Thanks for posting this to HN, because I'm bookmarking LH and willing to give it another go.
I remember when the original founder (Gina Trapani) stepped aside, it sounded to me like she was burnt out on the "post 76786 updates a day, no matter what" business model that they'd found themselves stuck with... although, she was the one at the helm, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ The idea of posting about multiple new "life hacks" per freaking day is just so obviously absurd. Life is hackable but not that hackable.
Hell, I wouldn't mind a much slower version of that site. 1-2 thoughtful articles a week. Then maybe 1-2 roundup posts of smaller news items.
Call it Slowhacker.
I like that name! In the same vein I wish there were a site Slownews with, say, weekly or biweekly summaries & in-depth analyses of what's happening in the world (politics, economics et cetera). Sure, lots of things are happening around the world all the time but most of them are just noise. And even if they're not noise and very relevant to me, it usually takes the media a day or two to go beyond the breaking-news!-I-have-no-idea-what's-happening-and-yet-I-am-reporting-about-it quality level and piece together everything into a coherent analysis. But, by that time, no one is spelling out the essential facts anymore because journalists silently assume you've been following the 24/7 news cycle all along.
But doing that just feels exhausting.
I had a wonderful zero clutter Google Reader setup and would consume these from there.
The pace of writing was manageable and I didn't feel like I was drowning trying to drink from a firehose.
The quality was high and I often learned something new and of value.
On the internet, things were just simpler. And I feel really old saying that.
Then there was Kotaku, their video game blog. It was the only site I ever got a comment ban on. I’d been a commenter for a few years, since the day they added them to the site. Then one day they posted a headline like “Pikmin comes to the DS” (or maybe 3ds I forget.) I click through and it’s basically a write up about someone who made a Pikmin picture/drawing using the handheld (something like that, my memory is vague on the details)
Which was annoying because Kotaku quality was generally not too click bait-ish and I said this in a comment. I got banned. I remember the editor who did it, Brian Crecente.
On the one hand their comments sections were generally non-toxic. On the other hand they had absolutely no tolerance, albeit sporadically applied, to critical opinions. Of course that’s their right, but it also made me wonder what other legitimate conversation they might be banning, and soured me on the site.
Despite this I’ll say Brian Crecente was a pretty good games journalist, and I kno many sites especially at that time were struggling with how to introduce comments without it turning into a waste dump.
Or I guess I should say "y frgt th bst frm f cmmnt mdrtn" ;)
(it was a common tool used to take care of easy trolls like 'Why is this on Consumerist?')
also used to read it like 15-20 years ago, but the content just didn't tell me anything new
I do think there is still a good future for a Lifehacker that goes back to high quality and interesting content from a small set of passionate voices. Too often on Reddit you get a hive mind where the group forms a consensus and any dissenting or alternate views are suppressed or ignored. It's nice to have something with a strong editorial team that can publish unique content based on the merits of its research, and not mashes of the upvote button.
It's a common trope, but reddit has really taken a nose dive as the average user base grows to reflect the average population better. As George Carlin noted, the average person is kind of dumb, and half of all people are even dumber than that. On top of this race to the mean, you have advertisers who are increasingly aware of how many eyeballs are visiting the site, and the playbook for shilling and influencing sentiment on reddit is pretty textbook and reliable at this point, so a lot of content isn't really "genuine" anymore, especially on the larger subs with more eyeballs to monetize or influence.
If they seek to be an honest source of information they ought to stand out in modern net sources. We all know the hell of searching for info on google nowadays.
I mean, Lifehacker is too, but in theory yes of course there’s a place for advice that isn’t garbage, even if LH isn’t it.
I think the issue is that these sites don’t generate enough income for whole teams of editors and to be bought by media companies like ZiffDavis.
Maybe they are better now, that’s nice.
But I think what works is a single person or maybe 3 finding life hacks and writing about them.
I’m not even sure what lifehacker is supposed to write about now. But I think until they get back to someone’s passion project, they won’t be very good.
I think the issue is that these sites don’t
generate enough income for whole teams of editors
A great recent example is Defector Media, formed by the former staff of Deadspin (also of G/O media) who quit en masse and then formed their own employee-owned blog, Defector.com with minimal advertising and a direct reader supported revenue model. Direct reader support isn't the right model for every blog, but the larger lesson is that they were able to switch to a sustainable and spam-free format once they no longer had to pay the bills and generate some additional zillion dollars of revenue for their corporate masters.
"The company has 19 employees, each of whom own approximately 5% of the company"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defector_Media
https://defector.com/defector-annual-report-year-two
Which rather well describes what just happened to DPReview. One wonders if some of the community there might be able to do something like this...
This is my dream for a strong social safety net,
maybe up to a UBI
The idea of a UBI that provides a comfortable lifestyle for anyone who doesn’t want to work a normal job is just a pipe dream.
Here is the article for orhers like me :
https://lifehacker.com/geek-to-live-list-your-life-in-txt-16...
https://www.43folders.com/2005/09/12/building-a-smarter-to-d...
Top article on Lifehacker right now: Donald Trump news.
If they go back to publishing quality life hacks I’ll go back to reading them. “Toxic” comments section or not.
Il the last years, it was full blown propaganda for the US democratic party and against republicans, which brought a matching audience of political activists that I think that it off topic and even toxic. Keep it about lifehacks. Why can't republicans have good lifehacks? That should be a politically neutral topic.
Really hard to blame Lifehacker, considering the damage done to legal precedent and other tomfoolery.
Oh, to be sufficiently privileged to be able to ignore the macroeconomic and political trends.
My grandparents taught me that politics aint about people. They learned that in the Depression. It's about existing power structures, deciding winners and losers. Demographically the GOP as a power player is living on borrowed time and doing everything it can to consolidate power and rebrand itself, in large part because its major three tents in its coalition (poverty-stricken disaffected [sometimes called eat-the-rich], business conservative, evangelical Christian) are not natural allies (as well as the latter two decreasing dramatically in both numbers and support). May the party of malcontent fail and more community-focused coalitions take the reins.
I’m referring to the top article in the general category:
> “What Happens When You Get Indicted”
> “If you happen to be a former president in a sticky spot right now, here's what you can expect.”
It’s nothing to do with life hacks… just a thinly veiled excuse to write about a current hot topic that gets clicks.
https://lifehacker.com/home-remedies-and-homeopathy-aren-t-t...
Some good writing
The more substantive thing is the change-of-ownership, which should, in-theory, allow them to grow in a way that diverges from G/O Media (and formerly the Gizmodo/Gawker empire) strategy.
Here's hoping they can recapture some of the spirit of the old days.
I hope this offers the site a new start and they can do longer form articles now
Hallelujah!
Gave me focus.
It doesn't matter if the V3.0 of LH has done away with slideshows, something I thought the Internet abandoned in 2012. There is no way for a modern content-only website to survive without saturating every paragraph with affiliate link spam.
Who woulda thunk it.
They covered niche, nerdy topics in simpler terms than most other publications, which was neat for a kid who just started learning English.