Overview

The Hacker News MCP Server allows you to access detailed information about any Hacker News user, including their profile details, submission history, and commenting activity. This feature is invaluable when you want to research contributors, identify subject matter experts, or track specific users' engagement within the community.

Accessing User Profiles

To look up a user profile, simply ask your AI assistant for information about a specific Hacker News username. For example, you might request "Show me the profile for username pg" or "Get information about the user dang."

The server will retrieve comprehensive profile data including:

• Username and account age - When the user joined Hacker News
• Karma score - The total points accumulated from upvoted submissions and comments
• About section - Biographical information the user has chosen to share
• Submission IDs - A list of all stories and links the user has posted
• Comment IDs - A record of all comments the user has made

Exploring Activity History

Once you have a user's profile information, you can dive deeper into their activity history. The submission and comment IDs returned in the profile can be used to retrieve the actual content of their contributions.

Viewing Submissions

Ask your assistant to show you specific submissions from a user's history. This helps you understand what topics interest them, what content they share with the community, and how their submissions have been received based on scores and comments.

Reading Comments

Similarly, you can access a user's comment history to see their perspectives on various topics, their areas of expertise, and how they engage in discussions. This is particularly useful for identifying thought leaders in specific technical domains.

Practical Applications

Research experts - Find users who consistently contribute valuable insights on topics like machine learning, security, or startups by examining their comment history and karma.

Track thought leaders - Monitor the activity of influential community members to stay informed about what captures their attention.

Due diligence - When evaluating companies or technologies, review what knowledgeable users have said about them across multiple discussions.

Community analysis - Study engagement patterns, identify active contributors, or understand the perspectives of long-time community members.

Tips for Effective Use

Start with a username you're interested in, then explore their most recent or highly-scored contributions. Combine user profile lookups with story and comment retrieval to get complete context around discussions. Remember that all data is retrieved in real-time, so you're always seeing the most current information available.