Are we more introspective than users of other websites?
ilamont: I think the HN community is more introspective, but the relatively small population of readers and submitted articles that make it to the front page certainly amplifies these discussions.Slashdot has sometimes had introspective discussions, either as a tangent to some other topic or prompted by an anniversary post or personal post from one of the founders (see http://meta.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/04/1319239). However, Slashdot's editor-vetted front page and relatively low volume of reverse-chronologically arranged front-page stories seems to have limited such discussions.Come to think of it, HN's algorithm probably plays a big part. Very few Digg stories stay on the front page for more than 12 hours, and Slashdot's reverse chron ordering pushes new items down every few hours. Here, a thread might sit in the top five slots on the front page for days, depending on the number of comments and upvotes. That keeps these threads alive much longer, and adds to the impression that we're an introspective group.