[password1]

HN became just another community where it's trendy to talk in a smug way about everything, like it's this elite community of smarter people and everyone acts like one. The only problem is that people know nothing and still act this way, like they are major experts in the field spreading the truth.

It's easier to notice when they talk about non-tech related things, because with tech you are prone to give the benefit of the doubt that they might now what they are talking about, since if it's not your field of expertise it's harder to doublecheck the claims. With news instead everything is crystal clear. Just the usual average internet user that believes he understood everything and acts as a major expert when in reality it completely misses the complexity of the issues he's talking about.

[bagacrap]

I find this to be true of smart people in general. They have strong opinions about things they know little about, maybe because they're used to being right more often than not.

[carapace]

This comment of yours is an amazingly good example, even an exemplar, of itself!

Well done! (I mean that. It probably sounds snarky but I swear I'm just impressed with how well the self-referentiality held up over most of the whole thing.)

Anyhow, I once got to talk to Alan Kay on here. There's a lot of noise, sure, but the signal here, when you get it, is outstanding.

[SantalBlush]

It's actually not a good example of the described behavior at all. The commenter was clearly opining about how some people act on HN, not feigning expertise in some field.

[kzrdude]

I want to ask about - sometimes people presume a statement on a forum like this is an authoritative statement, when it's just an opinion.

Why don't we always just consider posts on forums to be just some opinion, from the poster's point of view, isn't that how a conversation works? Though I know expectations differ, I'm not sure why.

[carapace]

Let me own up to it: to some extent I was just teasing the OP.

[kzrdude]

aw, I want to discuss the question in general, not specifically. Another time.