Same. It's the only place to find the sort of genuine, informed opinion that used to be common on the first page of Google results, on a wide variety of topics, without an awful lot of digging.
The majority of discussion here is "on topic" - which is good but very different to Reddit or Slack communities which tend to revolve more around personalities.
Been checking out The Independent more so lately.
Just thought I’d share as I used to read BBCnews daily.
Some of the stories ARS presents you won't even be able to parse as to why they were written unless you're aware of the general tech and social zeitgeist - which you can see on reddit somewhat
I suppose it can get addictive too, but I haven't found that to be the case for me, not yet anyway. HN on the other hand... :)