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Comment by dang | Hacker News Reader

HN has had plenty of large frontpage threads fitting each of those descriptions. What we don't want is too much repetition. Otherwise the small handful of hottest topics on the internet would dominate everything else, and HN isn't that kind of site.

Lots of past explanations at https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so..., https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so..., many more available on request!

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Speaking as the user you responded to in the first link: I’m sure you get flak from all corners, but I (and presumably many others like me) take zero issue with your philosophy or design goals for the site. I’m with you all the way when you say you don’t want to HN to turn into a current affairs site.

The problem IMO is the current sensitivity of the filtering. You said upstream that a high enough number of upvotes could outweigh flags — but that CECOT thread was one of the top 5-10 posts of the month despite having been taken down for many hours overnight. If that wasn’t a thread where the upvotes should be a strong enough signal to override the flags, I dunno what is.

We’re asking for subtle knob tuning, not revolution.

It seems like this post got killed as well, but it's the first I'm hearing of the functionality. I wouldn't say I'm a frequent user of the site, but I think I would have noticed if people were posting this link often.

“Too much repetition” of subjects you find politically incorrect, you mean.

As I've said in the past*, avoiding repetition is a core principle here and applies to every topic - especially when it's a repetitive+indignant combo. There's no political exemption.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42978389

* (edit: to you, as it turns out!)

And as I’ve said in the past, to you, no one’s buying it. It’s obvious to everyone that the same tech and biz topics can and do appear here ad nauseum.

Indignant, though. What a joke.

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