fair game. As online communities transform from niche-based places, to general purpose hangouts, the content can get watered down.

It's called Hacker News, not Founder News. It's right there in the title. Also, many of these "founders" are noise for LinkedIn . Anyone in their pajamas can start a single person LLC out of their bedroom and call themselves a "founder". Heck most don't even do that step anymore. I'm more interested with what an experienced grey beard has to say than some 20 something "founder" of some terrible, half-baked idea that was generated via an LLM.

Significantly fewer hackers than in years prior.

hn: you can close the tab but you can never leave. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BciS5krYL80&t=260s

HN goes through hype cycles, I suppose. Remember when it was all about crypto and every conversation ended with "we could use blockchain" and we were all fed up? Remember when everyone was an Elon Musk fanboy and Tesla was going to save the world? I'm sure there are more, but that's just off the top of my head.

There's always going to be a prevailing zeitgeist, and that's always going to dominate people's focus.

But by and large, HN is the most intelligent, thoughtful community I've encountered, with people going out of their way to be kind and thorough in their replies, discussing things maturely, disincentivizing unhelpful and low-effort behavior. Not to mention the dizzying wealth of knowledge and experience the people here have.

Obviously it's not 100%. There are plenty of harsh people and attitudes. But there's a lot of good discussion happening here, and that's what I try to focus on. I can only hope one day to be as interesting/inspiring a member of the community as some of the people I've seen on here.

I used to see posts that I disagreed with that I still upvoted because they made me think new things. That happened often - say, multiple times a week.

It's been a long time since I saw something like that. There's far more yelling, far more people who seem to be here not to think, not to discuss, but only to argue and push an agenda. Far more people that simply Will. Not. Listen. no matter how thoughtful a point is being made in reply.

HN lost something - something that was really sweet while it was here.

I only read HN for the tutorials and articles on coding in various programming languages. I don't see a lot of that any more and there's a disturbing trend of AI slop splashing through the the comments.

I came here from Kuro5in after that got enshittified. I came to kuro5in from slashdot when that got enshittified. Looks like I may have to find a new home soon.

No. I don’t even know why I come here anymore. Mostly flagging and downvoting idiotic comments out of spite.

The real hackers have left long ago.

Yes, it genuinely does make me happy, every week I find several things that make me smarter.

Is the the only social network that is not enshittified or dominated by inane algorithmic slop.

The LLM arguments are boring but exist literally everywhere online discussing technology

I feel HN has become a lot less philosophical, more techy over the last couple of years. The political devide can also be felt. Does it make happy? Probably not. it‘s like the news. And for tech news it’s actually quite good.

yes

No.

HN is full of pseudointellectuals who like to mask their bigotry under the strange guise of being "rational". So no, reading HN does not make me happy.

no - this is why we've decided to become a hive mind

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