Comment by kergonath

4 years ago

HN is not a “greatest 80s hits” radio, though. Users submit links and users vote on them. There is nobody making editorial decisions about what goes on the front page, beyond extreme cases. Sure, there is some tweaking, but in the end it’s all stories posted and upvoted by us, collectively. So it is entirely pointless to whine about the content: it is what the community wants to see.

6 comments

kergonath

Reply
pvg  4 years ago

There is nobody making editorial decisions about what goes on the front page, beyond extreme cases.

HN is more actively moderated than this, you can find piles of moderator comments about it.

  • dsr_  4 years ago

    YC companies can put in an submission; it goes to the front page but sinks fairly rapidly and can't be commented on. I think that these are usually employment ads.

    I also think that's the only direct placement, but I can't be certain.

    • arp242  4 years ago

      There's more than that. Actually, this story mentions it:

      > Moderators and a small number of reviewer users comb the depths of /newest looking for stories that got overlooked but which the community might find interesting. Those go into a second-chance pool from which stories are randomly selected and lobbed onto the bottom part of the front page. This guarantees them a few minutes of attention. If they don’t interest the community they soon fall off, but if they do, they get upvoted and stay on the front page.

  • kergonath  4 years ago

    There is the second chance, but stories that don’t resonate disappear quickly even after that. I included this in the tweaking the mods can do. I guess I went a bit far about editorialising, but it’s still a minor effect.