What I want when I open up HN is to see: interesting tools and concepts; productivity ideas (that aren't trying to sell me something); and technology community/industry news.
I tend to avoid:
- anything US-related since it's almost always irrelevant to me and often political (which invites a lot of bad faith discussion);
- most cultural issues being that they are rehashed, never interesting and the comments are usually flooded with people who already have strong opinions (not to mention the stale talking points);
- crypto (a financial exercise disguised as technology);
- anything that tries to gender a profession, activity or concept; and
- anything that tries to partition a profession, activity or concept by gender.
Those last two ring of schoolyard bickering. There are others of course, but these are the main offenders.
As far as 'blocking' them: I scrape the titles and domains and hide threads matching patterns in either of those two fields. I check domains to filter out the more 'mainstream' sources since their tech- and science-related articles are heavily oversimplified (and/or factually incorrect, usually as a result of simplification). If I have time over during a break—and I've exhausted the interesting threads—I'll skim the list of hidden threads in case something fell through the cracks. (That hasn't happened yet.)
The core issues I am trying to solve by hiding these threads are negativity bias and time. Divisive subjects—whether I enter the comments or not—sour my mood. One thread doesn't hurt, but they can add up. Removing them from sight saves on emotional energy, and it saves on the time I spend looking for an interesting new read.
>- anything US-related since it's almost always irrelevant to me and often political (which invites a lot of bad faith discussion);
That's too broad.
>- most cultural issues being that they are rehashed, never interesting and the comments are usually flooded with people who already have strong opinions (not to mention the stale talking points);
a lot of them boil down to local politics and voting mechanics, it really feels inappropriate on HN unless all you want to say is "building housing is illegal", local residents have solve it themselves
>- crypto (a financial exercise disguised as technology)
There are environmental disaster articles coming every single day/week. Just introduce a CO2 tax and be done with it. Talking about a boom and a crash every once in a while is ok however.
I should probably specify that I meant the US as a polity. I filter titles that mention (america|united states|usa|u\.s\.) or major officials by name. This has done me well so far, and the stories with farreaching consequences have always reached me via several other trusted channels (i.e. friends, family, colleagues, my feed, etc.).
- 'nytimes', 'theverge', 'theguardian' or 'npr' (politics, pop news and US business);
- 'bbc' for all those reasons and their inaccurate reporting on tech and science for the sake of accessibility;
- 'femfosec' (can we not?); and
- 'krebsonsecurity' (for dramatising and clickbaiting fairly mundane stories).
I'm fortunate enough that I hardly have to deal with FAANG where I live and work, so I also block 'fb.com' and any Google brand TLDs since I have trusted circles that act as a human filter on the interesting parts. I also previously blocked '.dev' because it's unavailable from the networks I'm usually working on, and they were usually vapourware email farms or CV padding.
For titles:
- /sexual|lgbt|pedo|culture war/ (unfortunate combo, I know) hides most US politics;
- /america|united states|\busa\b|u\.s\.|senat(?:e|or)|biden|trump/ hides the rest;
- /cov(?:id|-2)|corona(?:virus)?/ isn't what I'm interested in;
- /\w+js/ hides the JS (framework|library) of the (week|month);
- /in mice/ to hide the deadend studies.
I've also started filtering titles beginning in /^how\b/, since these are almost always advertisements ('How to do X with $product') or political essays. /\(\d{4}\)/ also hides links to past articles, since the graverobbers are usually just trying to make a statement by invoking the wisdom of old. The hidden gems make their way to me through other channels.
I use this exact same filter on several other aggregators with similar success, so I don't think it's specifically an HN issue. For example: when applied to entertainment aggregators, I only get the entertainment news I came for. HN is my best place for a general feel of the industry's pulse, it just has some fluff in the way.
What I want when I open up HN is to see: interesting tools and concepts; productivity ideas (that aren't trying to sell me something); and technology community/industry news.
I tend to avoid:
- anything US-related since it's almost always irrelevant to me and often political (which invites a lot of bad faith discussion);
- most cultural issues being that they are rehashed, never interesting and the comments are usually flooded with people who already have strong opinions (not to mention the stale talking points);
- crypto (a financial exercise disguised as technology);
- anything that tries to gender a profession, activity or concept; and
- anything that tries to partition a profession, activity or concept by gender.
Those last two ring of schoolyard bickering. There are others of course, but these are the main offenders.
As far as 'blocking' them: I scrape the titles and domains and hide threads matching patterns in either of those two fields. I check domains to filter out the more 'mainstream' sources since their tech- and science-related articles are heavily oversimplified (and/or factually incorrect, usually as a result of simplification). If I have time over during a break—and I've exhausted the interesting threads—I'll skim the list of hidden threads in case something fell through the cracks. (That hasn't happened yet.)
The core issues I am trying to solve by hiding these threads are negativity bias and time. Divisive subjects—whether I enter the comments or not—sour my mood. One thread doesn't hurt, but they can add up. Removing them from sight saves on emotional energy, and it saves on the time I spend looking for an interesting new read.