I doubt it'll work. HN doesn't work just because it's there, it works because it has a certain traction among a certain community. Building up such traction is very difficult, and I doubt doing so by adding a link to it from a non-Europe-focused site is going to help much.
Lamernews looked real cool the first 2 weeks as well, and then it mostly died out. How will Hackful be different?
I mean, I'd love it to be different, I'd love a site about hacker culture more focused on European issues, people and businesses. But I can't see why it'll work.
You are right... but that is why Hackful should be fine: it was born out of an email list called Open Coffee London where there is an amazing community of entrepreneurs helping each other everyday. We saw how open HackerNews is and thought that we should give our European community more chance to flourish.
Our NEXT steps are to make this more shareable: RSS, possibly daily email digests (opt-in only)
THEN we are plugging in a calendar of local events and need-to-know events
AND FINALLY capping it off with a local Angel List
HackerStreet India has been doing ok for the last one year since launch - http://hackerstreet.in/
The objective was never to become the next Hacker News or replace it but just to have India centric discussions there. I would say Hackful has an equally good (or better) chance
Let me start off by saying that this is a great idea, and maybe we do need more HN-like sites as HN currently has a usefulness monopoly as far as my news browsing habits are concerned.
On a more constructive note: please implement an RSS feed.
I can't do without an RSS feed either. Hacker News has the top spot on my iGoogle page and if I can't put Hackful next to it, I'll probably forget about it real soon.
The number one reason for me would be because lots of the things covered on HN tend to be US focused to the point that people forget anywhere else exists. I'm tired of articles praising some service provider or payment processor only to find they are US-only and may support the EU in 'the future'. I'm tired of rants about carrier practices that only affect the US as if it is universal. I'd like to see a site where there is an actual consciousness that not everyone is living in the United States of America.
As an EU hacker myself, I'm not exactly crazy about this regional split - it feels unnecessary and artificial somehow. On the other hand, if we're going to have an alternative HN site, it will probably have to differentiate itself in some way.
One reason that is good enough for me: HN is a bit of an echo chamber. It's maintained by a specific VC with specific opinions, which already was a source of some controversy. While I don't see a problem with the existence of opinionated media, I do think it's healthy if we have alternatives. And being "european" is specifically beneficial, because it brings with itself a somewhat different perspective.
I'd probably use both (unless the other one dies, of course — just because it's useful doesn't mean it will work).
Maybe it will do things in new ways that are better than HN. Maybe it will eventually become more International like HN is? Choice and variety are a good thing. You've got to differentiate yourself somehow when you're starting out.
Same here. In order to make a geo based community there better be good reasons for that. All the abandoned Social Networks in Europe that had a localized positioning are still witnesses of this development.
I've been to HackerNews meetups around the world and the London meetup is one of the biggest and best in my opinion. With more than 400 attendees a month, they sell out usually too.
Indeed, it solves the wrong problem. We are not lacking in tech news access over here, we are lacking in knowing who is around, what is around, who is hiring, who is firing, who funds, who succeeds, who fails, who is searching for cofounders etc.
A Hacker News for Europe would be great. A lot of the stories on HN are very USA-centric.
Currently it looks like Hackful focuses on the UK, especially London. Lets hope it expands to cover all of Europe.
Even though I am a fan of Hacker News I have the same feel that it is mostly USA centric. Sometimes after reading some articles I wonder how things are in Europe, similar or not, etc. Hopefully it can become not a replacement but a complement for the european hackers.
I have to say that I'm a bit conflicted about this.
On the one hand, there's nothing wrong with "splitting" HN, especially by geography. The main reason being that news that would interest only hackers in a specific region/country wouldn't see the light of HN's front page, as global readers just wouldn't care as much. As a matter of fact, I even run an "HN splinter" myself, for Israelis (https://bitorama.com), and I'm pretty hopeful about it.
That said, the EU is a pretty big and diverse place. Would a guy from Romania or Finland be more likely to find stories that interest him in an EU-wide site rather than in HN? I'm not convinced. Maybe a more regional approach is required.
Then again, I could be proven wrong. So best of luck to the guys running the site!
> Would a guy from Romania or Finland be more likely
> to find stories that interest him in an EU-wide
> site rather than in HN?
That was my thinking too. There are lots of small countries with relatively small hacker communities that don't generate that much news on a regular basis.
That said, I've always struggled finding EU-based services, so this might be their chance!
Passwords... Again. I can't believe I still have to create an account. Even for a website like HN that I'm completely addicted to, I would've never signed up if it weren't for OpenID. You want me to use your service? Make it easy for me to authenticate, I don't need yet another password...
Twitter, Facebook, or even GitHub authentication is certainly de rigeur, but I must admit I thought OpenID had fallen off the radar and I haven't seen any interesting new projects supporting it lately. Even 37signals gave up on it mostly due to lack of use: http://productblog.37signals.com/products/2011/01/well-be-re...
Nothing against OpenID, per se, but it doesn't feel like it has taken off. Or maybe the big sites that are using it are just getting on with it AOK :-)
I only recently made the effort to switch to a tool like 1Password and it's great for creating on-the-fly secure passwords that I don't need to bother remembering.
I believe there's quite a few products that do a similar job.
My only concern is that I don't think people in Europe feel very "European". There is no identity in being European like there is in being German, Swedish, or whatever. Bundling us together because we live on the same continent seems a bit artificial to me.
I'm in Canada and I can completely understand the sentiments that led to the creation of this site. However, I fear that this may lead to HN_Asia, HN_South_America, HN_Oceania, etc., making it extremely difficult to stay on top of good interesting news, and leading to a lot of duplication.
I would very much like to see instead a single additional site (HN') which would have a larger focus than simply the European scene, and where obvious US-centric post/comments would mercilessly be deleted.
This looks like a service that tries to imitate Hacker News and assumes the same traffic and audience.
Focus on fewer posts on the front page; no more than 20% of the posts on it should have 0 comments, because it just serves to make the site look barren - which it probably is. You don't even have a community yet, so there is no hive mind nor zeitgeist on the site; bringing people together to discuss a few issues will make people get to get and know each other and help build the community.
The problem with Europe is the multitude of languages. You can't target Europe with English language, or it will end up UK/US centric. That's pretty much unsolvable problem. Of course we can talk about things happening in Europe, but that doesn't make sense.
You're being overly pessimistic on the percentage of Europeans speaking English (though not necessarily as their native language). This language has worked as a common means to communicate for a long time and definitely won't leave this web site end up being "UK/US centric".
Interesting. I think there's definitely demand for services like this.
We have been working on a community for entrepreneurs and startups in the UK (in addition to our information website), lion.co.uk/community, we're still in the phase of optimizing things.
We've found that there's many entrepreneur and startup websites but gaining critical mass to make a useful community is another thing.
We should probably work together but then again, as others have mentioned, there's different requirements for different people. Founders of businesses other than technology and hackers for example might not have reason to collaborate.
That said, the more resources there are for business founders the better; especially in Europe right now.
One suggestion: hackful.com has no linkage to the differentiating factor of the website. Why not change it to hackful.eu? This isn't a decisive factor, but it could help in the positioning...
Bookmarked, lets see if it goes well.
One advice, give the page some border on the sides, its pretty bad at least for me to have to look to the edge of the monitor.
I'm British and I think this is a great idea. I'm interested to read about the startup scene in Europe and the UK.
I do think that we should be trying to move away from the 'hacker' label. People are never going to understand that 'hackers' can be good -- See that AP Press article. And really, our definition is the less popular one, and therefore less correct, and it is we who should change our wording.
Wouldn't this be more successful if it would be split across countries? Stories about US-focused topics interest me as much (or as little) as stories about European countries where i don't live.
Also, for more people than you might imagine a site thats in English (and not in their local language) could be a barrier.
But you do live in Europe, and can visit other European countries relatively easily. If you are a member of the EU, you could even move to another EU country.
I think most Dutch people would prefer the site to be in English, as the Netherlands is only a small country, and England's an hour or less away by plane. Surely Dutch people would be interested in, for example, sources of venture capital in the UK?
Why? I as a an Austrian am very interested in stuff happening in Germany - being indirectly affected by it (job markets, economy), and the possibility of tele-working in Berlin is not so far-fetched, going there just once or twice by plane.
I'd be more interested by a HN Asia or something. I mean, political, technological issues in US and EU are different but not that much, after all. Japan, Korea, China, Singapore, India, etc... lots of stuff is happening there and nothing much comes to the surface.
At first I didn't liked the idea, but it could work as a way to filter out US centric posts and focus more on Europe.
I think it needs some guidelines: is English the preferred language? If this is limited to Europe, is it ok to have posts related to other parts of the world?
[+] [-] skrebbel|14 years ago|reply
Lamernews looked real cool the first 2 weeks as well, and then it mostly died out. How will Hackful be different?
I mean, I'd love it to be different, I'd love a site about hacker culture more focused on European issues, people and businesses. But I can't see why it'll work.
[+] [-] rayhano|14 years ago|reply
Our NEXT steps are to make this more shareable: RSS, possibly daily email digests (opt-in only)
THEN we are plugging in a calendar of local events and need-to-know events
AND FINALLY capping it off with a local Angel List
[+] [-] prateekdayal|14 years ago|reply
The objective was never to become the next Hacker News or replace it but just to have India centric discussions there. I would say Hackful has an equally good (or better) chance
[+] [-] NameNickHN|14 years ago|reply
Do you really think HN has no European visitors?
[+] [-] Udo|14 years ago|reply
On a more constructive note: please implement an RSS feed.
[+] [-] elisee|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jsilence|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Jd|14 years ago|reply
I live in Europe, but AFAIK none of the places where I've lived/am regular even have an HN meetup. I have no idea we would want a splintered HN.
[+] [-] kiloaper|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Udo|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LaGrange|14 years ago|reply
I'd probably use both (unless the other one dies, of course — just because it's useful doesn't mean it will work).
[+] [-] mike-cardwell|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stfu|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brackin|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arguesalot|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|14 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] unknown|14 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] skeptical|14 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] ahy1|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LoneWolf|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rayhano|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sep|14 years ago|reply
On the one hand, there's nothing wrong with "splitting" HN, especially by geography. The main reason being that news that would interest only hackers in a specific region/country wouldn't see the light of HN's front page, as global readers just wouldn't care as much. As a matter of fact, I even run an "HN splinter" myself, for Israelis (https://bitorama.com), and I'm pretty hopeful about it.
That said, the EU is a pretty big and diverse place. Would a guy from Romania or Finland be more likely to find stories that interest him in an EU-wide site rather than in HN? I'm not convinced. Maybe a more regional approach is required.
Then again, I could be proven wrong. So best of luck to the guys running the site!
[+] [-] pestaa|14 years ago|reply
That was my thinking too. There are lots of small countries with relatively small hacker communities that don't generate that much news on a regular basis.
That said, I've always struggled finding EU-based services, so this might be their chance!
[+] [-] sktrdie|14 years ago|reply
After all, we exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias...
[+] [-] estel|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mikecaron|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] babarock|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] a3_nm|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] petercooper|14 years ago|reply
Nothing against OpenID, per se, but it doesn't feel like it has taken off. Or maybe the big sites that are using it are just getting on with it AOK :-)
[+] [-] robgough|14 years ago|reply
I believe there's quite a few products that do a similar job.
[+] [-] geon|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aroberge|14 years ago|reply
I would very much like to see instead a single additional site (HN') which would have a larger focus than simply the European scene, and where obvious US-centric post/comments would mercilessly be deleted.
[+] [-] kmfrk|14 years ago|reply
Focus on fewer posts on the front page; no more than 20% of the posts on it should have 0 comments, because it just serves to make the site look barren - which it probably is. You don't even have a community yet, so there is no hive mind nor zeitgeist on the site; bringing people together to discuss a few issues will make people get to get and know each other and help build the community.
Make it scalable.
[+] [-] rayhano|14 years ago|reply
That is where the idea came up - we needed a more open method to ask questions of each other, share info and demos
[+] [-] Geee|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bigfoot|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amac|14 years ago|reply
We have been working on a community for entrepreneurs and startups in the UK (in addition to our information website), lion.co.uk/community, we're still in the phase of optimizing things.
We've found that there's many entrepreneur and startup websites but gaining critical mass to make a useful community is another thing.
We should probably work together but then again, as others have mentioned, there's different requirements for different people. Founders of businesses other than technology and hackers for example might not have reason to collaborate.
That said, the more resources there are for business founders the better; especially in Europe right now.
[+] [-] rayhano|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lignuist|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fierarul|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danmaz74|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LoneWolf|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] v0cab|14 years ago|reply
I do think that we should be trying to move away from the 'hacker' label. People are never going to understand that 'hackers' can be good -- See that AP Press article. And really, our definition is the less popular one, and therefore less correct, and it is we who should change our wording.
[+] [-] weavejester|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] huskyr|14 years ago|reply
Also, for more people than you might imagine a site thats in English (and not in their local language) could be a barrier.
[+] [-] v0cab|14 years ago|reply
I think most Dutch people would prefer the site to be in English, as the Netherlands is only a small country, and England's an hour or less away by plane. Surely Dutch people would be interested in, for example, sources of venture capital in the UK?
[+] [-] manmal|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ekianjo|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pedrocarvalho|14 years ago|reply
I think it needs some guidelines: is English the preferred language? If this is limited to Europe, is it ok to have posts related to other parts of the world?
[+] [-] freyfogle|14 years ago|reply