| This is about people who like to post Ask items simply because they get more exposure (and I linked several examples above). I don't believe it takes guidance from the site owner to see why this practice is bad. It should be very clear to just about everyone that it's sneaky and does not enhance overall HN content quality. Not every example of sneaky, degrading behavior should need to be explicitly addressed in the FAQs. As for the question if it's a good idea to Ask HN whether you should Show HN, I don't see any legitimate reason to do this. If your project is bad and unworthy (or just unlucky), it will get ignored and/or flagged. I know, because it happened to me, too. Several times, actually. It's a great signal to stop working on a project. But chances are, your project is actually pretty nice and it will end up on the front page. There is absolutely, positively no need to ask whether you should show - other than to increase your visibility and circumvent the duplicate link mechanism. > tons of Show HNs that no one (except you) complains about I realize that in this, like in many other things, I might be utterly alone and that posting fake Ask HN items is actually considered a great hack to improve your exposure and everybody thinks it's just awesome. That's OK. I'm just a random guy stating his opinions. I tried to explain why I think it's bad and why I think people who are doing that are abusing the system. While I would never personally upvote or engage with such an entry, it's totally possible that nobody else sees a problem here. In fact, I'm pretty sure pg and admins don't see a problem there, or measures would have been taken to prevent it. Nevertheless, I feel the need to say what I believe is right anyway. It's up to you to decide whether I'm right or not. |