I actually like that... if it works like I think it should work. For example, let's say I really like what UserX has to offer. He posts a lot of science & technology articles, and he's generally a great guy. However, he keeps submitting these inane #askhubski questions that keep cluttering up my feed. I really don't like most things that are tagged #askhubski, and if I am in the rare mood to view such posts, I'll just go to #askhubski's tag page. UserX is really cool, and I like most of what he submits, so I don't want to unfollow him. Luckily, I can ignore the tag #askhubski, so I see everything that he shares, except his stupid #askhubski submissions. Actually, I think it would be great if mk took that a step further and allowed us to ignore specific tags by specific users. Say, if I generally liked #askhubski posts, but not the ones UserX keeps posting, I could ignore any #askhubski posts from that specific user. Maybe each ignored tag could have a choice where you made it a "global" ignored tag, or you could switch it to "specific users" and add users to the #askhubski ignore list one by one...
If, on the other hand, I choose to keep abreast of what's going on in the world of, say, #occupywallstreet, I'm fucked. If I want to find someone new who's talking about writing, I have to hit #writebetterdammit every morning. If I want to follow along with what's going on in, say, #detroit, well then fuck me. Most importantly, if I'm more interested in seeing what the gestalt has to say about something, forget Hubski. If the echo chamber I haven't carefully crafted for myself isn't talking about it, I'm not going to find it.
Your analogy of a "carefully crafted echo chamber" is, I feel, a fantastic one for what the actual goal of Hubski is (at least from what I've gathered). I think that means that quick changes and "flitting" between subjects are not really in the scope hubski. If you want to follow along with #detroit, you must carefully expand your echo chamber to include it. You'd have to comb the threads and choose the users who will best represent your interests. While tedious, this avoids a group-think mentality. Instead of everyone being forced into a common echo chamber (for example, a subreddit), each person crafts and maintains their own. It's more control ceded to the users, with an even flatter playing field, and I'm digging it.
I've just joined Hubski less than an hour ago, and realized that /that/ is how Hubski handles things. It's not a Twitter clone, nor a Reddit clone. This prevents group mentalities like 100k subreddits, but I am interested at how it deals with users with massive amounts of followers.
I kind of have to agree with kleinbl00. I don't see why you're taking away this optional user functionality from us. You realize that now people are just going to be searching for tags instead of following them? It's going to be basically the same thing, but with more annoyance to the users. I think this is an unnecessary change. I get what you're saying about it being contrary to what hubski is about, but if you want tags to go away you'd have to remove them completely. I'm willing to bet that most new users are going to be making threads over and over about where the follow tag functionality is, since you can just search for them. I hope you will reconsider this. It really didn't change all that much since the search is still available, but now it's just more tedious. If you really think tags are going to ruin hubski, then remove them entirely (but then I'll probably lose a lot of interest in the site, as will some others I reckon). Just my two cents.
Or, y'know, you could always search the tag in the search bar...
That's basically it, kleinbl00. In addition, ignoring a tag keeps it out of external posts that you let filter into your feed. It also removes them from Popular and Unshared posts. If #mylittlepony takes off, I don't have to work to avoid it. As for the user-specific part, I plan on implementing the ability search a tag and a user at the same time. I haven't given much thought to user-specific tag ignores, however. It could be a messy thing to implement.
>It could be a messy thing to implement. :( I hope not. I think that one of hubski's major strengths is the focus on tailoring your own experience yourself, letting it evolve naturally, instead of relying on moderators to curate a conveyor belt of content from a subreddit that inevitably devolves into groupthink and the lowest common denominator. You have control over your own feed, not some faceless moderator who's enforcing rules you may not understand or even care about. I think hiding posts will be a major part of that. If you don't like something, it's a simple click to hide it and forget it exists. If you're hiding a ton of posts from a specific user, then it's probably a good idea to ignore that user. If you could fine tune it to the point of ignoring specific tags from specific users, well I think that would just be the cherry on top of the whole thing. Step back and watch the community weave itself together into thousands of little perfectly individualized hubs.
This got me thinking, what about languages? If I were to follow someone because they submit good music but they also shared content in French it would be kind of annoying, as I don't understand French at all. I guess it would be easy to ignore as long as the content is consistently tagged #france #french #fr #frenchpolitics, but if the content is about video games it's more likely to be tagged #videogames or #jeuvidéo. Has any thought been put into this?
Well, you could add the possibility to say which language a post is and add a preferred language option under controls. Maybe use google to determine the language? Anyway, I think that language problems are most likely a localization problem. The problem will not be gone until Hubski is no longer an exclusively english site. And it will most likely not be a focus point...