No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 4:06 UTC (Fri) by pr1268 (guest, #24648)
In reply to: How Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak Gets Things Done (Lifehacker) by jordanb
Parent article: How Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak Gets Things Done (Lifehacker)

Please don't turn LWN into a Slashdot.

LWN's editors work hard enough to control the quality and semantics of the articles here at LWN. It hasn't become nearly as bad (or as good) as Slashdot, not by a long shot.

And also please never post anything ever again from Lifehacker.

It's up to LWN's editors to decide what to put on their site; as far as I've been able to tell (for the past four years I've been a subscriber), they've done a pretty good job. If you don't like the content of LWN, then don't bother subscribing. There are other places online to get your Linux/Open-Source news.

I read the Lifehacker interview and found the one paragraph about Woz's Linux experiences (or lack thereof) to be relevant to this site. At least he acknowledges the existence of Linux, unlike Steve Jobs.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 4:23 UTC (Fri) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link] (5 responses)

What value did you get out of this article? It is typical Lifehacker drivel: fawning over the personality of an Internet Famous person attached to Apple. He made one reference to Linux that wasn't even remotely enlightening or informative. And moreover, who cares if he's "better" or worse than Steve Jobs? Should I care that Mao was "Better" than Joseph Stalin?

I used the comment system to say that articles such as this (of which there've been a string lately) are not the reason why I subscribe to LWN. If you feel differently.. well, good for you. I'd rather not see this stuff. The editors of the site are free to take it in whatever direction they want, and they're more than free to ignore my complaint. But that's how I feel.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 8:30 UTC (Fri) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] (4 responses)

Why do you whine about this thing so much? I mean, I occasionally run in to articles on LWN that I do not care about that much, for one reason or another. What do I do? I simply choose not to read those articles. What I do NOT do is to start complaining about them.

"I used the comment system to say that articles such as this (of which there've been a string lately) are not the reason why I subscribe to LWN."

Yes, I guess the LWN-editors should start to pander to your personal wants and demands... Do you think that just because you subscribe to LWN, you can now expect only articles that are interesting to you?

"I'd rather not see this stuff."

Why not just glance at the article, decide "I'm not interested in that", and move on? How much time have you now wasted complaining about this?

I for one find the article interesting. Wozniak IS one of the great people of computing. Yes, he comes from the "other side", but that doesn't mean that his comments and opinions are not interesting or valid. I for one AM interested in his views about Linux.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 8:58 UTC (Fri) by MisterIO (guest, #36192) [Link] (3 responses)

When you're not interested in an article, you skip it. Instead when he doesn't like it, or he thinks the article is of poor quality, he writes a comment about it. So what? When I pay for something, I like to be able to say if I like or not what I'm paying for. Expressing opinions is exactly what comments are here for. Sure, the "ignore it" method is the most useless in any case. Feedback is at the base of everything that works in reality.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 9:40 UTC (Fri) by Janne (guest, #40891) [Link] (2 responses)

He did not pay for this particular article (which is available for free in any case), he paid for subscribing to LWN, which gives him many benefits over non-subscribers (like early access to the weekly editions).

Should we all constantly voice our opinions about whether we like or dislike some particular article? The comments would then quickly degenerate in to arguiming that is the article interesting or not, as opposed to actually discussing the contents of the article.

And in this case, the "article" is basically just a link to the interview, and a short blurb from it. So what's the harm here? this article didn't take any resources from the editors, so is this a case of aesthetics or something? That the person does not want to read about Steve Wozniak, so everything related to Woz should not appear in LWN?

what I get from his comment is a sense of entitlement. "I'm a subscriber and I demand that you stop publishing articles like this!". The easy solution is to simply not read the article in question. No-one is required to read everything that LWN publishes, we ARE free to pick and choose the articles that interest us. Demanding that LWN only publishes "interesting" articles is dumb, since every single LWN-reader has a different idea as to what is "interesting" and what is not. You can't please everyone. The easy solution is to simply skip the articles that do not interest you, instead of throwing a hissy-fit about it.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 10:10 UTC (Fri) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link] (1 responses)

I wholeheartedly agree.

I have no idea why people wants to impose a "only my interests" limitation on this wonderful news service, then we would need to have a gazillion mini-lwn's, each with like 4 readers.

No, you leave

Posted Apr 24, 2009 10:50 UTC (Fri) by hppnq (guest, #14462) [Link]

In just a few comments this escalated from a simple observation, although obviously written without support from the legal department, to a Slashdot-worthy skirmish. Thank God nobody mentioned the nazis.

Count me among those who feel that some articles (especially most linking to blog posts) are filler, and therefore bring down the LWN value.