Understanding User Profiles

The Hacker News MCP Server provides direct access to user profile information, allowing you to explore individual contributors' activities and contributions to the community. Each user profile contains valuable data including their karma score, account creation date, biographical information ("about" section), and complete submission and comment history.

To retrieve a user profile, simply ask your AI assistant for information about a specific Hacker News user by their username. The server will return comprehensive profile data that gives you insight into that user's participation and influence within the community.

Accessing Activity History

Every user profile includes their complete activity history on Hacker News, which consists of two main components: submissions and comments. This history appears as a list of item IDs that you can then retrieve individually for detailed examination.

Submissions represent stories, links, or questions the user has posted to Hacker News. By accessing these, you can understand what topics interest the user and what content they've chosen to share with the community.

Comments show the user's participation in discussions across various threads. Reviewing comment history reveals the user's expertise areas, communication style, and engagement patterns within specific technical domains.

Practical Applications

User profile and activity retrieval enables several valuable workflows:

Expert Identification: Find subject matter experts by examining users who frequently comment on specific topics with highly-scored contributions. This is particularly useful when researching technical domains or seeking authoritative perspectives.

Influence Analysis: Assess a user's community standing by reviewing their karma score and the reception of their submissions and comments. High karma and consistently upvoted contributions indicate respected community members.

Trend Tracking: Monitor how specific users or thought leaders engage with emerging technologies or topics. Following the activity of influential contributors can help you stay ahead of important developments.

Research Context: When evaluating discussions or submissions, understanding the submitter's background and history provides valuable context about their perspective and credibility.

Making Requests

Request user information through natural language queries to your AI assistant. For example, ask "What is the profile information for user [username]?" or "Show me recent submissions from [username]." The server handles the technical details, returning structured data about the user and their activity that can be immediately analyzed or discussed.