What is Dashdot?
Dashdot is news for nerds: a few stories a day about computers, science, the Internet and
whatever else our editors find interesting at 3am, followed by hundreds of comments from readers who disagree with them.
Why is it called Dashdot?
Say it out loud: dash, dot. In Morse code, dash-dot is the letter N. N is for News.
Also, the domain was available.
How do stories get posted?
Readers submit them. Editors pick the ones that look
interesting, add a snarky remark, invent a department name, and hit the button. We get about 300 submissions a day. If
yours didn't run, don't take it personally. Unless it was about your own web site.
What's a department?
The little "from the something dept." line under each headline. It's a joke. It has
always been a joke. There is no actual department. We checked.
What is moderation?
Comments start with a score (0 for Anonymous Cowards, 1 for registered users, 2 for
users with good karma). Moderators, picked at random from regular readers, get five points to spend adding or subtracting
a point with a reason like Insightful, Funny, Troll or Offtopic. Readers set a threshold and only see comments at or
above it. In theory, the good stuff floats and the junk sinks. In practice, Funny floats highest of all.
How do I become a moderator?
Log in. If the random number generator smiles on
you, you'll get points. Use them wisely, then go meta-moderate the other moderators on the
meta-moderation page.
What's karma?
A number that goes up when your comments are moderated up and down when they're moderated down.
It is not a measure of your worth as a person. It is, however, a measure of your worth as a Dashdot poster.
What is a "Dashdot effect"?
When we link to a small web site and fifty thousand nerds click on it in the same
ten minutes. Sorry about that. We recommend static HTML and a sturdy 486.
Why does the site look like this?
Because tables and FONT tags work in every browser, including the one
running on your toaster.
Who runs this?
See about. We're a handful of people, a rack of donated servers,
and a Perl script that's held together with hope.
Frequently Asked Questions
