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  • Hacker News Guidelines
    • Submissions
      • What to submit
        • Anything that good hackers would find interesting; not necessarily just hacking and startups.
        • "Anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."
        • Things covered on TV news are probably off-topic.
      • How to format the title
        • Don't use all-caps, exclamation points, or parenthetical praise in the title.
        • Append [video] or [pdf] to the title for those kinds of submissions.
        • Submit the original source.
        • Crop "10 Ways to (...)" titles to "How to (...)".
        • Otherwise please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait.
    • Comments
      • Be civil.
      • Avoid introducing flamewar topics. [NW: Like what?]
      • Don't sign comments.
      • Don't use all-caps for emphasis; use italics.
      • Don't submit comments that duplicate the effect of the 'flag' feature.
      • Don't comment about being downvoted, invite others to downvote you, or talk about expecting to be downvoted.
  • Hacker News FAQ


How to

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  • Be one of the first people to write a comment (say, in the first 15 or so comments).
  • Say something substantial, that other users will find particularly interesting. Like some gold-nugget of wisdom you've learned.
  • Make your post neither too long nor too short.
    • 1-3 paragraphs is probably the right range.

How to gain karma

  1. Find a submission that:
    • is relatively 'young' / new
    • is likely to become heavily-upvoted / commented-on.
    • is related to a topic you know something about, where:
      • you have something to say on the submitted article that the other users will find useful / interesting
  2. Get your comment to be towards the top.
  3. Respond quickly to rebuttals / replies, especially in the first 30-or-so minutes.
    1. Be polite and express your appreciation that the person took the time to reply to you.
  4. Once the submission is off the front page, the rate of new readers per minute will likely drop dramatically. You will likely gain very few–if any–new upvotes from your comments on that submission.

How to predict which submissions will become heavily-upvoted / commented-on

  1. Look for general-interest topics.
  2. YC-related blog posts will probably do well; follow the YC account on Twitter to be notified when they release a new blog post.
  3. Articles posted earlier in the morning (say, around 6-9am Pacific) on a weekday may be especially good candidates.

How to make it more likely that your comment will be at the top of a particular thread

  1. Be one of the first people to write a comment (say, in the first 15 or so comments).
  2. Say something substantial, that other users will find particularly interesting. Like some gold-nugget of wisdom you've learned.
  3. Make your post neither too long nor too short.
    • 1-3 paragraphs is probably the right range.

Misc articles about HN

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