Nice. I think no matter how we want to be seen, we will always be first compared to Reddit, which is fair. Perhaps I am kidding myself, but I see our paths as significantly different; however, I am sure it is not immediately obvious to newcomers. I don't simply want to inherit a space. I'd like to open up some new territory. Reddit is an amazing success, and due to the diversity of what goes on there, I expect that they will continue on for a long time to come. IMHO the cycle of The Eternal September might be a bit more complicated than commonly understood. Obviously we've tried to design ourselves to scale well, but IMO there are key factors involved that cannot be designed. The Reddit team is smart. They have a level of traffic that no other site like them has seen, and they have sustained it. I don't think what is bad for Reddit is good for Hubski. What is best for Hubski has almost everything to do with Hubski.
My hope is that we don't have a large influx of users that see this site compared to Reddit and then treat it exactly like Reddit or complaining that they don't like it or understand it. That would be completely missing the point of Hubski.Perhaps I am kidding myself, but I see our paths as significantly different; however, I am sure it is not immediately obvious to newcomers.
Reddit's choice to use sub-communities, rather than tags is what differentiates it from all the other link aggregators out there. Tags are public property but communities are controlled by the mods and the members. Each community has the power to make and enforce its own rules (like no memes). When one community starts being diluted by an influx of users, the core users migrate to another community. With tags, it's not easy to convert someone using #physics into using #real-physics instead. Reddit will always have these unique communities these will be what keep people on Reddit Hubski is closer to Tumblr (or Twitter or the stream component of Google+). It's mainly about following people or browsing hashtags. Hashtags are good to follow at the start - but eventually they'll get diluted. What is critical in this model is giving users a way to find people to follow. Twitter has this covered because there are a ton of celebrities on it and most people will have a few friends on it too. That said, Twitter offers friend lists that allow you to follow a bunch of people at once. Tumblr is also heavily based on following your friends, but they have a spotlight (http://www.tumblr.com/spotlight/travel) to highlight which users in a category may be worth following
I see Hubski as rather analogous to long-form journalism (something which obviously is pretty popular here). It's not often covered by major media outlets (at least, not the types most people tend to read, I think) and it's rarely spread in social media - the way the Reddit community tends to work, as I think we've all seen, is that people will often upvote a submitted title and not read an article, especially if it's particularly long. But, like Hubski, there are still places that longform journalism is really popular, and, interestingly, newer platforms are opening up - in New Zealand, we have the Pantograph Punch, a place for longer articles written by freelancers for the most part, and the writing quality is really good. Medium is getting more and more popular, and while it's not really longform journalism, it's in a similar vein, I think - not quite a blog post, but a similar sort of thing (mostly nonfiction work with personal anecdotes/experiences).
I agree. I think there's a place for more thoughtful content and engagement on the web. People won't always use Hubski for it, by my goal is that I can always use Hubski for it. There is such a prevalence of shallow content on the web, one might think that it is all the web is good for. Part of it is fulfilling a need, but part of it is self-inflicted as publishers seek revenue with a high-thorough-put approach. When I discuss a magazine with a friend, I almost never include the magazine's circulation numbers. I am always talking about the content. Of course, the publishers have those conversations, but on the web, the readers do too. IMO the web rushed as a herd towards one model at the expense of a number of others.
This was my article and I did it because I really enjoy Hubski, which surprised me. I am a Metafilter refugee who moved to Reddit a few years ago and have been looking for more long form interaction which Reddit seems to be losing. I still love Reddit for the sheer wealth of stuff they cover, but I'm finding less and less incentive to spend long periods on there, even in the subreddits. The /bestof and /truereddit seem to be closer to my ideal, and that's where Hubski dovetails in for me really.
Can you explain what exactly circlejerk means in the context of internet communities? I'm aware of the other definition. Does it just mean coming back around and around to the same topic? I see it used in various ways. I enjoyed the write up though. It's nice to think that Hubski has the potential to grow and it's also nice that he presents Hubski in an honest way. We are small, but I sincerely think we can scale and not disrupt the experience we have now, but only accentuate it. That is the true test. The New Reddit? Nah. How about the first Hubski.
A circlejerk is a bunch of like minded people all sitting around "debating", but really not debating or discussing anything, just reinforcing each others identical worldview. Like on Reddit, when you post a thread along the lines of "Does anyone else not like the NSA spying on us?", the comment section is just going to be a circlejerk of agreement. It's not a discussion, it's not a debate, it's just "YEAH TOTALLY I KNOW RIGHT?". It's essentially just going round and round on the same topic with no movement. It's just a circlejerk. Like /r/politics on Reddit is a great example. Everyone there, that comments anyway, has the exact same opinion, because they all formed their opinions in the same place.
Ya, I'm not sure if I like the reddit comparison. I mean reddit isn't going away. If Hubski scales up substantially it will be because it is filling a different function for the Internet than reddit currently serves.The New Reddit? Nah. How about the first Hubski.
Ya, I'm not sure if I like the reddit comparison. I mean reddit isn't going away. If Hubski scales up substantially it will be because it is filling a different function for the Internet than reddit currently serves.
Exactly. The quote at the end is from a comment I made on Hubski and I think the analogy is apt. I hang out with various people in various circles of my life for different reasons. Why should online communities be any different? There's room for us all.
I agree with you. I think reddit is a great platform for community building around single topics, whether it is a naked girl or birds with arms or weird marine life or whatever. I hope that reddit continues to fill the function of showing off the best easy-to-consume content with a strong commenting platform. However, I think that hubski will continue to fill the void of longer form content or more challenging content with people who actually want to discuss rather than comment. There are, no doubt, still subreddits that have discussions on higher quality content, whether it be in niche smaller subreddits or with heavy moderation, but overall reddit no longer is the place to go for that type of content and discussion.
Well, insomniasexx pretty much hit it on the head. Reddit offers instant thrills and it's easy to get distracted. Of course, users can tailor their experience too, but defaults make a huge impact on new users as far as tone and mentality. Hubski, from the get-go presents itself as the kind of place that one needs to interact with in a much more proactive way. Also, reddit exists as a foil to hubski, at least for me. I can get my cheap thrills and then head over here to learn something and to actually interact with users who are focused on the same kind of thing.
As far as I know, circle jerking on the net is stroking of each other's egos a bit excessively. Posting a story on Hubski about how awesome Hubski is seems to fit this definition. Not that I mind (so long as it's just form time to time), just having a little fun with it.
Something tells me that's probably going to get downvoted.
Good, and maybe some of the non-circlejerky type Redditors will come over and take a peak at what Hubski is. And the annoying ones can stay in their bubble.
I didn't know we were at 30,000 monthly visitors. Who's nigel? What's his hubski handle?
um... 30 k discreet monthly visitors? or is it just me, theadvancedapes, thenewgreen, humanodon, and flagamuffin visiting 6 k times a month?
lil I can confirm that they are unique visitors. While there is a small handful of us providing much of the content here, there is a larger number that seem to enjoy reading it. We get between 700 and 1200 visits a day on average right now. What's nice is that number bumps up slightly every month and then we will have a big influx of new users and it will rise dramatically and then normalize again. I can remember when having 200 in one day was worth celebrating. Who knows, maybe someday having 20,000 will be the new normal? The key will be to still see humanodon, theadvancedapes, lil and flagamuffin in my feed because that's who I follow.
That would be me. :) I came to Hubski a while ago after seeing it mentioned on Reddit, and really enjoyed the change of pace. Long form, civilized discussion and the rest. I'm still not completely sure about the format, I think it could be a little confusing for newcomers (esp those who are used to a simpler way to 'subscribe' to content) since it's not instantly clear what the best way to access content is. In my case I just set up a feed of a number of tags and have that in my feed reader for general access. It seems to work.