Out of curiosity: what kind of people use this "forum" (I mean Hacker News)?

And of course no one responds? something something "dead internet"? 0_0

Curious people.

18-25? Yikes, I've had my account here for just over 18 years...

Normal folks like me.

I am here because it feels like the last place to enjoy insightful discussion among a diverse group of strangers.

I really enjoy when someone fresh out of college asks a question and a retiree engineer/technician/manager joins the discussion with personal knowledge. The insight and experience here, pending the AI slop takeover, is what you usually find only on very topic-specific forums.

The text-only formatting, culture of contributing to the conversation, and simplicity (read: not shiny and new), hopefully continue to keep out the cesspool of other internet at bay as long as possible.

Lots of people, but a significant population of mid-30s+ Linux-using tech-veterans who are generally skeptical about AI and big tech.

Oh, I'm a former phone phreak in my late 50s who's about to start yet another (last?) startup. I come here because the level of discourse and mutual-respect is far-away above the alternatives.

Hobbyist programmer here. HN is my morning newspaper. I like exploring everything it offers, and I often find inspiration for both work and play. It keeps me informed better than plenty of other sites I enjoy.

I'm a self taught programmer who got into open source ~20 years ago (when I was 20) and now I'm a software engineer at Google.

I've been on HN for a long time, though this is my newer account to keep myself more anonymous.

I've loved the curiosity here, along with the fact that you often see high quality comments bubble up to the top of any article.

We can do an anonymous HN demographic poll.

Nice try profiling this supreme summit of smartypants, but you're no match for our collective IQ ;)

60 year old retired here. I browse it at breakfast and after my afternoon nap

I'm a web developer in my late 30s. I've been working mostly with PHP for the past 8 years, but have been a web developer since 2009.

I'm coming up on 50 years old, with 26 years in this industry. I work as an engineering manager/director these days. I've worked at startups and bigger companies -- they all have their problems and neither is better. I'm sick of layoffs. I'm sick of hype cycles. Honestly I'm ready for a career change but it would be a huge pay cut and lifestyle change for our family.

Aside from most people here being in tech, with a very heavy bias toward SV-style companies and venture capital, I think there's a reasonably broad audience in terms of age and experience.

Great replies yeah. Personally: I'm mid-30s, yet-to-retire addicted to programming, been programming for ages with many highs/lows (aka from developing project with opencv/ai for DARPA to creating the worst flop in history of games which is maybe still tormenting people Steam, i'm not naming it lol it's beyond bad). These days as a hobby: Experimenting with AI, battery designs and propulsion (long story!). I'm based in europe so maybe my English isn't perfect and sounds gpt 3.5 generated, sorry if that's the case.

I started to use HN when I was a young programmer and now I'm 37, probably will continue until old age, if it still exists.

I am a college student studying business and IT. I use HN as a place to learn about new products and stay up to date with tech.

Mid 50s software maker. Transitioned from slashdot.org. Why? It's frequented by fellow builders and a good place to learn from others. (higher signal vs noise ratio than other places.)