But also, plenty of public places like museums, restaurants - at least where I live - have a "guest book" where you can leave a message. I like to believe other visitors and the staff have a leaf through those every once in a while.
> First, it’s positive and affirming in the aggregate. Despite its scale, the internet can be a lonely place. Most creators create in a vacuum. ... Leaving something adds a little humanity to the internet.
I think I'll try better to re-establish this habit.
If the page had a comment box, would have done it there.
In contrast, people go to blogs to find opinions, and traces of opinions of others are usually adding, not subtracting. One can say whole HN is a sandbox for sharing opinions, therefore "untouched" posts with no comments and low points are less attractive.
But this was good advice years ago too. The average Facebook or Youtube comment section feels like it's full of empty drones, repeated and predictable comments that don't actually add much. HN comments are a breath of fresh air in that regard. Reddit can be to some degree, as long as you filter out the predictable kneejerk reactions and "I also choose this guy's dead wife" meme comments.
These days, I find myself questioning for whom am I leaving a trace for? What kinds of humans or entities? Do I care about the kinds of entities who will inhabit the future? Or will their value system be so different to my own that I'd prefer not to have anything to do with them.
Beyond human nature itself, I take issue with the trend of how human nature seems to be changing over time; for the worse.
How's your reasoning there? You only want to be nice to people who have earned it? This sounds a bit too close to the "you have to EARN my respect", which is a hallmark of somebody nobody wants to be around.
You can only control your own actions. If your "good deeds" are conditional or transactional, then that very much diminishes their goodness.
If you pay attention, you will notice that this is how the vast majority of people operate.
To me, that's transactional. Having fixed core values and expecting other people to share certain core values is not transactional, it's genuine. These are the kinds of relationships which don't require constant maintenance; you can not talk with the person for years and then resume the friendship like no time has passed, no matter how your situations have changed. If you can change your values based on the latest social trends, then you have no values. The friendship is held together by mutual material benefits; that's transactional.
I have no genuine interest in being friends with people who don't have core values. Because then I'd know I'm only in it for the money, and that's a lot of work and stress for me. Maybe second nature to some people. But I'm no good actor. To me it's work.
My view of humanity is most people are actors and most people lie to themselves constantly.
Glad I left a trace.
Go to your professor's office hours, learn the names of your neighbors, become a regular at the local sandwich shop and shoot the breeze with staff, ask the people you're waiting in line alongside if they have any good jokes.
Don't be fooled that social media and conspicuous consumption are the best paths to community.
The last thing I want to do when out in public is be stuck talking with strangers.
You don't do it because you like it. You do it because if you don't, then you'll be worse off years later.
This feels hyperbolic. While I would agree that community and remaining connected are very important to overall health, I don’t feel like making a habit of talking to strangers is a prerequisite.
But what really makes a trace valuable? Internet growth has proven that scaling traces does not really grow value to the same extent.
> Leaving something adds a little humanity to the internet. > It helped you, so it’s likely a useful idea > You now have a profile you can access that collects the things you found noteworthyWhere there's some detail that's causing them problems, and they would not hit it unless they were actually making use of the project in a productive way. It's sort of the ultimate proof of the work I did being useful for somebody and a genuine motivator to resolve that issue for them too.
"A stranger is wrong on the internet!" xkcd#386
I did that, once, and got an expletive-filled rant about ungrateful, entitled shits (meaning Yours Troolie), in response.
These days, I just quietly slip out the back, and close the door behind me.
> The more an article would benefit from photos, the less likely it’ll have them. -- Waterluvian's Law
I know no one who tries striking up a conversation with strangers, and I feel like the majority of strangers would be annoyed/uncomfortable with this.
Sometimes, I work against this and start conversations.
Rarely people are annoyed. Too often, they seem happy someone breaks their shell, they just don't want to be that person who takes the first step.
Every time I see a new person I still feel the same.
hk__2•1h ago
If you don’t have any comment box it’s hard to give you any feedback.
knorker•1h ago
"Why is nobody calling to invite me to parties", says man who unplugged his phone.
Edit: Ok, I'm old. For younger people, pretend I said "turned off his phone".
hoppyhoppy2•59m ago
knorker•49m ago
This reminds me of a friend of mine who in a B2B setting contacted a potential vendor by filling in a form, with his email and phone number as contact details. Instead of emailing or calling back, this vendor continued the conversation by tracking down my friend on LinkedIn and messaging him there! They already had the email and phone number from their form.
I'm also not super impressed by the consulting gig's "Johnny Holton" reference talking about Jake's "engineering excellence". A google search says Johnny Holton is an American hand egg player.
If I were a potential client going in cold then this would not fill me with confidence in his attention to detail.
ChoosesBarbecue•51m ago
knorker•41m ago
I put my email address on these things. All spammers already have it anyway. I get some feedback.
Or a normal web form with a captcha will create minimal spam. Certainly sufficient for someone not famous.
Or you can have a google form. Either with or without google verifying the senders email address.
hk__2•15m ago
uukelele•8m ago
https://giscus.app/
It works for static sites, you just need to embed their script, and spam and moderation would be handled by GitHub.
Gualdrapo•31m ago
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508069
[1] https://bruceediger.com/posts/honeypot-design/
[2] https://bruceediger.com/contact/