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What is the big deal here? It is a very well known fact that in most of the social news websites people always contact the users with the most reputation ask t
by niyazpk 17y ago
What is the big deal here?
It is a very well known fact that in most of the social news websites people always contact the users with the most reputation ask them to submit/upvote their articles.
If you want to get featured in Techcruch or RWW or any high profile blog, you have to send them emails to get their attention (opposed to they noticing you because you are a promising startup).
This is the way the world works. There is no point in blaming someone who comes from that world for contacting you privately. If you think it is against the spirits of HN, great; now let Dana Oshiro understand the same by telling him this privately.
There is nothing black hat in what he did. It is what they always do. It is their standard operating procedure - contacting powerful people in other fields and build a reputation from there.
I don't want to sound as if I don't care about the quality of HN. I do. I just want to suggest that people from outside may not know these norms and it is not polite to disgrace them in public like this.
- wheels 17y agoI suspect the disconnect may be much simpler. In many online communities, unlike Hacker News, it's seen as imprudent to post your own stuff. With HN's roots in the startup community, it's much more in the DNA for people to have an angle they're trying to hustle and there's never been a vibe of don't-self-promote. It may just be that the relative outsiders don't know that it's all good to post their own stuff here.
- robin_reala 17y agoIf it’s not a big deal then posting this isn’t ‘disgracing them in public’ surely?
- niyazpk 17y ago"Hi John, over here there is no need to talk so loud to get attention" Vs "Hey everyone, did you ever notice John talking loudly to get attention?"
- andrewtj 17y agoI don't think there's any shame to discussing this in public and I don't think any less of RWW or Dana for inadvertently sparking it. It affirms what the HN community values and let's "outsiders" know what expectations are. This isn't a witch-hunt, it's just public discourse.
- mnemonicsloth 17y agoI'm glad this was posted. Articles have been written about this sort of thing -- and more direct vote-swapping -- on Digg and Reddit. If I'd stopped to think about it, I'd have realized it's bound to happen here to some extent. But I didn't. I feel sorry for Dana Oshiro if this is ventureblogging SOP, but maybe the threat of exposure will make attempts to manipulate rankings less attractive in the future.
- petewarden 17y ago> If you want to get featured in Techcruch or RWW or any high profile blog, you have to send them emails to get their > attention (opposed to they noticing you because you are a promising startup). I don't know about Techcrunch, but RWW started featuring my company without me contacting them at all, and with zero PR push other than word-of-mouth. It's possible to be too cynical about the process.
- Psyonic 17y agoColor me naive, but I didn't realize that was SOP. Good to know though... good to know.