> In the case of hacker news, what we're addicted to is startup news and gossip.
Not me. I'm more interested in programming technology and understanding how trends in technology shape society -- and reading PG's essay has helped me do this.
I'm not sure all of us here are hackers and we don't always come here for programming articles. I read hacker news as an alternative to google news or watching tv. For me, it's mostly entertainment that alleviates my boredom with a weighting toward improving my skillset and keeping up to date in my industry.
If there were only code articles or technology articles, it'd get boring and I'd probably come back less often. I probably spend way too much time here really, but I probably click on 75% or more of the articles on the front page. I click on them because they are interesting, not necessarily because they are about programming or technology -- they expand my mind.
>Maybe we should be using Hacker News to, I don't know, show off cool hacks and build projects, instead of living vicariously through stereotypes on TV?
"hacker news becomes more interesting to people who want to have the sort of ideological conversations that eventually drown out the interesting stuff about tech and startups."
Unless you are the one starting said ideological conversations?
>It's worth noting that "hacker news" was probably never meant in the sense of "excellent programmer", but rather in the sense being criticized by the article:
I think your notation is revisionist history.
Here's an example of a PG's use of "hacker" from 2001. PG is very much talking about "hacker" as an above-average programmer not content with an inferior "blub" language:
YCombinator was started in 2005. The "Hacker News" was started in 2007.[1] The audience it intended to serve was the type of "hackers" mentioned in the 2001 essay.
PG also later uses "hacker" in the sense of a tech nerd who would rather focus on a startup rather instead of being discontent working at a corporate job. This definition of "life-hacker" is also not relevant to the article's definition. The article is talking about programmers who serve VCs' agendas instead of pursuing their true desires. PG has never advocated that. The essay also complains about the VCs who are pseudo-hackers because of their monetary influence. PG isn't talking about them either. Ergo, this website was not trying to attract them as an audience. (The "demo days" does try to attract VCs but that's an event separate from the website.)
One can look at Internet Archive Wayback Machine[2] and see that the front page was dominated by topics unrelated to "chasing the money". Just a bunch of tech geek topics. Programming languages, algorithms, etc. It was very much "news" for "hackers" in the positive connotations of that term.
Interesting.. are you learning/using programming as part of your work or for your own interests? If not, I'm curious what value you feel you get from Hacker News; I know a lot of non-programming topics get discussed here, I just typically assume the audience here skews more towards people working in technology/software-related fields.
I wouldn't expect hacker news articles to be restriced to technology or startups or even news. I would expect them to be aimed at a deeper understanding of a topic.
Is it weird that I read Hacker News for none of the reasons he lists? I'm rarely interested in reading about startups succeeding or failing, or new frameworks or languages, but I am interested in reading about cool things people have done with technology, or even non-tech related news. I guess I'd probably be more suited to slashdot's content, but I prefer Hacker News' format so much more.
Because flashes of insight and great ideas often come from reading articles about topics outside of our individual fields. Also, hacker news is primarily for entrepreneurs and hackers (not in the criminal sense of the word) which means besides the small common threads like technology and business, we come from all walks of life and fields.
I used to be in the trades. I read hacker news when I started getting into programming and now I work full time as a software engineer. So.. yes non-tech folks read hacker news!
I see most articles as a constant reminder that I really should be _doing_ and _creating_, as a lot of those people do, rather than be reading stuff on sites like Hacker News...
In defense of the article, what you are talking about is a different story more "finding the Internet and programming" that isn't really unique to Hacker News. It can surely be used that way, and people likely do, but you can also find those things by searching for "top programming books" (or hanging around twitter, quora, medium or other sites). They did sort of talk about that with the early motivations for Hacker News. And you could absolutely go to a music festival and write about the food trucks, the people and the atmosphere that if that is what unique about that festival. I think they did a good job in that regard. People don't obsessively read Hacker News to help newcomers, they do so because it is all in all a technical tabloid.
Not me. I'm more interested in programming technology and understanding how trends in technology shape society -- and reading PG's essay has helped me do this.
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