It's worth it to note that Designer News began as a side project, which may explain the less-than-perfect design details. I guess you could argue that a side project intended for designers should still meet basic accessibility guidelines, but the point certainly apologizes for some of the weaknesses of the framework.
I am very excited about the future of Designer News. As the community grows and matures, I hope it will conjure more discussion-oriented posts and less of the generic links that have made up the bulk of the content. But there is really no place for designers to discuss thought-provoking articles and trends or ask for feedback/criticism. I find Hacker News to be somewhat intimidating as a venue for design discussion, or unable to provide the perspective I am seeking feedback on. Other sides such as Dribbble or Forrest tend to be poor venues for constructive conversation - perhaps because it is the same place where people are displaying their work that might go under fire during the conversation, and many of us don't like to shit where we eat, as it were.
It's a strong concept, even if it needs a few more weekends of polish before it's truly fit for prime time.
After reading Designer News for the past week I've noticed most threads have zero (or single-sentence) comments nevermind in-depth discussions.
No offense, but it's essentially a dead-forum and to make it invite-only shows the bigger picture is out of their grasp. I hope they open registrations and shape itself to be something...anything.
Designer News is invite-only and will remain so forever.
While it's still in its early stages, we want to future proof things quite a bit. Currently, we can map our users onto a directed graph which will help immensely with spam, dead accounts and so forth. (If you're a spammer, everyone you've invited gets their account nuked along with the person that invited you.)
Also, one of our users put together a sweet visualization of this in action, which you can see here:
I never believed in invitation only. It work on certain types of communities, like torrents, with 100% control of the use. But on sites like HN, you simply doesn't need to use invite only.
I believe in a meritocratic system. If you contribute with good information, insight or whatever resource you want to call it, you will be rewarded well so the community will be.
Just think than one asshole with invite can invite another 23 assholes. Then you're beloved community will be ruined and "invite only".
I'm curious to know if there's an application process that's in the works or if it's going to stay entirely referral-based. Without the ability to interact with anyone or any content on the site, I can imagine this'd be a huge turnoff for designers who might not be in your particular clique.
As an aside, I just tried to register without a referral code and simply got a 404 error.
I'm curious to learn more about the decision to keep it invite only. I can only provide personal insight, but I lost interest as soon as there was a link I wanted to comment on and couldn't.
It's hard to say a forum is dead before it's even taken life...it's three weeks old! how active was Hacker News three weeks into its inception?
My point was, yes, the site needs polishing, but save the judgement of the community and its curated content until after it has had the chance to gestate a bit.
I am very excited about the future of Designer News. As the community grows and matures, I hope it will conjure more discussion-oriented posts and less of the generic links that have made up the bulk of the content. But there is really no place for designers to discuss thought-provoking articles and trends or ask for feedback/criticism. I find Hacker News to be somewhat intimidating as a venue for design discussion, or unable to provide the perspective I am seeking feedback on. Other sides such as Dribbble or Forrest tend to be poor venues for constructive conversation - perhaps because it is the same place where people are displaying their work that might go under fire during the conversation, and many of us don't like to shit where we eat, as it were.
It's a strong concept, even if it needs a few more weekends of polish before it's truly fit for prime time.