Are tags bad or counterproductive? I mean tags like "computer security", "law", "biology" etc. I ask because I am sometimes in the mood to read specific topic rather than just front page. Was curious if this would help new posts get more eyes and also make searching easier. Sometimes I try to find a post I've previously seen and have a harder time even thought i know what "category" it is.<p>Thanks for reading.
I remember somebody made a site which automatically categorized HN posts based on machine learning. Was there on the homepage of both HN and Product Hunt.<p>Can't find it now as it was hosted on some less used TLD that I can't remember. But that is definitely one way to do it.
I believe part of the philosophy of HN is to keep it all "one community". Although we do have a large range of topics, categorizing them in any way might encourage sub-communities to form.
The problem is: who is going to tag? If it is the submitter they may get it wrong. Who will police that? Mods have enough to do.<p>What if the mods tag it? Well they have enough to do!<p>You'd need community moderation like StackOverflow for something like this to work. On HN there is just flagging and upvoting. Flagging for a wrong tag seem OTT though.