You're giving HN too much credit. Reddit may be scraping the bottom of the barrel intellectually but humans pretty much all have decent skills at fitting in.

You're giving HN too much credit. Reddit may be scraping the bottom of the barrel intellectually but humans pretty much all have decent skills at fitting in. Reddit users are perfectly capable of coming here and not cracking puns if that's what it takes to make the virtue points counter in the top right get bigger. There's obscene amounts of in-group signaling here too. It just takes different forms. Forms other users can adapt to if they have motivation.