Talk:Kuro5hin

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I find it quite well... biased that the list of "well-known" Kuro5hin users are also prominent Wikipedians? Is this intentional or something? Ambush Commander 04:18, Feb 23, 2005 (UTC)

I wouldn't call Rusty and Larry Sanger Wikipedians. I don't think Rusty has ever contributed here, and Larry Sanger hasn't been associated with Wikipedia in years. Besides, all three are well-known Internet personalities, so removing them would not be the proper course. Maybe you could add to the list. I can't think of any other "well-known" K5 people though. Maybe Johnny and Carnage4Life. Rhobite 05:37, Feb 23, 2005 (UTC)

Ah... I see. I'm not really familiar with Kuro5hin. Thanks for clearing it up. Ambush Commander 03:22, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Contents 1 Closing and reopening K5 - important here? 2 Localroger's novel: noteworthy? 3 Live from the Diary Ghetto: Recent k5 History 4 Kucinich interview 5 Re: Rustina 6 Relability of Kuro5hin as a source. 7 Reference as a Slashdot Clone

[edit] Closing and reopening K5 - important here?

Is the text on temporary closing of K5 to new users important to this article? One would expect more general info like what kind of audience it attracts or how quality of website chneged over time than long forgotten minor technical details. Even the switch to not-for-profit organization would be more important.

Pavel Vozenilek 18:29, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yes, absolutely. The closing to new users was an absolutely HUGE part of Kuro5hin history. This was the most controversial thing Rusty ever did. I understood why he did it, but couldn't agree that it was good for the site (you should be aware I wrote an article on it). - Ta bu shi da yu 05:02, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

If you think... Pavel Vozenilek 00:10, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Localroger's novel: noteworthy?

Other k5ers will already know what I'm talking about. To those who aren't k5 users, I'll explain. A k5 user in long standing, localroger, used to post frequent submissions in the Fiction category. At that time, a significant group of k5er's believed localroger (whose real life name is Roger Williams) to be one of the best fiction writers at k5. The site managers hosted online a free e-text of a science fiction novel he had written entitled The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect. After being asked by some to publish, Roger agreed to publish through a print-on-demand company if and only if a certain number of k5er's vowed to buy a copy. I can't remember what that amount was, but it was fairly significant. Anyway, he got enough pledges and had the books printed, and they were sold as promised.

There are a few aspects of this that I think may be notable:

• k5's fiction section giving rise to at least one novel writer; these days, another author (user Michael Crawford) is advertising his own novel on k5.
• k5 actually hosts this novel as a free e-text.
• the novel was published (or, if you prefer, printed) in response to a community effort. If I remember correctly, Roger was initially rather reluctant to publish as he had a low opinion of vanity presses. It was other k5ers who finally convinced him to have the books printed.

I suppose it would be worth noting here that I may be a bit personally biased because I was one of those k5ers who asked Roger to have the books printed, and own a printed copy of the novel. But that aside, I think it really speaks to the site's original goals of being a community effort. Kasreyn 01:12, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

No. Here's why:

• He wrote MOPI years before K5 existed.
• We never voted on MOPI. Rusty hosts it as a personal favor.

--On Swole 22:37, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

But k5ers were critical in getting it published in book form. I already made those two points. What k5 did was persuade him to print it with Lulu, and enough of us promised to buy one that he agreed to do so. Kasreyn 02:53, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

A dozen sci-fi nerds financed a laughably low-volume order from a web-based print-on-demand service with a base price of $4.53, and you want a fucking memorial to their heroic effort? Get a grip. --On Swole 20:34, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi. Please research what you're talking about before attempting to talk down to others. The goal of pledges was 100 people promising to buy a copy, not a dozen. Also, a copy of MOPI costs $11.95 not including shipping, not $4.53, a figure which I have no idea how you came up with. I remember MOPI's publishing being reported on by MSNBC at the time, but their online archive does not seem to go back that far. I am not interested in a memorial. I am interested in the angle of MOPI being an example of what k5 was originally founded for: collaborative discussion and publication of ideas about the intersection of technology and culture. Localroger is among the top tier of k5 users by number of stories accepted (not to mention stories that have gone FP). This being the case I would consider the collaborative effort to get his novel in print - which is precisely about "technology and culture" - to be a notable example of what k5 was originally intended to do. Kasreyn 22:43, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Kuro5hin's mission is not to convince amateur erotica novelists to upload their crap to lulu/cafepress. The only notable thing about this is that localroger found 100 K5 users gullible enough to pay for a free e-book he wrote 20 years ago. Why do you have such a hard-on for this idea? Do you think some indirect acknowledgement of your activity on Kuro5hin will justify the enormous amount of time you've wasted? --On Swole 04:13, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I can see you're not interested in discussing the actual issue. I won't bother you further. Cheers, Kasreyn 06:27, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Anyone else? Should I go ahead and add the information? Kasreyn 06:27, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

We're using an encyclopedia which details the history of the Transformers in intimate detail; a one or two-sentence mention of MOPI as an example of the community finding interesting niche content, and pushing it back into meatspace, seems ok to me. You could also mention CheeseburgerBrown's publishing success. Mike Crawford's book isn't a novel btw. Conflatuman/Scrymarch 10:10, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Live from the Diary Ghetto: Recent k5 History

It's probably also worth noting that these days, the majority of material posted on k5 is in the Diary section, which is very frequently referred to by k5ers as "the Diary Ghetto" for the way it is often deemed "inferior" to the story submission queue. This is probably because Diary entries aren't voted on by other editors, so you can post anything you want to them. Compared to how it used to be (I have been at k5 for five years), the submissions queue is very, very slow these days. The Diary section, by comparison, scrolls by blazing fast with constant new entries and users posting diaries in response to each other, as a dialogue.

So k5 is still interesting, but not in the same way it once was. As formerly at what we call the other site, various memes have become ossified and overused. Examples would include internetisms like "YFI" for "You Fail It", "HTH HAND" for "Hope This Helps Have A Nice Day" (intended sarcastically), and "LOL WHAT" which is more or less a catchall response to any bizarre statement.

It's kind of sad that there are so few story submissions; a lot of k5's older users left within this last year and since then, many seem to prefer the sort of drama-queen atmosphere of the Diary section, which includes everything from random nonsense polls to threats to leave k5 (rarely followed-up on) to attacks on other users to commentary on whatever's happening in the world. Of course, none of this gets voted on, except informally (if it sucks no one will reply), so the quality of the Diary section in terms of actual stories is very low. Its quality in terms of humor and outlandishness is very high, though.

I'm still trying to think of an NPOV and encyclopedic way to actually cite all this. Any help would be appreciated.Kasreyn 05:04, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

I'd avoid "K5 is dying" whining, but the relative activity levels and crap in the diary section vs the front page might be worthwhile. ie Diary section is higher volume, more crap. Always has been as far as I'm concerned, though silly jokes have ebbed and flowed over time. Maybe you could work in how k5 is more or less contemporary, or even slightly anticipated, blogs. Conflatuman/Scrymarch 10:02, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

For a period of time following the 9/11 attacks, the queue overflowed and the users were generally sincere. It took a few years to fizzle out due to Iraq. It appears you got involved after the 9/11 circle-jerk was well underway. Get over it; K5 has been a low-rent multi-user blog since the beginning. --On Swole 22:37, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't happen to share your negative view of the site. I'll agree that a "multi-user blog" is what k5 has partially devolved to, but if I understand correctly that wasn't its original intended purpose. It is fashionable amongst kuro5hin users today to be very cynical and loudly proclaim how little they care for the site, how it's dying or worthless, and so on and so forth. All that bright-eyed 50's-esque optimism about democracy and technology that the site was founded with is just so embarassingly square, right? I will admit to having fallen into the trap of posturing as a jaded netsnob from time to time myself, though in reality I still find k5 interesting enough to be my homepage. (Without k5, how would I learn about bees from XC0005?) However, you're at Wikipedia now and I promise not to tell the others at k5 if you want to loosen up and express a positive remark about kuro5hin. Try it sometime, you might like it, even if it makes you uncool!  :P Kasreyn 22:50, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

K5 was not "founded" the instant you discovered it, you brat. What you perceive to be posturing and negativity is, in fact, actual knowledge derived from experience. --On Swole 04:13, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Once again, I remind you, we are at Wikipedia, where a different sort of atmosphere is preferred. This being Wikipedia, you can dispense with the cynicism and whose-uid-is-lower stuff. Y'see, different forums have different rules for behavior. Also, I'm curious where you think I claimed that K5 was "founded the instant I discovered it", because I don't recall saying that. In fact, I seem to recall being careful to use verbiage such as "if I understand correctly" to clarify that my knowledge in some cases is recieved rather than firsthand. A better way to rebut me would then have been to say "as it turns out, you do not understand correctly", rather than to put words in my mouth and resort to namecalling. Cheers, Kasreyn 06:25, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kucinich interview

It might also be worth mentioning that during the run up to the 2004 Presidential election in the U.S., Dennis Kucinich (a Democratic candidate who failed to win his party's nomination) gave an interview to the assembled hordes of k5. It was done in the typical method developed at slashdot; first a story was posted and the highest-rated comments were selected to be asked. Then a second story was posted with the interviewee's answers. Kasreyn 05:04, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

If you do, I'd include this interesting collaborative interview with Harry Browne too (and let's face it, Harry and Dennis had similar chances) Conflatuman/Scrymarch 10:02, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Re: Rustina

I'm not so sure it was vandalism that the imagelink was removed. The image is extremely shocking (I've seen it, and trust me, I wish I hadn't) and doesn't really illustrate anything or carry any information. I personally don't feel we need the link; the image's continued existence really doesn't play any current part at k5 (though I'm pretty sure anyone who posts it there will still get anonymized). Kasreyn 23:27, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Relability of Kuro5hin as a source.

The following was removed from the article:

There is a widespread belief that Kuro5hin has been taken over by trolls, leading to a perception of the site as a cesspool of idiots and causing many users to leave the site.^[1][2][3]

with the explanation

Sorry, these are not reliable sources. The sentence as written is neither verifiable nor in an encyclopedic tone.

I think that kuro5hin is in general a reliable source for discussing kuro5hin. I agree that the sentence is not in an encyclopedic tone, but unless there are specific reasons that the sources listed are not reliable, I would presume that they are. Jrincayc 16:22, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Those links are to specific examples of people leaving the site; they do not establish "a widespread belief that Kuro5hin has been taken over by trolls" or a "perception of the site as a cesspool of idiots". Kuro5hin posts can be used for certain claims (e.g., the cited posts by rusty are perfectly valid), but these posts are inadequate in this case. -SpuriousQ 21:34, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, that is what I wanted to know. Jrincayc 13:32, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reference as a Slashdot Clone

I removed the "and Slashdot clone" from the intro because while Kuro5hin and Slashdot may look similar in structure they differ enough in the type of content that I felt it was not warranted. It also may insinute that Slashdot is the end-all-be-all of of its type which is too sweeping. Xunker 07:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)