Tell HN: Use news.ycombinator.com/active | Hacker News Reader

Tell HN: Use news.ycombinator.com/active

40 pointslysace30 comments

news.ycombinator.com/news (the default redirect from the root) is being subjected to user-triggered censorship. There is a lot that these days.

Here's how I trained my desktop browser (Chrome) to visit the /active URL when when I type "ne<RET">

1. Type "news.ycombinator.com/active" into the Chrome combo box and hit return.

2. Type "ne" into the Chrome combo box.

3. In the list of completions, click on the cross/delete icon to the right for the first few that aren't what you want.

4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 until you get the desired result.

View on HN

I think RSS feed reader users are also unaffected by flags. At least hnrss.org feed followers are. I haven't tried news.ycombinator.com/rss. But as long as the post hits the RSS feed before it is flagged, your reader can pick it up.

Honestly, for me, most of the time I am not interested in the flagged posts, but if you are, RSS is another way to see them.

> I haven't tried news.ycombinator.com/rss. But as long as the post hits the RSS feed before it is flagged, your reader can pick it up.

I can confirm.

What "user-triggered censorship" are you talking about?

2-3 users with the proper standing pressing that flag link on a story.

So that would be me. I flag stories about US politics, for example.

Why?

I can read about US politics pretty much anywhere else.

this sounds more like GP believes one of the conspiracy theories about how moderation works on HN

What conspiracy theory would that be?

the one where a handful of people can coordinate to shadowban / flag

unclear if its the one where the official HN mods (there are only 2) believed to be the ones doing this

the reality is that the official mods are largely hands off, when they do get involved, more often than not it is to reverse a community flagging action, which is where most moderation happens, at a large enough community scale that a handful of people cannot wield this much flagging power

If you believe unjust flagging has happened, the best recourse is to email the HN mods, the are very friendly, helpful and fair

[flagged]

Crossing into personal attack will get you banned here. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46696791 and don't post like this again.

If the story has enough votes before then, it is only downweighted, and only a bit at a time. Same with the flamewar detector, it just pulls stories down a bit. After the score is more than (I think?) 10 votes, it won't get entirely flagged unless mods decide it should.

Active is by far the best way to read HN.

Yes. So little marketing crap and you also get to see so many more interesting discussions. It feels like HN ten years ago, but with more people. It's awesome.

Agreed, it was a bit like discovering HN all over again.

What is /active?

My understanding:

It shows recent active topics, rather than upvoted/unflagged (not yet censored) topics.

E.g. unlike /news, upvotes and flags are ignored in the ranking.

A bookmark would also work.

It didn't work for me. Can't hurt though.

...And it's flagged, by maybe 2 people, and therefore censored.

[flagged]

There’s no magic knowing why or who is flagging what that I can tell.

So when a comment supporting racially charged eugenics went unflagged it was because "the community" decided it was the quality you want? But this.

not every submission has enough views to reach the flagging threshold

do you have an example?

This is HN, look at any thread about immigration or wealth inequality: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=pastYear&page=0&prefix=fal...

two amusing things come from this comment

1. you mention immigration and wealth inequality, but then link to "eugenics"

2. the search results you linked to have exactly zero flagged entries, seems counter to the argument you are trying to make doesn't it?

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