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Comment by throwaway34539 | Hacker News Reader

I don't think HN deserves this reputation. Most discussions are shallow, some people don't even bother reading the story. Meta discussions are frequently the most upvoted and stories that takes more than a couple of minutes to appreciate are often left to die.

Partly it's because of the format and the platform. Instead of seeking out the information yourself, you're feed bits of it before moving on to the next bit. It works great for news, commentary, as entertainment or a starting guide to startups. But less so for actually acquiring and/or exchanging information.

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A pattern I think I see is this:

For anything "opinion" related, the conversation will go to hell very quickly. Read snippets and ignore.

For anything "knowledge" related, this place is phenomenal. Much to learn from the giants amongst us.

Opinion and knowledge are two different axes and I really enjoy reading the opinions of those who know a lot about a topic I don't know. Opinions about topics such as economics are best avoided.

If you think this could be true, simply focus on those discussions that elicit expert knowledge and opinion, rather than those that anyone can contribute to. Er, like this one. Bye.

Well, if there was someway to mark links as "opinion" or "knowledge" related, I'd be happy.. But, that is certainly not the case. Like some sort of crowdsourced opinion/knowledge on each link. Like upvotes, but a little more meaningful/useful.

Then again, you're still relying on the crowd and its whims. But it'll be consistent!

I can't tell the difference between which type a thread is without reading the comments or article.

I think HN does host an abundance of really smart folks.

The main irritant is that so many of them are nitpicky and/or snarky.

Anyone else noticed this?

There is a lot of literalism among technical people. It goes with the territory.

Yeah, but out demographic is one that prone to sarcasm, criticism, sarcasm, etc, myself included. :)

Compared to, let's say Slashdot? This place is pretty tame in comparison.

flamewars are the favorite pastime of the internet. it's been like that since before i was alive, or so i'm told by the grey beards.

Which would be relevant if HN had flamewars. It does not. It does not even have a significant frequency of individual flames.

A flame is a long impassioned harangue or rant.

Agreed. The groupthink mentality here is almost as bad as reddit from what i've seen (say...50 to 70% of the way there); however, i think some of the show HN thing have been interesting to see (and I don't think i would've found them on metafilter, reddit, etc.)

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