HN Explorer

Ask HN: Websites / Apps that aren't a waste of time?

11 points by ChilledTonic ↗ HN
With X, formerly Twitter, going the way it has, I find myself lacking spaces on the internet to scroll and learn things at the same time (besides this one.)

Where does HN spend their downtime on the internet?

19 comments

[ 0.23 ms ] story [ 56.5 ms ] thread
petargyurov
> aren't a waste of time

> spaces on the internet to scroll

These 2 are mutually exclusive ;)

flymaipie
“Scroll and learn” sounds like oxymoron.
nejsjsjsbsb
Scrolling is OK if there is an end. Like a blog post!
karles
Read newspapers. Read about Philisophy and society. Look up data on national/local trends (national/local government usually have databasen). Educate yourself.

Lord knows the world need more of that in the coming years.

scarface_74
When you find interesting blog posts on HN, skim the other articles on the blog and if they seem interesting, subscribe to their RSS feeds.

For the Mac/iOS I use NetNewsWire. It syncs over iCloud and it’s free and open source.

I deleted my Reddit account last year after 8 years.

mancerayder
Is there a windows or android NetNewsWire-equivalent?
bobheadmaker
Have you tried joining any relevant discord groups?
nom
> to scroll and learn things

Maybe you can approach this a bit differently, it sounds like you are looking for another place to waste your time without learning anything.

Learning doesn't happen by scrolling.

mancerayder
Counterpoint: you don't know what you don't know.

When scrolling Hackernews, intriguing topics abound that I never thought about before, much less even asked myself the question about. And I read the comments and become interested in a new area.

Counter-counterpoint: attention moves to something else before much learning was performed...

jezek2
I would use the term "reading" than "scrolling" though. Scrolling implies that you don't really care much about anything and just mindlessly consume content.
dalmo3
Agreed. There's value in being attuned to what's there. It's breadth-first learning.
entrepy123
You could try the Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link:

  https://www.well.com
  https://www.well.com/about-2/
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_WELL
mancerayder
Quora isn't horrible, but sadly it seems it's kind of intrusive from a privacy perspective. Still it has interesting insights on psychology and personal experiences, with people who enjoy writing. It's like an organized Q and A blog.
scarface_74
Quora is so bad that it’s the only site that I specifically block to make sure I don’t go by there by mistake
AznHisoka
Literally nothing public, unfortunately. I just got some private chats and slack groups where i interact in once in awhile.
readyplayernull
I've found very niche groups in Reddit to be huge sources of information, not even interrogating LLMs can possibly provide as much value. Though you will keep fighting Reddit's recommendations all day, every day.