Ask HN: What are other minimal, all-content, no-frills discussion sites like HN? - rms_returns
======
bane
Pick a topic, find the subreddit for it. If you don't like the vibe there,
make your own subreddit and moderate it -- or offer to help mod the primary
and let them know it's because you want to change the vibe -- lots of mods
really don't have the time to do a great job.

Go advertise your "just like /r/floobinart but with more zimbledings" sub
everywhere to get people to come to it.

~~~
IanCal
If people haven't tried looking for smaller subreddits or more controlled
subreddits then I'd highly encourage them to. Reddit may have a huge amount of
low effort content and frankly highly disturbing content, but some of the
subreddits are absolutely fantastic. I'm not really into history but
[https://reddit.com/r/askhistorians](https://reddit.com/r/askhistorians) is a
treasure trove of fascinating information, with well sourced and detailed
answers to the kind of questions non-history buffs might want to ask.

Reddit, with good moderation, is a world apart from what you see if you visit
the main page.

On a side note, it's also a great place to go and see discussions around
things you highly disagree with. It might help to understand the motivations
of "the other side".

~~~
areyousure
I don't know about the quality of moderation in r/AskHistorians however.

I read a recent answer there whose first sentence was the opposite of reality.
Thinking of how I could demonstrate this easily and effectively, where any
person could follow up easily and see what's right, I posted a comment saying
it contradicted the second sentence of the Wikipedia article on the topic.

My comment was automatically banned by the auto-moderator because it had a
link to Wikipedia and no other links. I tried reading the subreddit rules
before posting, but it's pretty hard to find this rule -- indeed, it is not
explicitly stated as far as I can tell.

~~~
IanCal
> My comment was automatically banned by the auto-moderator because it had a
> link to Wikipedia and no other links. I tried reading the subreddit rules
> before posting, but it's pretty hard to find this rule -- indeed, it is not
> explicitly stated as far as I can tell.

It is at least currently in the subreddit rules page, as linked to on the main
site.

"Wikipedia, or any other single tertiary resource, used by itself not a
suitable basis for a comment in this subreddit."

[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/rules)

In general on reddit, if you've had a comment removed and think it's not right
then message the moderators.

~~~
areyousure
The comment I was responding to was written by a moderator, who saw my comment
and edited their comment to hedge their incorrect claim. They messaged me but
my comment was not reinstated.

I don't think that a subreddit that bans links to Wikipedia can be considered
a good source of information.

~~~
IanCal
> I don't think that a subreddit that bans links to Wikipedia can be
> considered a good source of information.

I don't believe it does as I recently posted a comment with a wikipedia link.
It does, however require more authoritative sources than wikipedia, mine did
at least have several other corroborating sources. Perhaps the auto-mod is set
to remove comments without at least one non-wiki link.

They encourage people who would otherwise have linked just to wikipedia to
hunt out the sources that claim comes from and use those instead.

I hope they put in a note in their comment or said thanks at least, I'd hope
for more there.

~~~
areyousure
Yes, as my post a few back mentioned, I think the automated ban is for
comments that include a link to Wikipedia but not elsewhere.

They were nice about things; the PM read "AskHistorians doesn't allow
Wikipedia, but .... I clarified in my OP .... Thanks for prompting the
clarification!"

------
campbellmorgan
I've always thought that a simple HN-like site directed at those of us
interested in art, critical theory and literature would be wonderful. Does
anybody know of one? I would be interested in helping set one up...

One of the difficulties is that artists and academics tend to be very
protective of interesting sources as I think intellectual individuality is
much more of a currency than in the tech world.

~~~
mubub
I would be interested in this. I come from an art background and many people
use aldaily.com to get a sort of curated collection of articles. But adding
the voting from HN would be interesting.

That said, you are right that academics are protective. Much of what they are
actually interested in is pay-walled as well.

~~~
NicoJuicy
I once created a HN like alternative -
[http://tagly.azurewebsites.net/](http://tagly.azurewebsites.net/)

\- Has Tags

\- Reputation

\- Votes used as favorites

\- Permission based roles ( not everyone can see all tags), according to tags
--> custom roles or permissions on the topics.

\- Personal tag header ( you can pick which tag you want to show in your menu)

\- Custom tag based posts ( eg. when you add the tag newsletter, it adds 1
text input named subject, 1 textarea with Html and 1 textarea with text).

\- You can hide tags showing, so it's only used as data

\- ...

I could add paywall to it, if a post contains a tag named " paywall"

The demo is currently in Dutch though ( titles).

For anyone who wants to try: Demo1:123456 ( user : pass) --
[http://tagly.azurewebsites.net/Account/Login?returnUrl=](http://tagly.azurewebsites.net/Account/Login?returnUrl=)

It's not completely finished though

~~~
webmaven
You should post this as a "Show HN:".

------
k__
I like the topic boards of 4chan.

The general stuff like /b/, /r9k/ and /pol/ is pretty crappy.

But stuff like /fit/ helped me a lot.

No voting karma crap, just anons posting stuff, read what you like, hide what
you hate. the end.

~~~
djmobley
Agreed. 4chan is a nice antidote to all the karma whoring and gaming of
Reddit.

------
louthy
[http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/](http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/)

------
anthony_franco
[https://barnacl.es/](https://barnacl.es/) is similar but targeted to self-
funded founders

------
rmccawl
[https://pinboard.in/popular/](https://pinboard.in/popular/)

~~~
dfc
Where is the discussion?

------
mynewtb
Hobbyist-hosted niche community forums.

------
karimf
Looking at the alternatives on this thread, I'm glad I've been procrastinating
on the right website.

------
BinaryIdiot
Honestly if you can find some good communities on Slack those are usually
great. Unfortunately I don't have any recommendations as I only have private
slack teams but if anyone has recommendations that are popular that would be
pretty awesome.

A hacker news team would be fantastic!

~~~
akvadrako
How could anybody find a community on Slack? Are they listed somewhere?

~~~
BinaryIdiot
I've seen them posted online. But it would be pretty interesting if there were
a way to discover public teams.

~~~
onembk
Late to the party, but
[http://www.slacklist.info/](http://www.slacklist.info/)

~~~
BinaryIdiot
Well look at that, thanks!

------
aban
[https://freepo.st/](https://freepo.st/)

~~~
mopper51
yeah I also read it regularly, and highly recommend it if you're into
free/libre software

------
MrJagil
I'd love one for music production. Muffwiggler is the best so far, but it's
just an old school messageboard.

All the subreddits seem overly focused on EDM, and entirely without the
scientific vibe that HN has.

~~~
lwhalen
I've heard that Gearslutz is quite good for music production, although I
haven't spent much time there myself.

------
AmitJS
I spent two hours yesterday watching and reading the top posts from
[https://www.reddit.com/r/oddlysatisfying/top/](https://www.reddit.com/r/oddlysatisfying/top/)

Also these subreddits have interesting content : r/science ,
r/interestingasfuck , r/space , r/food , r/travel , r/earthporn ,
r/coolgithubprojects , r/iama etc

------
qwertyuiop924
Lainchan usually gets the mention at this point.

------
jacalata
[http://metafilter.com](http://metafilter.com)

~~~
akvadrako
I just visited and the top post this month is
[http://www.metafilter.com/163757/Emotions-are-
Work](http://www.metafilter.com/163757/Emotions-are-Work), which was the most
anti-male comments I've been exposed to in a while.

The name meta filter implies to me this site wanted to be somewhat neutral and
open-ended, but my impression so far is it's become dominated by SJW types,
which is going to make it unreadable by me.

~~~
redsummer
MF is a pay-to-post site, so it is skewed towards people who will pay. It's
the same as those small elite colleges where people will study something
impractical for an exhorbitant fee. You would only pay if you agreed with
whatever the orthodoxy is. And it becomes self-selecting, and self-
perpetuating. The people on MF are the sort of people who would say "OMG I
can't believe anyone voted for Trump, because nobody I know did"

~~~
grzm
MF has a one-time sign-up fee of $5.[0] It's a method of making it less likely
that people create fake accounts and for members to value their accounts more.
There are some people for whom this fee is beyond what they can pay. For many
people, it's a cup of coffee or two, or a beer at a local bar. Yes, it has a
gating effect. It'd be interesting to do a more formal study to compare the
discussions there with other sites, such as HN, lobste.rs (invite-only), or
Reddit.

[0]:
[http://www.metafilter.com/faq.mefi#1](http://www.metafilter.com/faq.mefi#1)

------
crncosta
Lobsters [https://lobste.rs/](https://lobste.rs/)

~~~
colinbartlett
I enjoy reading Lobsters, but the invite-only nature of it has had me
sidelined as a passive observer for years and that's frustrating.

~~~
gravypod
How do you obtain an invite? That seems crazy.

~~~
aban
You can come hang out in #lobsters on freenode and ask for one. I can invite
you both if you like.

~~~
gravypod
Yea that'd be cool. My email is in my profile. Thanks!

~~~
aban
Done. No problems!

------
amorroxic
datatau.com is a good hn-like source for most things AI/data

------
astrodev
[https://www.physicsforums.com](https://www.physicsforums.com) \- for, well,
physics.

------
rini17
[https://soylentnews.org/](https://soylentnews.org/) is slashdot clone, but
tidier.

~~~
sturza
this could look better

------
lisivka
[https://top.st/us/day/news](https://top.st/us/day/news)

------
Numberwang
reddit.com is a popular one.

~~~
witty_username
No, it has tons of fillers and memes.

~~~
otalp
Everybody knows you stay away from the defaults and stay on the smaller
subreddits. There are a lot of small, specialized subs that have a great
community.

~~~
h1d
Any examples?

~~~
suby
I'm not OP, but
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/)
is a good example.

~~~
dfc
Sadly, it seems it is also the only example. Can you name four or five other
subreddits that come close?

I always felt like vommiting when I saw people recommend /r/woodworking, but I
couldn't figure out why. I was reading an unrelated critique of /r/fitness one
day and somebody summed up my feelings about /r/woodworking perfectly

"/r/_______ is a bunch of beginners masquerading as experts."

~~~
otalp
r/AskScience, r/AskAnthropology, r/TrueFilm, r/DepthHub and r/TrueReddit are
those that come to mind. None of these are some perfect, but neither is HN and
IMO you find a lot of great content there that you wouldn't find here.

~~~
rms_returns
r/Linux and r/Technology are also good ones for those interested in CS and
tech stuff.

~~~
dfc
The top post in /r/linux right now is a link to imgur that is a screen cap of
an Amazon question:

Q: Does this keyboard support Linux?

A: The keyboard is advanced but you can not run Linux on the keyboard.

This is probably not what most people think of when they are looking for
serious and in-depth Linux discussions.

------
silvaben
Inbound.org

For those interested in Marketing, SEO, Sales etc.

------
rms_returns
To answer my own question, I've found voat.co to be a good alternative to
reddit. The community is small, but the content is about as great as HN or
some good quality sub-reddits.

------
sunilkumarc
Reddit!

------
lisivka
nntp

------
webmaven
Needs an "Ask HN:" in the title.

~~~
rms_returns
I tried doing that in the first place, but it goes above 80 characters!

~~~
grzm
You could shorten your title:

 _Ask HN: What are other minimal, all content, no frills discussion sites like
HN?_

------
wagecuck
[http://autoadmit.com](http://autoadmit.com)

