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Comment by rdl | Hacker News Reader

This seems like a great change. A dream team, and it's interesting to learn who the secret moderator has been!

My fantasy would be some way of fixing /newest as well as adding topic tags; perhaps topic tags just within /newest. I'd be happy to read everything in /newest which matches: security, crypto, hypervisor, hardware, wireless, ...; I basically find it unusable as it is now.

I don't find the level of (in)civility to be a personal deterrent, but I grew up on EFnet and alt.*, so that would be an almost 4chanian bar. I do dislike when it deters worthwhile contributions from people who are less thick skinned. I'd generally err on the side of "let people say stupid things so they can be debunked in public" vs. "censorship", but at some point lack of filtering becomes a form of censorship of its own (crapflooding, etc.)

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It's funny, I just wrote a blog post yesterday about how I don't contribute to many public discussions because I'm too afraid of the hostility that can come along with my participation (I'm pretty thin skinned). I haven't posted it yet specifically because I was agonizing over what I say getting picked apart sentence by sentence by an angry HN mob. I probably won't ever publish it. I hope Daniel can do more to fix the nastiness that can exist here on HN.

Quality discussion isn't supposed to always feel good. Nor is it a bad thing when what you've expressed is heavily analyzed and perhaps contested.

It's really no different than physical exercise. Yes, it can be painful in the short term, but over time it allows adaptation that increases strength and robustness.

This comment is a fine example of jl's points. While the tone was not rude or aggressive, commenting merely to contradict and to attempt to invalidate specific points, out of context, is unhelpful to someone who is self aware enough to admit they are pretty, thin, and skinny. (We know our own and can read through the code.)

Jl is probably aware that this sensitivity can be overcome, and how to do so. Sometimes it's ok to pass over a thing in silence instead of telling a stranger to smile.

>Sometimes it's ok to pass over a thing in silence instead of telling a stranger to smile.

That's not how I interpreted Pacabel's response. I interpreted it more like him/her telling jl that his expectations of Daniel 'fixing' HN to ban critiques are unrealistic.

When someone comments with "I don't contribute to many public discussions because I'm too afraid of the hostility that can come along with my participation (I'm pretty thin skinned)", it's probably fair to say anyone responding and trying to be helpful should take that into account...

(I felt slightly bad about my response, in retrospect; I meant "YC partners seem to be subject to particularly harsh criticism, which is unfair. Perhaps if you were anonymous it would be less aggressive trolling directed at you." I'm sure jl has thought of that of course.)

Have you considered posting anonymously? Or would it be painful to see your work picked apart even if it weren't connected to your name?

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