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I read HN probably more than I should, and I was pretty surprised to see this has over 500 comments and I didn't see it at all. Turns out it was only on the fro

I read HN probably more than I should, and I was pretty surprised to see this has over 500 comments and I didn't see it at all. Turns out it was only on the frontpage for 1 hr. https://hnrankings.info/39205676/ https://hnrankings.info/39205676/

Macha 3y ago
The way HN is set up, having 500 comments would have contributed to that. The "flamewar detector" the mods sometimes mention seems to take comments/votes and comments/time into consideration then penalises threads.
- throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
  Yep. The HN users see is highly curated. Mostly by algorithms, sometimes by humans.
  - jpoijw 3y ago
    [dead]
  - dang 3y ago
    You're right. Here's 10 years' worth of me explaining that: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20hn%20curated%20site&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
- Brajeshwar 3y ago
  Yes, this is correct from my observation, too. The comment-to-vote ratios go fast; up south, they will likely be out of the pages quickly. One might think that a post that falls off the homepage would linger on page 2 for a while, but it can be out of even the first 100 posts fast. I have stopped thinking about HN's algorithms and just let it do its job.
dang 3y ago
I was offline for a few hours and am just getting to this thread now. Here are the explanations I posted in the previous threads: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39210947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39210947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39172045 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39172045 If you or anyone read those and have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. Edit: I've turned off both the flags and flamewar detector on this article now, in keeping with the first rule of HN moderation, which is (I'm repeating myself but it's probably worth repeating) that we moderate HN less, not more, when YC or a YC-funded startup is part of a story (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderate%20%22less%2C%20not%20more%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...). Please note: that doesn't mean we don't moderate at all; what it means is that whatever we would normally do, we do less of it in such cases. Normally we would never late a ragestorm like this stay on the front page—there's zero intellectual curiosity here, as the comments demonstrate. This kind of thing is obviously off topic for HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. If it weren't, the site would consist of little else. Equally obvious is that this is why HN users are flagging the story. They're not doing anything different than they normally would. All this goes double when a story has already had extensive discussion, and more still when the article is sourcing its content from Hacker News itself, as this one is. That's absurd. But I'm willing to take the hit because the first rule of HN moderation is more important.
- gurchik 3y ago
  Thanks Dan. When I wrote my comment I thought most people would already know that it was most likely an automated system that downranked the post. The next time I talk about this topic I'll make it extra clear I'm not insinuating any manual censorship. With that said, it is a shame that in cases like this, you may not even know about a post with hundreds of comments unless someone sends you a link. Have you thought about implementing a view that ignores the flamewar detection? This could even be a historical view, like https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2024-01-31 https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2024-01-31 . The post in question was one of the highest upvoted submissions of the day and yet it's not on the first page of this link. I fully agree with you that in the majority of cases these comments are not encouraging intellectual curiosity, I still do like reading the comments because I do find some interesting stuff there sometimes.
bun_terminator 3y ago
The only reasonable HN interface is hckrnews.com. The vanilla site is "moderated"
- archagon 3y ago
  I always go to news.ycombinator.com/active. That’s the “real” front page as far as I’m concerned.
- vidarh 3y ago
  A lot of us come here because it is moderated. There are plenty of unmoderated, or less moderated, places for if we want that chaos. Both have their place.

Macha 3y ago

The way HN is set up, having 500 comments would have contributed to that. The "flamewar detector" the mods sometimes mention seems to take comments/votes and comments/time into consideration then penalises threads.

throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
Yep. The HN users see is highly curated. Mostly by algorithms, sometimes by humans.
- jpoijw 3y ago
  [dead]
- dang 3y ago
  You're right. Here's 10 years' worth of me explaining that: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20hn%20curated%20site&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
Brajeshwar 3y ago
Yes, this is correct from my observation, too. The comment-to-vote ratios go fast; up south, they will likely be out of the pages quickly. One might think that a post that falls off the homepage would linger on page 2 for a while, but it can be out of even the first 100 posts fast. I have stopped thinking about HN's algorithms and just let it do its job.

dang 3y ago

I was offline for a few hours and am just getting to this thread now. Here are the explanations I posted in the previous threads: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39210947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39210947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39172045 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39172045 If you or anyone read those and have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. Edit: I've turned off both the flags and flamewar detector on this article now, in keeping with the first rule of HN moderation, which is (I'm repeating myself but it's probably worth repeating) that we moderate HN less, not more, when YC or a YC-funded startup is part of a story (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderate%20%22less%2C%20not%20more%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...). Please note: that doesn't mean we don't moderate at all; what it means is that whatever we would normally do, we do less of it in such cases. Normally we would never late a ragestorm like this stay on the front page—there's zero intellectual curiosity here, as the comments demonstrate. This kind of thing is obviously off topic for HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. If it weren't, the site would consist of little else. Equally obvious is that this is why HN users are flagging the story. They're not doing anything different than they normally would. All this goes double when a story has already had extensive discussion, and more still when the article is sourcing its content from Hacker News itself, as this one is. That's absurd. But I'm willing to take the hit because the first rule of HN moderation is more important.

gurchik 3y ago
Thanks Dan. When I wrote my comment I thought most people would already know that it was most likely an automated system that downranked the post. The next time I talk about this topic I'll make it extra clear I'm not insinuating any manual censorship. With that said, it is a shame that in cases like this, you may not even know about a post with hundreds of comments unless someone sends you a link. Have you thought about implementing a view that ignores the flamewar detection? This could even be a historical view, like https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2024-01-31 https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2024-01-31 . The post in question was one of the highest upvoted submissions of the day and yet it's not on the first page of this link. I fully agree with you that in the majority of cases these comments are not encouraging intellectual curiosity, I still do like reading the comments because I do find some interesting stuff there sometimes.

bun_terminator 3y ago

The only reasonable HN interface is hckrnews.com. The vanilla site is "moderated"

archagon 3y ago
I always go to news.ycombinator.com/active. That’s the “real” front page as far as I’m concerned.
vidarh 3y ago
A lot of us come here because it is moderated. There are plenty of unmoderated, or less moderated, places for if we want that chaos. Both have their place.