
Ask HN: What would it take to have a DM feature on HN? - flashgordon
I understand this could be a tricky &quot;product&quot; feature and needs some thinking but has this been considered before?  Any pointers to previous threads would be greatly appreciated.
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ekr
For those wondering, DM stands for direct messaging (I hope I wasn't the only
one).

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muzani
Yeah, I was wondering why HN needed dungeon masters.

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Someone1234
The site doesn't even support basic text formatting features like tables,
lists, quotes, and code sections that don't scroll. I'm just pleased we got
the comment expand/collapse, people were asking for that for years.

DM is a whole other kettle of fish, since it would change how the site is
meant to be used, and may open the admins up to more law enforcement
inquiries.

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flashgordon
So the reason I am looking for a DM feature is not so much that it becomes a
chat, but often you do see requests to be DMed for furthering a conversation
offline - say for jobs or projects etc. And often this results in hunting down
the "target"'s email from their profile and firing up an email client etc. Yes
a very first world problem but still was hoping for a slightly easier way to
do this (short of writing a browser plugin).

I do like @remyp's app idea but it still requires me a few "redirects"
mentally.

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muzani
It might not be a good fit. I just see HN as a way to gather nerds, have them
talk about news, and somewhat funnel them into YC recruitment.

It doesn't seem to be designed as a community, more like a bazaar.

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remyp
The current workaround is to put your contact info in your profile, which has
worked well for me.

With that said, I did create a small app to encourage HN users to message
1-on-1: [https://findkismet.com](https://findkismet.com)

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paulcole
Would love to hear the estimate from one of the many people who think
Dropbox/Twitter/Facebook are simple weekend projects.

They could probably knock this one out in less time than it took me to write
this comment.

