Understanding Comment Threads

Comment threads on Hacker News contain some of the most valuable technical discussions on the internet. The Hacker News MCP Server makes accessing and reading these conversations straightforward, whether you're researching technical topics, gathering community perspectives, or simply following an interesting discussion.

How to Access Comments

To read comments on a story, you'll need the story's unique identifier. You can obtain this by first retrieving a story from one of the feeds (top, new, or best stories), then request the comments associated with that item.

Simply ask your AI assistant to "show me the comments on [story title]" or "get comments for item [ID number]." The server will retrieve the entire comment thread, presenting it in a structured format that preserves the conversation hierarchy.

Navigating Comment Hierarchies

Hacker News comments are organized in a tree structure, where replies nest under their parent comments. When you request a comment thread, the server returns this hierarchy intact, allowing you to follow conversation branches naturally.

Each comment includes:

• The comment text and author
• Timestamp of when it was posted
• Score (upvotes from other users)
• Child comments (replies to this comment)

This structure lets you understand not just what people are saying, but how conversations develop and which points spark the most discussion.

Reading Individual Comments

If you're interested in a specific comment rather than an entire thread, you can request it directly using its unique identifier. This is useful when someone links to a particularly insightful comment, or when you want to check if there are new replies to a comment you've been following.

Ask your assistant to "retrieve comment [ID number]" to access any specific comment along with its immediate replies.

Tips for Effective Comment Reading

Focus on highly-voted comments first when dealing with large threads. Comments with higher scores typically contain the most valuable insights or important corrections to the original submission.

Follow entire branches when a particular subtopic interests you. The nested structure often reveals deep technical discussions that evolve significantly from the original topic.

Check timestamps to understand whether you're reading real-time reactions or considered responses posted hours or days after the original submission.

Common Use Cases

You might access comment threads to gather expert opinions on a new technology, understand how developers are solving specific technical problems, or research community sentiment about a product launch. The server makes all these scenarios simple—just describe what you're looking for in natural language, and your AI assistant will retrieve and present the relevant comments.