Yes, I would love to find that. Less web, less startup, less silicon valley, less brogrammers, but more C++/Fortran/Java, more depth, more performance, more BigCorp, more career. With people who are not impressed by the latest fad, because they have seen the same ten years ago.
Unfortunately, the interesting guys to fill such a forum do not hang out on social platforms and bikeshed a lot. They are busy. Usually you can find a few on project specific forums/mailinglists.
The problem for "interesting" people is discussing those topics with you or me, isn't that interesting to them. That's the problem with discussion forums - I'd find discussing Linux with Torvaldes fascinating, but his side of the conversation wouldn't help him solve his problems or forge new ground. It wouldn't just be a waste of his time but it would be boring.
I've seen all of those topics you mention gain traction, probably with the exception of "climbing the career ladder at big corp", but that's the broader Zeitgeist not just HN.
The way to get more C++/Fortran/Java discussion on HN is to submit good relevant content. If you post something really really good, sometimes the James Gosling of X shows up to comment because HN's diversity keeps them around. But any really good topic is likely to draw comments from people who worked with the James Gosling of X because HN has a lot of those people.
HN has grown large enough that there is an audience for just about any tech topic so long as the resource is reasonably good...in fact, that's been the case for a long time, and this from someone who was posting articles about Windows and Microsoft in the days where every time the Macbook got a new 8% faster Core 2, the front page of HN was dominated by the press release and Ask HN was full of "are you upgrading?" treads.
In the end, finding or creating good content is the way to increase discussion of the topics one finds interesting and to influence the direction of the community.
I suppose Quora could have filled this niche - real people providing candid, real life answers. But for whatever reason, Quora is full of fluff and unfriendly business practices
Your question is far too vague. For example, how do you personally
define "web-focused" or "technical" or "professional"? All of those
definitions matter a whole lot. Also, you left out an important aspect,
namely if you're looking for a discussion forum or an aggregator?
Since I'm blindly guessing at what you mean, the following suggestions
might not be what you want, but they're the best I can do.
Lastly, on HN you can see the submissions from a given HN user, so if
you find someone who regularly submits stories that interest you, you
can check their submission history. For example:
- I am looking for a discussion forum, not an aggregator.
- By "web-focused" I meant posts about website development technology used on client and/or server side. Some of this technology is still interesting, like databases, but there is a lot more, e.g. desktop sw technologies, algorithms etc.
- By "technical" I meant in-depth technology reviews and discussions. More posts by people that are not about "how to use x" but "how x works inside".
- By "professional" I meant posts not about computer science basics (stuff a person knows when going through formal education and/or long years of practical experience).
Thank you for your suggestions. I looked through the websites you posted.
Do you know what the purpose of http://www.datatau.com/ is? They do not really tell on their website (or do they?).
Lots of HN articles are not about the web, we have lots of science and technical items. I'm not sure what you mean by "professional", I think many if not most people on here do software development for a living. It sounds like most of what you're looking for may already be here. Upvote articles that interest you and comment on them, that should help shift the focus in the direction you want.
I guess what I meant by "professional" was more people with a formal education in computer science and some years of practical experience. It is just my impression that this is not so much the case here at HN.
This being said, I do not mean to be disrespectful towards someone who "only" has practical training (they may be older so that when they studied there was no formal computer-specific education).
So I had never heard of lobsters, and just checked its front page and a couple of comments and ... is it Stockholm syndrome to say I prefer the HN design / look and feel?
And is it unfair to lobsters to say the posts all seem very very familiar? Just asking as one is always worried about missing out on the next great thing, but the HN niche seems pretty well filled?
If you are interested in lobste.rs invitations send me an email with your "keybase profile" and at least 1 public network identification that will let me know that you're not a self-destructive troll and I'll be happy to help you.
UPDATE: Since I received a lot more emails than I thought and it's time consuming, my offer stands for another 24 hours.
To me, this is a (major) downside. Among other reasons: I'd want a website where people like me felt welcome. And I know that for me, personally, I do not feel welcome at any site that didn't even allow me to join.
Something worth checking out (partly because the cost of checking is so low) is simply the "new" section here on HN.
I find a lot in there in the areas you're looking for that the general populace here doesn't vote up. At a minimum, it's similar to the front-page but it moves faster (so you don't have to see the "pong written in go" type posts more than once)
I've been wondering about this as well. I mean, there's lots of interesting stuff here on HN, but the deeply technical stuff is far and inbetween. And due to the way topics very quickly drop of the first two pages it's hard to discuss more technical stuff.
More often than not I find there was an interesting discussion on some entry, but all the discussion ended 8 hours ago, and nobody will read it now.
Hm, limiting the frontpage stuff could be an interesting twist to links aggregators.
For example, only drop things off the frontpage, if nobody made a comment for 24 hours. Obviously, this builds up a queue of content. Now we could let people vote on these for ordering the queue, but comments are only allowed for frontpage stuff. Hm, sounds very similar to plain old web forums, though.
I found this too. This is probably due to the fact that Hacker News is (mainly) for sharing news not discussing topics. The discussion part is not supported well by the mechanics of the site.
I wish there were something similar to Hacker News for IT. I work at a small nonprofit, and I handle both the web side and the hardware side. One day I'm making a data visualization with D3, the next I'm trying to understand why the printer won't print random chunks of a PDF. One day I'm configuring a new VPS, another I'm trying to figure out why the ClearOne in the conference room hates our VoIP system. I've found tons and tons of resources for web development anything. Similar resources for IT have been practically non-existent by comparison. Maybe I just don't know where to look?
Install selfoss[1] on your own server. Then add RSS feeds of authors you like to read. Many sites with RSS feeds have their own commenting system for discussions.
"better moderated"? Isn't that a bit subjective? I left slashdot.org because I found their moderation to be horrible. Hell, in my opinion, the vast majority of reddit's mods are better than slashdot's mods.
The issue is something everyone overlooks when making these kinds of judgements: adaptability. You have to be able to evolve and adapt to the changing times and, most importantly, adapt and evolve with your user base. This is where reddit really shines and one of the big reasons why places like Fark, mefi and slashdot stagnated and quit growing (relatively speaking).
Large online communities are highly dynamic. There is user churn, as well as the obvious cultural evolution that takes place. Places like fark and slashdot never evolved and adapted with their users and the changing times so people eventually get bored and leave. It's one of the reasons for their stagnation. Mods have to be adaptable and evolve with their communities.
Reddit is evolution and adaptability personified. It's the culture itself running the show over there (anyone can create a subreddit), so the new users with their new ideas, interests, memes, etc all have a place. When something gets boring, old or loses popularity (like FFFUUU comics) it doesn't hurt the site, just the subreddit. People just move from one subreddit to another instead of moving from one website to another.
And that's the problem with slashdot's mods (and fark's mods too). They're the same people and rarely do they let new blood in. And the new blood instantly conforms to the old guard's way of thinking and policies. The way content gets moderated always remains the same. This might be good short term (some people don't like change) but people do eventually get bored of the same old, same old.
Slashdot is differently moderated, but the overall comment quality (and s/n level within threads in general) is considerably lower than here. The editorial policy is also very different (in that it exists): Submissions are curated rather than solely bubbled by user moderation, so the submission s/n ratio is perhaps better (if you get article by feed rather than just surf the respective front pages), but we don't just come here for submitted links, do we?
Here, you can find expert level commentary on pretty much any field from philosophy to economics to law enforcement (aside from the technology experts that are a given), whereas in /. you generally have to dig deeper in a comment stream to find anything approaching the same value.
[+] [-] qznc|10 years ago|reply
Unfortunately, the interesting guys to fill such a forum do not hang out on social platforms and bikeshed a lot. They are busy. Usually you can find a few on project specific forums/mailinglists.
[+] [-] brudgers|10 years ago|reply
I've seen all of those topics you mention gain traction, probably with the exception of "climbing the career ladder at big corp", but that's the broader Zeitgeist not just HN.
The way to get more C++/Fortran/Java discussion on HN is to submit good relevant content. If you post something really really good, sometimes the James Gosling of X shows up to comment because HN's diversity keeps them around. But any really good topic is likely to draw comments from people who worked with the James Gosling of X because HN has a lot of those people.
HN has grown large enough that there is an audience for just about any tech topic so long as the resource is reasonably good...in fact, that's been the case for a long time, and this from someone who was posting articles about Windows and Microsoft in the days where every time the Macbook got a new 8% faster Core 2, the front page of HN was dominated by the press release and Ask HN was full of "are you upgrading?" treads.
In the end, finding or creating good content is the way to increase discussion of the topics one finds interesting and to influence the direction of the community.
[+] [-] sebastianconcpt|10 years ago|reply
If you are more prone to be personally expossed trends start to matter more and influence which stacks you'll get involved into.
Sadly that has a self-serving foundation but, what can you do about it? In the other hand, happily, disruption is healthy.
[+] [-] trequartista|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ArekDymalski|10 years ago|reply
I'm genuinely interested about topics you would like to read about/discuss in these areas.
[+] [-] kluck|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ironicaldiction|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcr|10 years ago|reply
Since I'm blindly guessing at what you mean, the following suggestions might not be what you want, but they're the best I can do.
https://lobste.rs/
http://slashdot.org/
http://www.datatau.com/
http://skimfeed.com/
http://hackurls.com/
http://filll.com/news/
http://talll.com/news/
A similar question to yours, with lots of subreddit answers:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7254884
There have been other "Alternatives to HN" type posts over the years, and a quick search will find them
If you're in the mood for skimming to find interesting titles, you can even skim the big HN rss feed:
https://news.ycombinator.com/bigrss
Lastly, on HN you can see the submissions from a given HN user, so if you find someone who regularly submits stories that interest you, you can check their submission history. For example:
https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=jcr
[+] [-] kluck|10 years ago|reply
- I am looking for a discussion forum, not an aggregator.
- By "web-focused" I meant posts about website development technology used on client and/or server side. Some of this technology is still interesting, like databases, but there is a lot more, e.g. desktop sw technologies, algorithms etc.
- By "technical" I meant in-depth technology reviews and discussions. More posts by people that are not about "how to use x" but "how x works inside".
- By "professional" I meant posts not about computer science basics (stuff a person knows when going through formal education and/or long years of practical experience).
Thank you for your suggestions. I looked through the websites you posted. Do you know what the purpose of http://www.datatau.com/ is? They do not really tell on their website (or do they?).
[+] [-] unknown|10 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Udo|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kluck|10 years ago|reply
This being said, I do not mean to be disrespectful towards someone who "only" has practical training (they may be older so that when they studied there was no formal computer-specific education).
edit: nice typo "sad" -> "said" ;)
[+] [-] sideproject|10 years ago|reply
http://postatic.com
Disclaimer - I run this site - shameless plug, I know.
[+] [-] aembleton|10 years ago|reply
`User your own domain name` should be `Use your own domain name`
[+] [-] chirau|10 years ago|reply
This looks awesome, I would love to talk more, I have been looking for something like this
[+] [-] NumberCruncher|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] flarg|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] samuell|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] escherize|10 years ago|reply
And you need an invite to post iirc.
[+] [-] lifeisstillgood|10 years ago|reply
And is it unfair to lobsters to say the posts all seem very very familiar? Just asking as one is always worried about missing out on the next great thing, but the HN niche seems pretty well filled?
[+] [-] atmosx|10 years ago|reply
If you are interested in lobste.rs invitations send me an email with your "keybase profile" and at least 1 public network identification that will let me know that you're not a self-destructive troll and I'll be happy to help you.
UPDATE: Since I received a lot more emails than I thought and it's time consuming, my offer stands for another 24 hours.
regards
[+] [-] TheLoneWolfling|10 years ago|reply
To me, this is a (major) downside. Among other reasons: I'd want a website where people like me felt welcome. And I know that for me, personally, I do not feel welcome at any site that didn't even allow me to join.
[+] [-] unknown|10 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] r3bl|10 years ago|reply
As a guy born in Serbia, I have to say that this is the first creative domain I saw with .rs extension.
[+] [-] mbubb|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zongitsrinzler|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] empressplay|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Carl_Platt|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zinxq|10 years ago|reply
I find a lot in there in the areas you're looking for that the general populace here doesn't vote up. At a minimum, it's similar to the front-page but it moves faster (so you don't have to see the "pong written in go" type posts more than once)
[+] [-] dmichulke|10 years ago|reply
http://planet.clojure.in/ and especially https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/clojure
I suppose there is something similar for most languages
[+] [-] anarazel|10 years ago|reply
More often than not I find there was an interesting discussion on some entry, but all the discussion ended 8 hours ago, and nobody will read it now.
[+] [-] qznc|10 years ago|reply
For example, only drop things off the frontpage, if nobody made a comment for 24 hours. Obviously, this builds up a queue of content. Now we could let people vote on these for ordering the queue, but comments are only allowed for frontpage stuff. Hm, sounds very similar to plain old web forums, though.
[+] [-] kluck|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] PascLeRasc|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kilimchoi|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] r3bl|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tvanantwerp|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sosuke|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scotty79|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mandlar|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] reedlaw|10 years ago|reply
1. http://selfoss.aditu.de/
[+] [-] a3n|10 years ago|reply
These days usenet is either a paid service, or Google Groups.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet
[+] [-] Cakez0r|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] elorant|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ricklancee|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evook|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mahranch|10 years ago|reply
The issue is something everyone overlooks when making these kinds of judgements: adaptability. You have to be able to evolve and adapt to the changing times and, most importantly, adapt and evolve with your user base. This is where reddit really shines and one of the big reasons why places like Fark, mefi and slashdot stagnated and quit growing (relatively speaking).
Large online communities are highly dynamic. There is user churn, as well as the obvious cultural evolution that takes place. Places like fark and slashdot never evolved and adapted with their users and the changing times so people eventually get bored and leave. It's one of the reasons for their stagnation. Mods have to be adaptable and evolve with their communities.
Reddit is evolution and adaptability personified. It's the culture itself running the show over there (anyone can create a subreddit), so the new users with their new ideas, interests, memes, etc all have a place. When something gets boring, old or loses popularity (like FFFUUU comics) it doesn't hurt the site, just the subreddit. People just move from one subreddit to another instead of moving from one website to another.
And that's the problem with slashdot's mods (and fark's mods too). They're the same people and rarely do they let new blood in. And the new blood instantly conforms to the old guard's way of thinking and policies. The way content gets moderated always remains the same. This might be good short term (some people don't like change) but people do eventually get bored of the same old, same old.
[+] [-] jeremysmyth|10 years ago|reply
Here, you can find expert level commentary on pretty much any field from philosophy to economics to law enforcement (aside from the technology experts that are a given), whereas in /. you generally have to dig deeper in a comment stream to find anything approaching the same value.
[+] [-] onion2k|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] twsted|10 years ago|reply
Ten or more years ago it was a great site, then I noticed a gradual and general decline. Nowadays I follow it just sometimes.