I agree 100%.

In addition, a friendly reminder to us all...

When you see a Show HN, assume that whoever created it, perhaps not unlike you, is working to drive his or her dreams into existence. Each post represents a dream, a personal story, a literal piece of their Life.

For many of us, perhaps the majority of us, that means grinding at the mine during the day, returning home after perhaps a long commute, spending time with and cooking for our family, our significant other, etc... then, clocking back in at 9:00pm or 10:00pm to bring it for the next several, precious hours, working to make the dream real... then catching some sleep, waking up and turning around and dropping the hammer all over again.

It's just something to remember as you comment to someone about their work.

The problem is that people are different. Some people will like the diverse community at HN to scrutinise their work to potentially improve it. Otherwise just want positive reinforcement. You can't really put both sides into the same bucket and decide that everyone should sugarcoat all the time.

I love criticising and my projects being criticised as long as there clearly is knowledge or experience behind. What if you see someone making a huge mistake based on your knowledge, should you stay quiet? Making sure that feedback comes across as nice and well-intended can be hard and time consuming for people who speak English as a second or third language.

So maybe there should be a differentiation between "Proudly presenting" and "Looking for honest feedback" somehow?

I don't think anyone is suggesting a lack of honest feedback. I don't like the phrase "constructive criticism" because it's been used into meaningless, but that's basically what's being suggested. Let me try an example instead of a definition.

Let's say someone is making a clear architectural misstep: They're trying to use python/django on a project, but their goals really require something like Tornado, and they're building themselves into a corner.

Maybe from where you're sitting it looks like an idiot mistake. The question is then, how to engage? Do you tell them condescendingly that only an idiot would misuse tools like that, and that they're foolishly the HTTP request/response model that Django implements?

Or, do you try to guess at where their knowledge fails, and give them links to writeups about asynchronous programming? Or do you engage them in conversation and try to ascertain why they're making the mistake, and gently explain that better programming models have been devised for the problem they're trying to solve, and why don't they look into it and see if they agree, and "by the way if you have any more questions here's my email, I'd be happy to help."

If people can't handle receiving this last approach, then it speaks to a certain lack of immaturity. If people can't handle acting taking this, it also speaks to a certain lack of maturity. We should try to build and enforce social norms that help growth as programmers and minimize conflict. Fortunately these goals aren't inimical; in fact, the more contentious the discussion, the less learning gets done.

You can always express your feedback/thoughts without calling other person an idiot/fool etc.

I guess it was oriented more towards people who are more negative saying things like "this sucks and will fail because of X, Y and Z" and not personal things like you said.

I agree. It's important, and tricky, to strike the right balance. We're not calling for sugarcoating. That's why the last guideline says:

  When something isn't good, you needn't pretend that it is. 

I'm not sure it's best to have this as well, though:

  But in that case, consider saying nothing.

... because it slightly implies that criticism isn't welcome. Substantive criticism isn't the problem—gratuitous negativity is. So we may revise this.

Edit: We changed it to:

  When something isn't good, you needn't pretend that it is.
  But don't be gratuitously negative.

In other words, you don't need to sugarcoat, but nastiness is unwelcome.

The key word is "gratuitous". Substantive criticism is neutral and about the work. If it's personal or snarky, that's gratuitous.

Those last two sentences might be worth appending to the guideline </2¢>

This is a great comment. An upvote wasn't enough.

Absolutely agree on these guidelines. It takes a lot of bravery to put yourself out there in public. It should take just as much class to offer advice and constructive criticism instead of tearing somebody else's work down.

edit also, is it just me or is the front page plastered with Show HN links? Does anybody else think that's awesome?

Am I the only one who thinks it isn't awesome? As someone who comes to HN for news, I really don't want to see any Shown HN on the front page. Certainly not half the front page filled with them.

It'll settle down. Never judge HN by one day or even a few—the status quo ante is more stable than that. Genuine long-term changes here are more subtle. (Which is actually a challenge, but that's another story.)

What is "news"? Show HN is arguably, in many cases, the newest thing. Techcrunch, Wired, et al, are just corporate or mainstream news (not that there aren't other interesting posts that also aren't news on HN). I think many people come here to learn, new or not.

No, I agree with you. I come here for news and occasional projects and now it's 70% Show HN.

Before this feature, users had to search manually. Now it's easier to find. This just reflects the content we've wanted.

It's not just you, and I agree that it's awesome. I hope that trend continues, it might be the push HN needed to bounce back from becoming slashdot, going back to its roots as a news site by and for entrepreneurs. With which I don't mean that HN should be 100% 'Show HN' posts, but more that HN should be generated by the sort of people who appreciate Show HN posts.

I've always wished that the front page had 1 or 2 "Show HN" and 1 or 2 "Ask HN" posts on the front page. Removing them faster off the front page has puzzled me for years.

Almost makes me wonder if there should be a karma requirement to comment on Show HN posts. I hate restrictions generally speaking, and I don't know if it's safe to assume longer tenured members inherently have more class when offering feedback.

>I don't know if it's safe to assume longer tenured members inherently have more class when offering feedback.

I don't think it is. If anything, tenured members may feel more entitled to be rude without consequences. Karma isn't really a measure of civility so much as popularity over time, and it doesn't really communicate any context. Also, if there were a minimum for commenting, there should be a minimum for posting, which might leave new users with interesting projects out.

> Also, if there were a minimum for commenting, there should be a minimum for posting, which might leave new users with interesting projects out.

I don't get that implication. The commenters, if seen as offering mentorship, should necessarily be more experienced than the people they're trying to help. Otherwise, what's the point?

I like to repeat this fact whenever it's relevant: In my two or three years now on HN, the most upvotes I've ever got were all on scornful comments (towards a single company). It didn't make me or others any wiser, though I still got 'karma' points.

If karma is a valid measure of poster quality then surely it's just as important to ensure a higher standard for posts as well as comments. If, on the other hand, karma doesn't indicate experience in anything other than getting karma, then it's irrelevant either way. I happen to believe the latter is more true than the former.

Yes, but experience in the project domain(s). Which doesn't correlate with experience using HN. Not even for $tech_du_jour_popular_on_HN.

Something that's elsewhere in the guidelines is: pretend your talking to someone in person and think what you'd say. For me that strikes the right balance - I might find things I'm not enthusiastic about, but I'd weight my words carefully.

Maybe the guidelines should be stickied up top, along with the current explanation text, at least while this gets going!

https://news.ycombinator.com/show =/=

https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html

edit: they are, but just not called out as such.

[Show HN] is for something you've made that other people can play with. The newest Show HNs are listed [here].

(eg clicking the first hyperlink will bring them up)

Yes, we clearly need to make those more prominent.

Edit: we changed it to emphasize the Show HN guidelines more.

Edit 2: I think we'll also write something much more detailed about the kind of discussions we want in Show HN threads: discussions that foster further creativity. Perhaps we'll put it up on the YC blog and then have a new thread about all this, once the dust settles from the first Show HN carnival.

> Show HN is for sharing your work. Please read the [guidelines]. A list of the most recent Show HNs is [here].

. . . Looks good, nice and concise.

I came here to say exactly that. I couldn't agree more with the guidelines and with your comment.

Can we put these (or a shortened form) on every Show HN post automatically before the comment box?

Something like:

> Is your comment respectful & helpful? > Is it positive criticism?

Please?

We've actually talked about that, but it feels a bit nannyish.