The first: why did Hacker News start so successfully? 1) A built in group of YC founders to initially populate it. 2) A famous creator with a large following. 3) The strong encouragement of YC applicants to be involved. 4) A clearly defined purpose.
Second: why has it grown so well and continued in its success? 1) Clear guidelines for behavior. 2) Very involved moderation, but without opinion-based censorship. 3) A proliferation of YC-clones and a national increase of interest in entrepreneurship.
And then there's the final question: What's wrong with Hacker News? 1) After a certain point you level max. There are loads of people here that I could learn a lot from, but the forum is greatly limited and becomes repetitive. The reason new members think that it's devolving is not that HN is changing, but that they themselves are learning. 2) No discussion lasts longer than two days, and all discussions are based around other peoples' news--i.e. reactionay. 3) Thoughtful self-posts are discouraged both by the guidelines and by the unreadable light gray font.
That's a very interesting point, I never thought of it that way - but it feels right.
So what's the next level?
How to do this effectively is a largely unsolved problem. Blogs, forums, aggregators, etc each have their own strengths and weaknesses.
PG's influence has drawn a lot of really bright people here. Sure there are silly comments, some articles that don't seem important to me, but overall I come here just about every day to see what new gem someone has found.
Could you be specific about the influence? If there were no funding by PG et al., would this be the same kind of place?
-Startups
-Web applications
-High-level, often functional programming languages with sometimes fringe appeal
Looks like almost a complete overlap with the topics PG writes about. I never used Digg or Reddit heavily, but on Slashdot the emphasis was more towards open source, science fiction, privacy, and YRO.
a) Paul Graham gets good PR and often says interesting things low on pure hype and high in thoughtful content (in a kind of feedback loop).
b) PG and YC are pretty good community builders, e.g., with Startup School.
c) There is money on the table but the table is only open to certain kinds of nerds / intellectuals.
So that selects who might come and read / contribute to HN. Then:
d) The software that runs the infrastructure has some pretty excellent design elements. It's minimalist and fast. The "new" firehose is perfect for coffee breaks. The point system, unlike most in the world, seems to give helpful feedback and keep "noise" to a minimum.
A lot of it is attitude, I think. There's PG's general attitude. There's the attitude of the types YC has a history of funding. These seem to me to set a kind of high bar for submissions and comments in terms of the quality of the informativeness of them and the good natured, let's all cooperate and marvel at stuff and learn kind of spirit of the thing.
e) It's a gift to the community that joins it rather than something that has to make money. It seems to display no greater (or lesser) ambition than to be good at being what it is.
-t
Could we add "provides a forum for talking with people doing what you want to do?"
Because I'm not here for YC, I'm not here to promote my startup, and I'm not here really to contribute. I'm here to bounce ideas off of people who are a few steps ahead of me in the startup game and to listen to the type of things they talk about.
I hope I put that diplomatically enough.
If I owe you anything for the plug? Just bill me. I won't pay it, but it might make you feel better sending the bill. :)
Be great if the crowd were smaller, but perhaps I have "leveled up" as another thread put it.
still it never hurts to suck up; even by accident. ESP if it's true.
From the guidelines:
On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
The question was what was the reason for success. The only way I know to answer that question is to state why I visit, which is what all the options on the poll refer to -- why are you visiting? I imagine each person will respond with their own reason and hence the poll has some value. Because after all, the reason PG created HN and the reason people visit may be two completely different things :)
I've said many times that the board is Paul's and it's Paul's to decide what he wants on it. That's all fine and dandy, but it don't mean diddly squat for why or other folks visit. That's a completely different thing.
As a side note, one thing I've found from the very beginning is that anything you say can be misconstrued/misunderstood. In a small group, people get to know each other and are able to "fill in the blanks" whereas in a larger group this becomes unworkable. I know on a couple of occasions a year or so ago PG has expressed frustration with comments like "do I have to explain everything!" which I didn't understand at the time but do now. So you either write some super-long comment, trying to cover all the ways you might be misunderstood, or you end up having long threads of conversation which effectively end with "So sure, that's what I've been saying all along!"
Yet another force that drives the board towards quick one-liners.
- Learn new things.
- Engage in meaningful discussions.
- Meet like minded people.
- Find out what others think.