Ask HN: We screwed up our HN post. What next? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: We screwed up our HN post. What next?

23 pointstwanschik15 comments

After 2 years of hard work on our web app we made the mistake to ask our beta testers to support us on HN.

Because of this we got reported and removed from the front page - which is understandable in hindsight.

We believe in our wireframing solution and would like to share it with the world. Is there a chance to post again on HN without getting banned? Or do you have other suggestions to go public?

View on HN

Get covered on another blog and get someone to submit the URL?

Honestly, I think you'll be better served thinking about how to create a repeatable process for acquiring customers rather than worrying about one time traffic hits from HN.

100%. HN is not the end-all of press / beta launch news. There are tons of other sites. I think folks on here make the mistake (myself included) of thinking that HN is the only place that matters - it's not.

Make a new account, set up a voting ring (a proper voting ring this time, where the accounts have some history - ask your HN-using friends to help out). You only need about 4 upvotes to make the front page and then momentum will help you if you're any good. Ever wonder how the Buffer guys keep making the frontpage despite basically rehashing the same article over and over?

How about: Reddit? Lobsters? Designer News? Doing a Meetup Talk? Blog.yourapp.subdomain with an innovative way to use your tool? Emailing or twittering people in the design world with an invite?

Without knowing the context, it sounds like you didn't get banned for the content of the posting, but for asking your existing users to come and upvote you en masse. That's generally considered to undesirably skew the voting, and will get detected and flagged.

Maybe if you just re-posted without the appeal to your fans, you'd see how well your product and pitch resonate with the HN community.

Thanks, we posted it again: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5978451

We posted merely 2 weeks ago. So, many HN users could down-vote it because of that. What do you think?

I don't know, how long were you on the front page before you got taken off? People won't complain about double posting unless they actually saw it the first time!

You can't downvote links on HN. You only have to worry about not receiving upvotes.

Sorry, I meant getting flagged.

People flag things with no rhyme or reason I've found. I wouldn't worry about that.

I'd be more worried about getting the domain banned from HN in regards to reposting it. But that probably won't happen unless you do it a lot.

If your account has been flagged for potentially being part of a voting ring then I'd suggest emailing the admins. Otherwise your future posts will all die a quick death.

I just tried your app. Accuracy seems poor -- almost like a mini-game rather than a useful tool. The concept is very clever, though.

So, zooming doesn't solve your accuracy problem? Did you use a graphics tablet or an iPad?

I used the desktop. I don't think I should want to zoom to draw an element because I would just have to move my fingers further.

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