Hacker News Insights research
Hacker News in 2012
The strongest tracked Hacker News title themes in 2012, with annual shares and historical context.
Data through 2026-07-13
This page ranks the tracked topics by their share of retained Hacker News story titles in 2012. It is a full calendar year; topic patterns can overlap and the list is not a taxonomy of every story.
| Rank | Topic | Category | Title share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Startups | Meta | 3.013% |
| 2 | JavaScript | Languages | 0.977% |
| 3 | Security | Crypto & privacy | 0.791% |
| 4 | Python | Languages | 0.765% |
| 5 | Open source | Meta | 0.699% |
| 6 | Linux | Infra | 0.657% |
| 7 | Privacy | Crypto & privacy | 0.442% |
| 8 | jQuery | Web | 0.353% |
| 9 | Bitcoin / crypto | Crypto & privacy | 0.180% |
| 10 | MongoDB | Data | 0.163% |
| 11 | Redis | Data | 0.110% |
| 12 | Postgres | Data | 0.105% |
Context markers
- 2012-02 — Rise of single-page apps: Backbone/Angular era; the SPA pattern spreads.
Method
Every percentage uses that year's retained story-title count as its denominator. Visit the Attention Lab for 2012 or read the methodology.