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Ask HN: Are My Links Really That Boring/Spammy?

by kcoop on 7/3/13, 1:12 AM with 10 comments

I submitted two links today, one of my app's launch, the other an article in GeekWire about the app. Neither lasted more than a few seconds on the front page.

Am I doing it wrong?

Edit: this one didn't even get on the front page.

  • by tptacek on 7/3/13, 2:01 PM

    Did you consider finding a Snowden angle for your launch story?

  • by jefflinwood on 7/3/13, 3:01 AM

    This is probably the first HN readers have heard about your app, and it doesn't appear to be backed by a larget company, so they probably just skimmed the link in the new list and didn't even click on it.

    One suggestion would have been to title it "Show HN: My first iOS app, real life scavenger hunts, covered in Geekwire", so at least it would make this ask section, where the links get a little bit more of a chance for upvotes.

    Neither of your submissions had any upvotes, so I'm guessing it just got pushed off by a rush of other news.

    In particular, for the last few weeks here, the front page has been overwhelmed with one story in particular, so startup launches and programming topics are going to fall by the wayside - it may have just been a bad time to launch on HN.

  • by Sealy on 7/3/13, 1:45 AM

    I noticed that I tend to get upvotes for posting genuinely interesting articles. Or at least articles that I think are going to be interesting (and from a good source). The posting policy here encourages value adding tech links.

    Most of them are from tech news sites and out of 5 links I would post, 4 of them will get 2-3 karma and drop off very quick and 1 might get 20+ karma.

  • by danso on 7/3/13, 1:20 AM

    Getting on the HN front page is a crapshoot...it's only partially related to the content of the submission and the headline, and strongly related to what else is trending and who happens to be checking the 'New' links. Everytime I think I'm being deliberately ignored, I think of the time poor Jeremy Ashkenas had to submit a PHP-related link just to get noticed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2864185

  • by throwaway420 on 7/3/13, 1:43 AM

    I'm not 100% sure how it works, but I think the mods are very trigger happy when it comes to deleting content that they don't judge to be appropriate. This has a positive effect on maintaining the quality of the overall posts, but is a negative when one person's opinion shuts down a potentially interesting topic.

    I think you erred by trying to make two posts about the same thing in one day that. That might be something that gets you flagged.