
Ask HN: Do you read the article or the comments section first when browsing HN? - uoaei
Of course you may have different protocols for different types of posts.<p>Personally, I find reading the comments section gives a good taste of the thesis of the article, and sometimes the thoughts of the commenters are way more insightful than the article itself.
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robteix
I almost invariably read the HN comments first. In fact I often read _only_
the comments and end up never visiting the actual article

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davidpelayo
Yeah me too. That's why I (we) created the HN Notifier Chrome plugin, to
subscribe to any thread and get notifications when new comments are posted.

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dmschulman
The article then the comments generally, I want the context before I get to
the conversation.

There are other instances when I get the gist from the headline and don't care
about the story, but want to read what others have to say (for example, the
current front page story about New Zealand banning foreigners from buying new
houses in the country. Headline says it all but there must be something
interesting to talk about if a story like that garners 444 comments)

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twobyfour
Depends on the section and topic. New posts section is article first, then
read the comments and add my own.

There are two reasons I visit the HN front page instead of getting all my news
off comment-free aggregators like Google News or more specialized equivalents.

Reason #1 is that often HN surfaces articles on topics that I wouldn't see
anywhere else without a lot of digging through noise. Those I usually click
straight through to the article and skip the comments.

Reason #2 is that sometimes I've already read about a topic elsewhere and feel
strongly about it and want to express myself or hear how the larger community
is thinking about it. Because someone is wrong on the internet! Those I dive
into the comments first.

Occasionally an article will satisfy both reasons, and then I'll do both but
the order of operations depends on how well informed I already feel about the
topic. The better informed, the more likely to start with the comments.

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PeachPlum
Comments - to read "this is bullshit and here's why" before going in

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catacombs
I'm with you on that.

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jaredtking
HN comments first. I read the article before contributing to the discussion
though.

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davchana
Comments 99% of the time; and that too only the first few. Things push me to
go back are: too long paragraphs of text, name-calling, insulting the other
posters, too much technical scientific jargon.

Things I continue reading:

Perfectly spaced 5/6 lines of paragraphs, explaining without sounding smart :)

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kahlonel
Almost always the article first. Its easy to jump to conclusions by just
reading the comments, without ever touching the article; which is bad.

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mswen
Comments first

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jryan49
Comments

