HN is a great site to attempt to gain exposure and new subscribers.
I understand why someone would choose to post their content here, despite my other comments railing against self-promoters.
If you make it to the front page you will gain a great SEO boost simply due to the new links that pop up on dozens of HN copy-cats that exist elsewhere[0]
So, I say go for it if you have content that you want to share!
Please don't use HN primarily for promotion. It's ok to submit your own stuff occasionally, but the primary use of the site should be for curiosity.
I think the key word is "primarily". From what I've seen over the years here on HN, a certain measure of self-promotion is totally fine and even expected. But it's not considered cool to spam the site with your own self-promotional stuff all the time.
My personal, subjective, non-official interpretation, based on my experience here over the years:
If you're submitting (a) link(s) to your own stuff everyday, it's probably going to raise eyebrows. If you submit your own stuff once a week, it's probably going to raise eyebrows. If you're submitting your own stuff once a month, I doubt anybody would much notice or care. If you're submitting your own stuff once every couple of months or so, you're probably fine.
Again, totally non-official, but I think that's a useful approximation.
> If you submit your own stuff once a week, it's probably going to raise eyebrows.
I browse /new frequently and come across self-promoting accounts constantly[0]. It may depend on dang having time to remove these submissions and other users to flag them.
That example is in the border, but it's not annoying enough and can fly under the radar. I'd not be surprised if it get's banned eventually.
* Once every two days, so people don't remember.
* Not exact repost, so people don't remember.
* The post are too short, but not completely off-topic.
* Not obvious suckpuppets or similar activity.
Note that this is not a foolproof recipe. As I said before, it's not annoying enough and can fly under the radar. I'd not be surprised if it get's banned eventually.
There is quite a bit of good content that never makes it to the front page. Having less muck to sift through would be nice :) however, this is just a symptom of HN steadily growing more popular...
Personally, it irks me that a lot of these submissions get posted because it adds to the list of posts that I have to weed through in order to find the gems.
I've been making it a point to flag submissions—more often—when they do violate the guidelines (resubmissions, political/can be discussed elsewhere, etc.)
I understand why someone would choose to post their content here, despite my other comments railing against self-promoters.
If you make it to the front page you will gain a great SEO boost simply due to the new links that pop up on dozens of HN copy-cats that exist elsewhere[0]
So, I say go for it if you have content that you want to share!
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21092890