Ask HN: What Happened to Indie Hackers? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What Happened to Indie Hackers?

22 pointstriceratop8 comments

I was a huge fan back in its heyday but in recent years the site has become a complete disaster. Discussions are dead, nobody that actually makes money posts there, and the newsletter seems like its written by a 16 year old "maker." I could go on and on. I don't get what happened. Am I the only one who feels this way? Did csallen exit?

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The site became noisy by indie hackers creating products for other indie hackers and using the site for promoting their products.

There's also a community focus on less hackerish topics as paid newsletters and content products.

Also, the whole site is a bit sluggish, which may lead to less engagement in the discussions.

It essentially became Product Hunt 2.0 instead of focusing on its own niche.

It was bought by Stripe four years ago[1]. No idea if or how that’s related with what you’re observing.

[1]: https://www.indiehackers.com/blog/acquired-by-stripe

I actually deleted my IH account awhile back because of this. It turned into... something else. As far as alternatives -- https://www.starterstory.com has some good interviews though not really tech-focused. And I also came across https://console.dev/qa a couple weeks back and it gives me heydey IH vibes, but not everything is a business.

I don't know what it was like back in the day

Other than I tried a time or two and had people shit on my ideas so I bailed

Soft I know

But I've been back for a few months and generally enjoying it and finding it almost semi-useful

Forums generally do seem dead-ish

I would prefer to pay $20/mo -- at least -- to have truly engaged people.

But not sure if charging a small fee would help or hurt.

I did notice that recently there are a lot of "I m building in public" type folks. Also no real interviews since January 2021.

Is there a problem with "I'm building in public" people? Or do you mean they have nothing interesting and just announce they are building X taking up space?

I may sound elite but yea, most of them are wantrapreneur types and worst, selling their product/service in the name of being an indiehacker. Nothing wrong with hustling but I don't see much of quality anymore.

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