
Let’s continue to build Product Hunt, together - csmajorfive
https://medium.com/@rrhoover/let-s-continue-to-build-product-hunt-together-fd5bed490bfe#.bhhlc2h4y
======
minimaxir
This is mostly a disappointing response that tries to deflect with "hey, we do
good stuff too!" which is a PR move, not an argument against the events which
caused the accusations against Product Hunt.

The highlighted quote and central thesis of "Everyone’s upvote is equal — my
upvote counts the same as yours" misses the point that the _product selection
process is opaque_ , and the updated FAQ of "we receive so may products per
day!" does not absolve PH of that. (it's a 2 year old startup. They no longer
get a pass on scalability issues).

Speaking of the FAQ, here's the update discussing conflicts of interest:

> "Do I need to disclose that I’m invested or advising a company I post to
> Product Hunt? Product Hunt is a place for authentic, honest conversation and
> we highly encourage people to disclose any potential conflict of interest in
> the comment thread."

...which misses the point _entirely_. The conflicts-of-interest are with _the
moderators themselves_ , and friends-of-friends of the submitters. And given
the culture of PH, very few people will disclose a conflict of interest
willingly if it hurts them.

I'm not reassured that anything will change in the near future.

EDIT: Added my comment to the comments on the Medium article.

~~~
avinassh
> the events which caused the accusations against Product Hunt.

can you tell me more about this? I do have a PH account, I have hardly used
it, so I don't know much.

~~~
tedmiston
He's referring to the Medium post from earlier this week:

 _How Product Hunt really works_ by Ben Wheeler
[https://medium.com/@benjiwheeler/how-product-hunt-really-
wor...](https://medium.com/@benjiwheeler/how-product-hunt-really-
works-d8fdcda1da74#.qbcdbg1wj)

I have another post in the comments here that explains the context a bit more
as well.

------
tedmiston
Some context for those who haven't followed this in the past week:

1\. There was a controversial Medium post 6 days ago accusing Product Hunt's
ranking system of being unfair amongst other things.

> How Product Hunt really works (medium.com)

687 points by brw12 6 days ago | 222 comments

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10739875](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10739875)

2\. Then the same day someone started a signup sheet to build an open version.

> Let's Create a Better Product Hunt (docs.google.com)

222 points by BetterLaunch 6 days ago | 98 comments

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10741827](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10741827)

3\. Then someone built and launched it.

> Show HN: Open Hunt – an open and community-run alternative to Product Hunt
> (openhunt.co)

1072 points by mhurwi 3 days ago | 176 comments

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879)

For most of the day on Friday, Open Hunt sat at the #1 spot on Product Hunt,
and Ryan Hoover was a good sport about it.

[https://www.producthunt.com/tech/open-
hunt](https://www.producthunt.com/tech/open-hunt)

~~~
frik
Ryan Hoover's response to "How Product Hunt really works" article on Twitter:

    
    
      <person1>: Seems bad for @ProductHunt. Changes my perception of them. <link to article>
      Ryan Hoover: sad to hear, <person1> :(
      <person2>: That's all you have to say, really? Jerk.
    

[https://mobile.twitter.com/rrhoover/status/67692662897972019...](https://mobile.twitter.com/rrhoover/status/676926628979720192)

Someone pointed to this conversation in the OpenHunt discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879)
->
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10760462](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10760462)

------
josephpmay
What struck me from the HN thread on the article this is responding to was the
vitriol directed towards Ryan. The general consensus seemed to be that he was
a terrible person who was using Product Hunt to perpetuate the "Old Boys Club"
in tech. From my experience dealing with him, that seems like the polar
opposite from the truth. I don't know him well, but he appears to be a
genuinely nice guy who loves discovering new technology and wants to enable
people to share their creations with a wider audience. I do believe the OC
made a number of valid points, and Product Hunt needs to evolve so that
insiders have less influence. Still, it saddens me that HN's reaction was to
make personal attacks and accusations. (most of the evidence given was
anecdotal, too) I think Ryan's response clears up the reasoning behind why
Product Hunt is structured the way it is. I hope that in the future members of
the HN community stop and think before they make personal attacks based on a
one-sided Medium article.

~~~
sparkzilla
I don't care how nice he is in person, just as I don't care how mean Steve
Jobs was. I judge people by the products they put out. If his product
perpetuates the power structures of Silicon Valley and gives insiders special
access then he's actually not a very nice guy.

~~~
Alex3917
> If his product perpetuates the power structures

All successful social software is going to perpetuate the existing power
structures at the expense of outgroups in some areas, and empower outgroups at
the expense of the mainstream and the insiders in other areas. As it should.

~~~
sparkzilla
Social software _can_ perpetuate existing power structures, but it can also
create new structures. Software can also evolve to eliminate power
concentrations. That's why it is important to always recognize that
inequalities can arise in social software, and to devolve power in the system
as much as possible.

~~~
Alex3917
> devolve power in the system as much as possible

Can you think of good examples where this has actually happened? In most cases
you have situations like where everyone has access to the sum of all human
knowledge for free, but where high-SES kids have more time and ability to
benefit. Part of the issue is that social software is built on networks, and
networks naturally concentrate power because of Zipf's Law.

Most design elements are also really just double edged swords. E.g. lots of
people argue that Facebook's real names policy is bad for the LGBTQ community
or whatever. But at the same time, Xbox Live isn't exactly the world's most
LGBTQ friendly community either.

One of my favorite quotes on social software is still this old one from Joi
Ito, "You're not a leader, you're a place. You're like a park or a garden. If
it's comfortable and cool, people are attracted." It's important to be
cognizant of power structures when designing structures, but at the same time
what really makes good social software is seeking out and accentuating the
interstitial. But this usually eventually results in the creation of new power
structures, and the best we can do is try to give a wide variety of folks the
opportunity to benefit.

~~~
sparkzilla
Wikipedia is actually a good example of where devolution has not happened.
It's long been known that Wikipedia has a gender gap, where less than 10% of
active users are women. Many reasons have been given for this, most of which
are along the lines of "women don't have time" or "they're not interested". I
would probably have thought the same, until I started my own site, creating
broadly similar crowdsourced content, and ended up with 80% female
participation. That meant women _are_ interested, and _do_ have time. I
realized that the software choices I had made on my site resulted in more
inclusion than Wikipedia. Therefore, the only way to change wikipedia to
include more women (and to include more men also) is to change the software so
that power is taken away from those who hold it now, and distribute it more
widely. In fact I'd go as far as saying Wikipedia is a system that rewards the
accumulation of power, more than the creation of quality content. You can read
my essay on this here: [http://newslines.org/blog/the-sexists-at-the-top-of-
wikipedi...](http://newslines.org/blog/the-sexists-at-the-top-of-wikipedia/)

------
staunch
> _...The problem is not so much the money itself as what comes with it. As
> one VC who spoke at Y Combinator said, "Once you take several million
> dollars of my money, the clock is ticking." If VCs fund you, they're not
> going to let you just put the money in the bank and keep operating as two
> guys living on ramen. They want that money to go to work._

[http://paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html](http://paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html)

This is an example of A16Z killing a startup. They only care about about the
big hits, so they'll happily dump too-many-millions into small products like
ProductHunt and RapGenius, trying to force them to Get Big Fast.

ProductHunt should've been operated by two people for 5+ years but they raised
too much money. Communities can't really be bought with money. You have to
grow them organically and authentically over many years. Hacker News and
reddit are perfect examples to emulate.

Digg is an example of the VC way of doing things.

~~~
mkagenius
Blaming it all on the VCs may not be the complete picture. There are companies
raising millions and not spending most of it and still doing good. Do VCs
force people to take money even if they don't want to?

~~~
ddw
Yeah it reminds me of that one episode of "Silicon Valley":

"No one told me that I didn't have to take the money!"

------
matt2000
I just wanted to suggest to everyone here who is building a product this
thought: product hunt didn't launch on product hunt. It was a simple email
test which found an audience and grew from there. That's the opposite of
hoping to launch on some list of top products and grab an audience.

It's not a bad thing, but you don't need it. And if you're counting on it
having a major impact on your traction, you probably shouldn't be.

~~~
OmarIsmail
I wish every single person that is upset about ProductHunt's ethics
internalizes this comment.

The only people that should really care about PH's ethics are makers. But if
you're a maker, you shouldn't care at all about PH. You should be busy talking
to users and building product. If you're not seeing traction by doing those
two things, then it is nigh impossible that getting on PH will do anything for
you. And if you do have traction then getting on PH won't matter!

~~~
sparkzilla
Product Hunt's rigged system affects everyone in the startup community. Some
of those insider's products had ZERO traction before being on Product Hunt.
The insider relationship gave them the boost they needed to get attention from
the media and VCs, while denying other startups who were spending their time
doing what you say: "talking to users and building product".

~~~
Disruptive_Dave
Again, who says the world is supposed to be fair? Am I supposed to believe
that every product written about in TechCrunch is there because of its merits
alone? What about funding? We should probably band together on forums to talk
about how some founders are born into money and VC relationships and others
aren't. This all seems a bit silly, to be honest.

~~~
tim333
It's kind of that they give the impression it's a fair vote when it isn't
that's annoying. And indeed the world isn't fair. However individual sites can
be. It reminds me a bit of the early days of Google vs search engines where
you could buy higher placement or Stackoverflow vs Experts Exchange neither of
which went so good for the unfair players.

------
kevindeasis
People are beginning to move to:
[https://www.openhunt.co/](https://www.openhunt.co/)

Just look at this HN post: Show HN: Open Hunt – an open and community-run
alternative to Product Hunt (openhunt.co)
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10759879)
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10741827](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10741827)

How about their ranking system:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10739875](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10739875)

~~~
wingerlang
> People are beginning to move

Isn't this how it always goes? Something controversial happens, someone shows
an alternative, it gets praise and a flood of users and is within a week
forgotten about. E.g. reddit > voat recently.

Digg > reddit doesn't count, as they actually broke their site.

~~~
tim333
Depends on the details I guess. I signed up to ProductHunt I a year ago and
still can't comment, vote or submit unlike the chosen few and as a result have
not taken much interest in it. If Openhunt becomes more like HN where I can do
that stuff I think I'd use it.

~~~
xiaoma
I know, right! What if only YC employees, alum and their extended friends
could comment here? Can you even imagine how many Show HN posts, including
some by future founders that wouldn't have happened?

------
empressplay
All you have to do is look at Ryan Hoover's "recommended" comments on his own
post to get a sense of his position on things. This is a weak attempt at
damage control that shows absolutely no desire on his part to address the
central issue with Product Hunt: those people (in particular, those who aren't
PH employees) who can arbitrarily post startups to the front page with no
differentiation from those who made it there via popularity.

Of course they won't change it. The whole "game" is to provide a system that
on the surface looks meritocratic, but actually isn't, in order to give
visitors the impression that the arbitrarily posted products / sites are
popular (because they must be to have made it to the front page), and thus
drive traffic to them. It's dodgy.

------
jlukic
My experience with Product Hunt.

\- Front page of HN, check.

\- Top trending weekly product on GitHub. Check.

\- Ability to get the in-crowd at Product Hunt to approve of my product for
voting on their site. NOPE.

The response was the same canned one that others have mentioned. AZ buying a
product news outlet to advance their other startups is a vague accusation, but
in my world not in the tin-hat territory whatsoever.

~~~
tedmiston
I glanced at your bio and recent comments. I'll take a guess that Semantic UI
is the product you're referring to.

It looks like it was posted and got a few upvotes, but only shows in search
results after clicking "Show all" on the right. I'm not positive, but perhaps
this is a way upcoming posts are differentiated from front page posts.

[https://www.producthunt.com/tech/semantic-
ui](https://www.producthunt.com/tech/semantic-ui)

------
swanson
My big takeaway from the original post was that "early insiders" controlled
the frontpage of ProductHunt. This post confirms that "early insiders" can
still post straight to the frontpage. I see data from this blog post that is
presenting an argument that the "early insiders" are a small percentage of the
currently upvotes, but I don't understand why someone would opt for viral
effects if you could just have an "early insider" post it directly.

When I view the Product Hunt frontpage, I see nothing to indicate that a
submission has been 'boosted' and that seems to be an area that could be
improved if "early insiders" will continue to have the boosting ability.

------
tonydiv
Product Hunt faces a difficult challenge. Many people from the
software/startup world are egalitarian, yet Product Hunt is a business. They
must find a balance.

A more democratic approach to this would work much better than the insider
model they've adopted. Hacker News isn't a business, Reddit is, yet both are
egalitarian. There does exist a balance that works.

They've solved the problem of sorting good/curated products based on upvotes,
but that is not the true problem.

The harder problem is ensuring new products can reach the front page fairly.
Reddit would not be the amazing community it is today if there were a curation
team at Reddit determining what should be on the front page. If I were PH, I
would focus on this problem.

I would urge them to address the issues that the community is bringing up. His
post does not seem to indicate any change will occur.

------
ascendantlogic
Am I the only one that read (most of) this and didn't really see any direct
responses to the criticisms leveled at it last week?

~~~
sergiotapia
You're not the only one. They don't address any of the issues in this blog
post.

------
FussyZeus
Literally addresses NONE of the issues presented in the piece he's responding
to. No one questioned the upvote system and how much each vote counted, though
I'd say that's still dubious. When insiders exist to get your product on the
home page and no one who doesn't use that method gets on the home page, and
you have coordinated launches using SPECIFIC TIMES that it will be on the
front page, you don't get to come out in a medium post with a cute cat and go
"But, we didn't do that!"

As I've said previously on here I'm a capitalist and I respect greed, but I
don't tolerate liars. If you going to build and insiders promotion site, then
do it, and own it. Don't backpedal when someone calls you out.

~~~
aaronbrethorst
I interpreted this whole thing as 'I'm sorry you're mad.'

~~~
kirbyk
Me too.

------
hoodoof
The guy is a politician. So many smokey words and mirrors, so little straight
talk.

~~~
maceo
It was probably edited by a crisis management firm.

~~~
hoodoof
Honest, authentic straight talk is the solution.

------
thetmkay
I think PH suffers from an identity crisis.

It started off as a curated newsletter and became a portal. It never fully
embraced a community-driven approach (as evidenced by their opaque curation
policy) nor a pivot to a more search engine/yelp-like community. In essence,
they have yet to conquer their scalability problem: how to maintain quality
while increasing quantity of products. It's a bloomin' hard problem to be fair
to them.

What I am most disappointed by is that with network effects, it is beneficial
for a community as a whole to have one dominant portal. The one thing you want
for a dominant community platform is transparency (there's an argument for
decentralization too), a requirement that has yet to be met.

------
sqldba
Wow what a crock of shit. They got called out for back room deals and ignoring
products; and it's only after a revolt ready to make their entire operation
obsolete that they publish a half hearted PR response that admits no
responsibility at all.

------
rjvir
> Once the product has received a significant number of credible upvotes
> (those that aren’t manipulated by voting rings) from the community, will be
> promoted to the homepage within 48 hours.

> Everyone’s upvote is equal — my upvote counts the same as yours — and
> ultimately upvotes determine what rises to the top of Product Hunt.

To me, this was a direct contradiction.

~~~
JMCQ87
Not only to you. Homepage or no homepage is a pretty staggering difference in
"vote-weight".

------
jrometty
I encourage everyone with unanswered questions to participate in Product
Hunt's LIVE chat. If you feel like a point wasn't adequately covered, drop by
and ask Product Hunt's team directly. (link is from the article)
[https://www.producthunt.com/live/product-hunt-
team](https://www.producthunt.com/live/product-hunt-team)

------
byoogle
I’m unsure as to why the Product Hunt outrage in particular. _Every_ major
distribution platform (the press, social networks, app stores, even Hacker
News) favors insiders. Has PH been presented as a solution to this problem? (I
never thought so, but perhaps I haven’t been paying such close attention.)

~~~
minimaxir
Hacker News and Reddit do not favor insiders, despite popular misconception.

~~~
tedmiston
I recognize it's an edge case, but YC company hiring posts appear to go
straight to the front page and stick for a little while.

~~~
tim333
At least that stuff is open though. It would probably be better for Product
Hunt if they separated openly voted for stuff from the others similar to how
Google separates paid and organic search.

------
OoTheNigerian
Meh.

This is a response to the traction openhunt is getting. Another version of
"I'm sorry we got caught".

Ryan, maybe had good intentions at the beginning then got carried away with
the "stardom" and of course, with $6 million in the bank, a bit of arrogance
took hold.

His initial response to the Medium article was "lol", while that of the posse
was "fuck the haters". He forgot his remit was building a massive community
and not a small clique.

Competition is good. It makes people humble.

Product Hunt cannot change. It's "community" is vested in ensuring things
remain the same. Just like fat cats.

Reminds me of a certain logo.

Coincidence?

 _Edited: $6million not $16 million series A_

~~~
rl3
> _... with $16 million in the bank, a bit of arrogance took hold._

Uh, what?[0]

Also, I'd argue that Product Hunt's Series A was almost modest in light of
their popularity and growth last year.

[0] [https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/product-
hunt/](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/product-hunt/)

~~~
OoTheNigerian
You're right. I meant $6 million series A. Corrected.

------
alexatkeplar
My only interaction with Product Hunt was through the email harvester they ran
on 17 December 2014 (a few months after joining Y Combinator) which found our
company's public info@ email address and subscribed it to Product Hunt.

------
shahocean
Oh come on! I had thought you are better than this! Another PR stunt?

------
DodgyEggplant
It's digg all over again

~~~
pdq
THIS. I remember Reddit being seen as the red-headed-stepchild to Digg, back
when you could get 3-letter usernames. Digg was estimated to be worth $200MM.

And then Digg v4 got released in 2010, with a huge community uproar. People
flocked to Reddit, and within 18 months Digg gets sold for $500k.

Product Hunt, your clock is ticking. Fast.

------
hoodoof
If you want to protest, just don't submit your new startup to ProductHunt.

~~~
JMCQ87
... and then someone else submits it and it gets like 5 votes, so you can't
complain anymore that you don't get on there. ;)

------
jsneedles
Hi All, I'm new here and I'm familiar with PH. I'll come right out and say it
- I'm a big fan. I think people are looking for a point-by-point response to
the earlier piece... and that's unrealistic. If you look at the message being
sent here, it's valid and honest. Some thing are addressed directly "your vote
counts the same as mine" dispels the direct link myth. The change in % of
"insider" posts making it to the homepage has substantially decreased meaning
you don't NEED to be or know one of these people to make it.

I've been on both sides - I've coordinated a launch with the help of PH & I've
launched my own things at my own times. I've had great success and some flops
doing both. There are pros & cons. But again... the frequency of this is
certainly decreasing.

It's not that you need an insider, but if you really want to have a "launch"
they help... If you want to share something cool you made, and think it's
good, and garner some useful feedback... Post away!

~~~
tarr11
Insiders are still favored for no other reason than their relationship to the
founder:

>>> "Unless you’re one of the early members of the community (those that
helped get Product Hunt off the ground and continue to be instrumental in
curating great products), all posts submitted to Tech first start in Upcoming.
"

Eliminating that loophole completely would help in restoring faith.

~~~
jsneedles
I disagree. The homepage has to start somewhere... and the small # of
"insiders" who post great content everyday have that reputation built up to
elevate posts. I'm sure if an "insider" posted some bad products that weren't
a great fit for the community... they'd be treated like everyone else. I've
seen it happen.

~~~
minimaxir
> ... and the small # of "insiders" who post great content everyday have that
> reputation built up to elevate posts.

This is circular logic. How did the insiders get the great content to post? By
excluding other viable content posted by others.

~~~
jsneedles
Some work super hard to cultivate sources because they like to be known as
great hunters. Some are contacted by companies/startups and offered to try
things early... Some post for their friends. They're not excluding anybody.
They're surfacing things that for the most part, have been proven to be liked
by the community.

