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Ask HN: Why my posts are removed?

12 points by kreci ↗ HN
A few of my last posts that got many votes up is removed from main page after a few minutes... Looks that someone does not like me... Is HN working that way that sympathy decides about posts and no community?

For example my today post: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3285674

It got +7 votes in about 3 minutes... Showed on main page... and dropped 2 minutes later.

17 comments

[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 50.9 ms ] thread
ajuc
I don't know if that's the reason, but I've flagged your post by accident (wanted to click "comments"). But then I unflagged it, so this doesn't count?

Anyway - maybe someone thinks it's too repetative to add each post to hackernews? I don't think so (because I think of getting pasive income myself and find your post interesting), but I can understand if somebody did think that way - after all people interested in your posts could go to your page to read next posts, if they wanted to.

kreci
Thanks for reply. I think it would be to easy if anyone could flag post to be removed without checking by moderator. And most probably it is not the reason.
_delirium
Depending on how the upvotes came, there's some code to detect voting rings and externally-driven votes, and reduce their effect. So if for example it was 7 people who came from a link elsewhere (or who you know and asked to upvote it), that might explain it. No idea if that's the case here, just a possible mechanism other than being manually penalized.
kreci
I have no idea who voted. I just submitted link to HN. And has not asked about upvotes anywhere.
whyleym
It is a little bizarre - I find your posts incredibly useful for the mobile space - so why this would get downvoted (if that's the reason) is beyond me.
bdfh42
This is HN. You can't down-vote a post. If you check the submissions list from this user you will see lots of posts - many with respectable scores indicating a good measure of interest.

I think this member of our community is upset at not getting continuous front page feature.

kreci
You can downvote. Check my post that says that this thread has been removed.
bdfh42
I would not have thought that 7 points was enough to hold a post on the front page - take a look at what else is there. If your post had continued to gain points then there is every chance it might have "stuck" for a while longer.

"Front Page Service" is not a right - it is a result. The result of an algorithm that measures several factors that represent the level of interest from the HN community.

kreci
From my experience it is enough it voted in so short time period as it was.
kreci
This post has just been removed as well!
bdfh42
What nonsense - it is number 27 on the new list right now.
kreci
But is not on "ask" section (was number 1). And has been on main page as well... Same with my other posts.
bdfh42
Why should it be on the front page? The only new (low current score) item on the front page at the moment is the story about the BBC and net neutrality. If that does not continue to pick up votes then it will quickly drop off the front page as well. New items get a very short life - they prove their worth or have to wait for interest to build more slowly.
ColinWright
If someone thinks a given submission is inappropriate for HN they can and will flag it. Flags cause a submission to plummet in the rankings, and just a few flags suffice to send your item down to the 500's or worse, even if you have 5 to 10 votes. Getting 5 to 10 votes quickly is enough to get you to the front page at certain times of day. Once there, more up-votes usually follow. A single flag is enough to make that moot and get you off the front page.

Further, enough flags and your item will be killed with no attention from moderators required.

If someone has decided they don't like you, or don't like the topic on which you regularly post, then it's plausible that they will simply flag everything you submit on reflex.

Having a few active flaggers who are uninterested in your topic of expertise is enough to explain the symptoms you describe. I've seen it happen.

Further, complaints about voting and flagging are the items most certain to get flagged by a specific minority.

kreci
That may explain it... Thanks.
AliCollins
Does HN have a "mechanism" for tracking how people flag posts? Like if someone is an active "flagger", but doesn't upvote, does that get noted at all and affect their ratings??
dandrews
Chris, I didn't see your post but probably would have flagged it as off-topic if I had seen it. I don't think it meets the on-topic criteria posted at http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

In general if it's not hacker-worthy ("gratifies ones intellectual curiosity") or vaguely related to the startup community I'll likely flag it. Your "make money on Android" post was neither IMO. Maybe that's what happened.