Ask HN: Did the HN ranking algo give more weight to 'Show HN' submissions?
So, it seems for most of today about 70-80% of the front page have been "Show HN" submissions... nothing wrong with that, I enjoy seeing what people have built and am more-than-happy with the new 'Show' link and page in the header.
But did the algo change to give more weight/life to Show HN submissions? Or is this extra exposure purely down to how easy the Show HN submissions are to find now? (And that the announcement drew attention to that fact?)
No - just the announcement triggering a lot of amazing people to share and support.
I don't think so, but in my opinion it would be better if they're weighed down (instead of up). That way anyone interested can go to /show and the good stuff still makes it to the front page.
Or like muppetman suggested yesterday (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7986578), make it a profile option whether to show them on the front page. Or perhaps add a weight field as a profile option? That should make everyone happy I think.
The combination of this being a new feature and the "Show HN" posts now having a dedicated page simply gave them a big boost in exposure.
I doubt it has anything to do with the algorithms. I will, however, be interested to see how things settle once it is no longer a NEW feature.
I think more people created show hn posts to capitalize on the novelty of showing up on the new list.
From an engineer's point of view, it was probably either change the algorithm or increase exposure. I don't think they've done both, so I would say it's just the extra exposure.
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An increase in "Show HN" could be partially explained by the recent closure of Freshmeat (Freecode).