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And HN and other tech sites are somehow exempt from this phenomenon? With billions of dollars at stake at Uber and its various competitors, is it impossible to
by dowjones 10y ago
And HN and other tech sites are somehow exempt from this phenomenon? With billions of dollars at stake at Uber and its various competitors, is it impossible to think, for example, that Susan Fowler had professional authoring help, or was offered compensation to publish her recent blog post? Or that paid/professional/fake commenters downvoted, attacked, and drowned out any voice who simply requested documentation, or cautioned that judgment should be reserved until both sides of the story were made public?
- kneel 10y agoNo one said HN is exempt from this, actually it happens all the time. However HN is tiny compared to reddit it doesnt fracture itself into small subreddits. Things are much more managable this way. When shill content does pop up it's pretty obvious and it's usually called out.
- techstrategist 10y agoIt seems likely that only the poorly-written shill content gets called out.
- grzm 10y agoWithout substantiation of any of these types of things occurring, it actively destroys discussion to engage in speculation of them, particularly online. People are left with no good faith upon which to have constructive discourse.
- dowjones 10y agoI agree with you. Which is why the entire Susan Fowler discussion and subsequent holier-than-thou proclamations (i.e. Mitch Kapor) are odious, since there is currently zero substantiation of any of her claims.
- grzm 10y agoby "types of things" I mean speculation of shillage/astroturfing as to discussions on HN, not the content of the articles themselves. Those are two different issues, and to conflate them means we can't discuss them at all.
- staticautomatic 10y agoWho can be relied upon to substantiate her claims (particularly if there is no lawsuit) ? Surely not Uber itself or its so called independent advisors.
- dowjones 10y agoShe claims to have screenshots of everything, so she could substantiate them. But you've pointed out the impossible position Uber is in... what if her claims are false, or exaggerated? How would the company disprove a negative? How could they show that she was never propositioned for sex, if in fact she wasn't? What if federal and state laws, and/or internal privacy policies, prevent the company from publicly releasing communication that would clarify things?
- jacquesm 10y agoTo see this coming from a novelty account is hilarious.
- hacker_9 10y agoThere is brigading going on with some HN articles, though the comments fare a lot better. I think this mainly related to people not being able to down vote until they reach a considerable amount of karma. Often if an article reaches the top too quickly, people call it out in the comments.
- oconnore 10y agoIn Susan Fowler vs. 5.5 billion dollar company, why on earth would you suspect that Susan is the one contracting with reputation management firms?
- DanBC 10y agoDowjones is advancing the conspiracy theory that The sinister BigTaxiCartel want to see Uber done in, so they pay for writers to create blog posts for disgruntled ex-employees. (It's not something I believe).
- anon2837134329 10y agoLyft is a company that exists, and has a lot to gain.
- dang 10y agoThat reads like a cross between personal attack and concern trolling. Artfully done—too artfully actually. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13724990 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13724990 and marked it off-topic.