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Yesterday I could only make two posts on HN before HN temporarily banned me with the message "Please slow down. You are posting too fast." This kind of ban is o

Yesterday I could only make two posts on HN before HN temporarily banned me with the message "Please slow down. You are posting too fast." This kind of ban is only for a few hours. I don't know if this ban is automatically triggered or mod initiated but believe the trigger for it is when some comments of mine receive high upvotes and downvotes (perhaps "flagging" the comment as "controversial / inflammatory"). And I guess it is part of HN's moderation tactic to ensure quality of content, and while it is annoying sometimes, I don't see any conspiracy in it. However, like you noticed, I do believe that some of my posts are targeted as part of the online marketing / "reputation management" that happens regularly all over the internet by BigTech. I am vocal about right to privacy, right to repair and need for government regulation of BigTech, and have noticed that if my posts on these subjects specifically mention Google, Apple, Microsoft or Amazon they are often downvoted (I once noticed a post go from 10 upvotes to 10 downvotes, in real-time, and that's when I realised what's happening). (Anyway, HN doesn't like this kind of discussion as it doesn't add much value due to its speculative nature and it tends to distract us from the main topic.)

saagarjha 5y ago
Hacker News caps scores at -4.
- webmobdev 5y ago
  What I noticed was that an attempt is made to keep the comment from gaining points and to keep it at 1 or 0 (this is what I meant when I said I saw a comment gaining points, and losing it just as fast). This is perhaps to ensure that vote brigading is not obvious.
echelon 5y ago
I'm convinced FAAMNG are a partisan voting block. Occam's razor leads me to believe that it's organic behavior and not organized vote brigading. Perhaps employees or shareholders take opposition to negativity more frequently than not. Or maybe negative articles get posted on an internal company Slack and get extra attention. I suppose they could hire a service that does the same as a form of brand management, but I'm more inclined to think that those in our profession have simply forgotten the importance of privacy and speech when they're being paid not to care.

saagarjha 5y ago

Hacker News caps scores at -4.

webmobdev 5y ago
What I noticed was that an attempt is made to keep the comment from gaining points and to keep it at 1 or 0 (this is what I meant when I said I saw a comment gaining points, and losing it just as fast). This is perhaps to ensure that vote brigading is not obvious.

echelon 5y ago

I'm convinced FAAMNG are a partisan voting block. Occam's razor leads me to believe that it's organic behavior and not organized vote brigading. Perhaps employees or shareholders take opposition to negativity more frequently than not. Or maybe negative articles get posted on an internal company Slack and get extra attention. I suppose they could hire a service that does the same as a form of brand management, but I'm more inclined to think that those in our profession have simply forgotten the importance of privacy and speech when they're being paid not to care.