What a disaster that would be, to attract thousands of smart people to a site that caused them to waste lots of time. I wish I could be 100% sure that's not a description of HN.
The reason HN is so addictive is because it is filled with things we think might be useful someday. We're like pack rats at a flea market.
The question is, what utility do we get out of what we find here?
Idea: maybe there could be a second class of upvote, which could only be given, say, a week, or a month after a story or comment was submitted. The meaning of this upvote would be, "This proved to be useful to me professionally." And so, in addition to HN/best and HN/bestcomments, there could be HN/useful and HN/usefulcomments.
Anway, thanks again for the site, Paul, and please keep experimenting. Watching you experiment is at least as interesting as any particular post.
Despite all the time I have wasted here, I can tell you (with 100% confidence) that it was worth it.
My co-founder is nearly 3000 miles away. Hacker News single-handedly keeps my head in the startup game. Bootstrapping would be impossible without this site to act as a virtual startup town square. The stories and comments I read here motivate me better than anything ever has. I used to start projects and forget about them on a nearly daily basis. Hacker News has focused my efforts and sharpened my mind. Sure, you can fritter away hours here, but hey, you need to break a few eggs to make an omelet.
A big thank you to PG and to each and every one of you smart people!
"Despite all the time I have wasted here....it was worth it"
This sentiment is very common here, but I strongly question it. I also wonder why people don't label their time here a little more honestly: as procrastination. We all justify it as "oh, but I might learn something useful for my future". And some of us might have indeed tangibly improved their lives (though I'm sceptical). But surely whatever benefits you gain can be reaped by visiting say once every 3-4 days, vs 12 times in one day? More generally, out of the people who do claim to have benefited their lives, are they able to point to a specific instance or two where HN tangibly improved their lot?
I'll be honest: I resent visiting here often. I'm a worse person for it. Every minute I (or you, for that matter) spend here, someone else is spending that minute doing great work (for some definition of 'great'). In fact I am suspicious of anyone who has a ginormous amount of comments posted frequently; I do not see it as something to be proud of, but quite the opposite.
I'm sure there are people who buck the trend (pg seems to frequently post here, yet still manages to do great work. I am convinced that he has cloned himself without telling anyone).
I realise that what I'm saying might be heresy (see 'What You Can't Say' etc) given the constant optimism among this site's visitors, but I do not mean to denigrate anyone when I say that most of us (me included of course) are timewasters.
I am less concerned by the implication of reduced productivity. Though reading Hacker News may negatively impact present productivity, it may improve future productivity by exposing readers to new concepts, approaches, etc.
It reminds me of an article about Pixar (though a cursory search doesn't seem to find it...) which described their workspaces as having only a few central bathrooms in order to facilitate people running into each other, discussing ideas, and being exposed to different people's work. I think Hacker News provides a similar service without having to get up and walk at all.
Hacker News, unlike bathrooms, is instantly available and you can get to it in a few clicks. This is easily the site I spend my most time, and I'm not entirely certain that's a good thing.
An important difference is that people actually need to use the bathroom anyway, so such chance encounters are not creating an interruption where one did not exist before. They are also self-limiting in a way that browsing the web (or RSS feeds, etc.) is not.
I have definitely found utility in HN, in direct feedback/advice that I've solicited, in examples from what other people are doing, in learning about sites that I could integrate with, and from principles that helped me prioritize.
If you look at the feedback I initially got here for OurDoings, and then look at what OurDoings is like today, there's no question I've learned a lot.
Oh, and from JavaScript code I copied from the HN. The Image() voting code looks like a hack, but if Paul Buchheit did it it must be OK. :-)
I live in the middle of the Tirolean Alps and don't speak the local language. HN has been my outlet for 'geek talk'. Hopefully when we're back in Italy (next week! yay!) I'll have a bit more contact with various friends and contacts.
The reason HN is so addictive is because it is filled with things we think might be useful someday. We're like pack rats at a flea market.
The question is, what utility do we get out of what we find here?
Idea: maybe there could be a second class of upvote, which could only be given, say, a week, or a month after a story or comment was submitted. The meaning of this upvote would be, "This proved to be useful to me professionally." And so, in addition to HN/best and HN/bestcomments, there could be HN/useful and HN/usefulcomments.
Anway, thanks again for the site, Paul, and please keep experimenting. Watching you experiment is at least as interesting as any particular post.