zlacker

It's a valid point, though. At what point is the line drawn? Political issues often result in uncivil discussion. There is also probably significant audience crossover with reddit that caused that post to rise up. Hackers may have an interest in libertarianism or economics, but does that mean that this site should become one about Ron Paul if people feel that way?

Editor control should be used to put a stop to that, IMO. Democracy is great, but it went too far with Reddit. HN would become much less useful to me if it went in that direction.

>>whughe+(OP)
> It's a valid point, though. At what point is the line drawn?

That wasn't really his point so much as yours. ;)

> Political issues often result in uncivil discussion. There is also probably significant audience crossover with reddit that caused that post to rise up. Hackers may have an interest in libertarianism or economics, but does that mean that this site should become one about Ron Paul if people feel that way?

That is in fact a good question to ask, and I wasn't precluding it from being asked, but rather reiterating the stated goals for Hacker News. Such questions ought to be asked.

>>whughe+(OP)
The reason political issues often result in uncivil discussion, me thinks, is we have not spent enough time in a forum (online or off) that demands civility in such discussions. If HN can provide both (1) topics members want to discuss along with (2) its approach of keeping the discussion civil, this seems a very good thing.

I am a big fan of hacking social and economic problems. If a topic is not of interest I ignore it. A thread rarely stays on the front page more than a day or two.

I originally came to HN for Web 2.0 news. But things have evolved.