I appreciate your comments in this thread. But could you please stop baiting people on this point? If there's one thing I've learned from running HN it's that the generalizations about the community that people come up with are invariably wrong. They're overgeneralized from a small sample of what the generalizer happened to notice—and since we're far more likely to notice what rubs us the wrong way, the results always have have sharp edges. In other words, people remember most the things they most dislike, then tar the whole with it. To borrow your phrase, the actual TLDR is less interesting.
Thanks for the mild rebuke dang, I think you do a great job meta-moderating this community.
I wish I had stayed out of this from the beginning, I see no merit in arguing about whether HN has some themes. I’ve been watching it daily for a long time as you can tell from the age of the account.
If you want to do something that would be both a good call as a mod and a favor to a longtime user, just whack this whole thread. I was trying to chime in with some knowledge but just wound up pissing everyone off.
I have to say I strongly disagree—I thought your contributions were excellent, and HN lucky to have you contributing on a topic that you know a ton about. If I contributed to your feeling otherwise then I wish I hadn't posted!
One thing I can offer from years here is: never underestimate the silent readership (I'd say silent majority but...associations). The vast majority of readers don't comment and most don't vote either. It doesn't mean they aren't following and getting a lot out of what you wrote. Usually it's only the most-provoked segment of the long tail that is motivated to respond. That's fine, it's the cycle of life on the internet—but it doesn't represent the whole community.
