from Hacker News

Ask HN: Threaded vs. Flat Discussion

by magackame on 3/14/25, 2:31 PM with 3 comments

I thought about implementing a simple HN-like forum with the assumption of a single instance being like a subreddit (like r/emacs is just about emacs, no categories), but I am having a headache deciding between threaded vs flat.

Do you think one is inherently superior, depends on type of forum (discussion/support/development/etc) or there should be a UI toggle?

  • by Tomte on 3/14/25, 2:40 PM

    Toggle won't work, because people will see different variants of the discussion and reference it ("the sibling comment", "two above").

    I was net-socialized in Usenet, strongly believe that threaded is much superior, but would choose flat every time for a project today.

  • by toomuchtodo on 3/14/25, 2:37 PM

    I have been thinking similarly to support threads on Bluesky/AT protocol (to replace Reddit subs). I think threads have value on some discussion topics, but not all, and it is hard to know in advance which will be most useful before the discussion happens. Mods here are somewhat privileged in that HN supports threads, and they can move comments and subthreads around at will to shape the discourse.

    TLDR Support threads, but enable flexibility when doing so (imho, ymmv, etc)