

Does Hacker News Deliver Value For Startups? - pkenjora
http://www.awarelabs.com/blog/does-hacker-news-deliver-value-for-startups-or-just-y-combinator/

======
brudgers
Irrespective of the relationship slideshare has to Ycombinator or HackerNews,
the "buried" article simply didn't gain traction - it happens all the time.

200 visits is just a small slice of HN users and reflect a response to the
title of the article, not the quality of the article itself.

Anecdote is not evidence, but the article wasn't compelling enough that I
would be likely to upvote it - upvotes are the only thing that keeps new
stories from being buried and flagging only comes into play once a recent
story gets upvotes.

New articles get just one point all the time - indeed I've seen cases where a
story had no votes or comments the first time it was posted only to make the
front page and generate lively discussion when reposted later with a slightly
different URL.

Odds are that any new article will be ignored. A conspiracy is not necessary -
and since the article was buried by a lack of points and the weight of time,
it's hard to believe that there was one.

Consider it editorial feedback in regards to style, timing and relevance.

~~~
pkenjora
I appreciate the feedback. It was just surprising to see the article with
significantly more relative traction get buried while others I've posted
without seem to still be here.

I hopeI was fair in my analysis, given the data I had at hand. Still think its
worth posting to Hacker News, just with a grain of sand.

I'm pragmatic, which is cool because if Hacker News is not what I said, its
only a matter of time before I come around.

------
trevelyan
As a founder -- I'm fairly sure that if I hadn't started reading HN in 2007,
it's unlikely I'd have had the temerity to leave a company that was screwing
me over and just start my own thing. Entrepreneurship was never in my blood,
but HN made it easier to take the leap by making it seem normal when in
hindsight it seems somewhat rare.

Reading this site exposed me to a lot of writing about entrepreneurship that
was new to me. As the site has grown there has been more and more self-
promotional linkbait spam, but some is pure gold and the best bits are often
buried in the discussions rather than the articles. The last few years have
been a financial and emotional struggle, but it's been tremendously helpful to
see other people go through the same ups and downs and often be so open about
what works and doesn't work for them. So I'm grateful to Paul and many of the
other regular commenters here. Answering this question is a no brainer.

------
dean
The author seems to be under the impression that 200 visits from a link he
posted to Hacker News automatically means "people were discussing my article
and engaging", and there was a "lively discussion" about it.

Discussion about a posted story is not a given, even if you get many visits
from the site. Personally, I've often visited the posted links, and not been
bothered to up-vote the story, let alone comment. And I've often seen stories
on the front page with many up votes and no comments.

I think the OP is jumping to conclusions when he says that "Hacker News had
buried my submission, precisely because it was getting rapid traction." That's
a pretty strong accusation. I didn't read the post the author is referring to,
but I think it's more likely that the post was just not that interesting to
Hacker News readers.

------
dariusmonsef
Umm. That slideshare post has one upvote. And that is from your submission. It
didn't have significant traction and then get buried... it just didn't move
once you posted it.

I posted something yesterday not exactly critiquing YC, but presenting an
alternate idea to how they should run housing for batches... that post didn't
get buried because it had a different viewpoint. PG even commented in it.

Also... any reason to link "Hacker News" 12 times in your post to your old
thread? IMHO it makes it looks a bit SEO spammy.

------
gyardley
The author seems to be talking about this submission:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3644751>

It got a couple hundred visits from HN and, if I've found the correct
submission, no votes or comments - so he's assuming there _was_ an active
discussion and it was removed and buried because of the content.

There's a simpler explanation, of course.

~~~
pkenjora
I get the skepticism, and I'm not trying to convince anyone I'm right, just
putting forth an observation.

I have 5 submissions on Hacker News. The only one to get buried is the one
that registered any significant visits in my Google Analytics.

So please be receptive to the idea, from my point of view how I could form
this theory. Then put a plausible reason for why Hacker News would do this. I
love knowing why, it makes me learn and be better.

All of this may just be a coincidence that the OP decided to remove the one
story out of all 5. No big deal, it happens, per the OP's suggestion, I
reposted still enjoy Hacker News.

------
jnorthrop
From my own experience with posts to Hacker News from my own blog I can tell
you 200 visits is about what you'll get from time a post lasts on the front of
the "new" page. Then, if no one is interested in the story, it drops off that
page and so do the visits.

I don't understand the basis here for any accusation.

------
brcrth
Does your blog post deliver value for Hacker News? The answer is simple: it
depends on the reader.

------
arman
If you look at the HN ranking formula, it's (p - 1) / (t + 2)^1.5 where p =
points, t = age in hours. The older your article is, the smaller the rank.
Done to ensure the freshness of links.

------
chrisacky
The bottom line is, as far as I gather, stories published here need to be non-
conflicting with YC startups in so much as they don't set out with the single
intention to trash the credibility of a startup.

Submitting an objective, or factual story is fine, but when the sole intention
is to tarnish the reputation, then the "bury hatchet" comes out. I've even
seen high karma members get completely banned because of submissions about
Curebit and AirBnB.

When you come to one persons house, you can't argue if some ground rules are
set.

~~~
kls
I have never looked at HN as a place to go to trash a company, there are other
sites with that as their core mission, for me I have always thought of HN as
having a positive vibe, I understand that some of that is my own filter bubble
but never the less I am fine with the fact that they don't view it as a place
to trash the companies that they invest in. I would be more OK with it, if it
where just a blanket rule of don't come on HN to trash companies.

~~~
gravitronic
On HN contentless positivity is regarded the same as contentless negativity:
hyperbolic spam.

That being said if you can glue together 500 words about how to program in
clojure after waking up early at your standing desk you will have your day in
the sun.

------
danso
200 visits is not really much of anything...I think I've averaged about 100
visits per point...so 10,000 visits for a story that manages 100 votes. HN
does from time to time bury submissions that break a rule (dupes, for example)
but getting votes seems to be a combination of good content and traffic
conditions.

