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There was a weird ad-post for You.com earlier, which I mistakenly thought was organic... And now this. HN needs a bit more transparency or it’s going to lose a

by numair 5y ago

There was a weird ad-post for You.com earlier, which I mistakenly thought was organic... And now this. HN needs a bit more transparency or it’s going to lose a few of us.

FuckedCompany 5y ago
HN has already lost a lot of quality posters over the last 10 years. It’s a drop in the bucket as more and more new registrations happen anyway. For the savvy reader: the best kind of astroturfing on a tech site involves nerdsniping. Make a small obvious error and you’ll get people trampling over each other to correct you. Never underestimate how smug stooges can pay off. Keep an eye out for these kinds of posts (see Twitter blue thread).
jffry 5y ago
I sort of glossed over that thread earlier but oh my goodness that was a trainwreck, I'm glad you mentioned it and I went back to have a look
dippindots44 5y ago
That thread was moderated. You can tell because the founder’s opening introduction was pinned above dang pinning his own comment about a related thread. Those are conscious moderator actions which are about as transparent as it gets and illuminate the thinking on the other side (hint: you’re not aligned, but it sounds like you already expected that)
- markdown 5y ago
  Except @dang was hiding negative comments about You.com. There's nothing transparent about that.
  - detaro 5y ago
    which negative comments where hidden? The entire threads are full of negative sentiment?
  - dippindots44 5y ago
    He replied to you explaining his reasons for detaching your completely shit comment. I found that explanation in ten seconds just by clicking on your name. I also found you replying to his reply, so it’s amusing to see you claim what went down wasn’t transparent. You were there, friendo. Way to go all debate club on dang with a clearly hurt essay after a pointless observation about the name being used as a verb didn’t score as you’d like. Don’t dilute this thread about (legitimately interesting) turfing with your simmering annoyance from being moderated for good reason. We all see what happened, it’s fairly transparent
    - markdown 5y ago
      This is HN, where how startups market and position themselves is discussed just as much as their tech stack is. In the context of a Show HN, pointing out a terrible name is just as relevant as pointing out bad code or a bug. A comment being negative =/= it being "completely shit".
- eitland 5y ago
  Also dang did that to the other big Show HN story yesterday: "Show HN: I'm 48 and finally learning how to be a game developer" so it seems to be a new thing he does independently of if the post is by a YC company or not.
dang 5y ago
Please don't jump to grandiose conclusions from a couple of data points from the stochastic stream. Given enough randomness (which we certainly have here), you can literally jump to any conclusion that way. This leads to false feelings of generality (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=%22false%20feelings%20of%20generality%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...). The moderation practices haven't changed here for many years. We don't publish a moderation log for a bunch of reasons*, but I'm always happy to answer any questions and usually spend hours a day doing it. * Past explanations if anyone wants more: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20litigious&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

by numair 5y ago

There was a weird ad-post for You.com earlier, which I mistakenly thought was organic... And now this. HN needs a bit more transparency or it’s going to lose a few of us.

FuckedCompany 5y ago

HN has already lost a lot of quality posters over the last 10 years. It’s a drop in the bucket as more and more new registrations happen anyway. For the savvy reader: the best kind of astroturfing on a tech site involves nerdsniping. Make a small obvious error and you’ll get people trampling over each other to correct you. Never underestimate how smug stooges can pay off. Keep an eye out for these kinds of posts (see Twitter blue thread).

jffry 5y ago

I sort of glossed over that thread earlier but oh my goodness that was a trainwreck, I'm glad you mentioned it and I went back to have a look

dippindots44 5y ago

That thread was moderated. You can tell because the founder’s opening introduction was pinned above dang pinning his own comment about a related thread. Those are conscious moderator actions which are about as transparent as it gets and illuminate the thinking on the other side (hint: you’re not aligned, but it sounds like you already expected that)

markdown 5y ago
Except @dang was hiding negative comments about You.com. There's nothing transparent about that.
- detaro 5y ago
  which negative comments where hidden? The entire threads are full of negative sentiment?
- dippindots44 5y ago
  He replied to you explaining his reasons for detaching your completely shit comment. I found that explanation in ten seconds just by clicking on your name. I also found you replying to his reply, so it’s amusing to see you claim what went down wasn’t transparent. You were there, friendo. Way to go all debate club on dang with a clearly hurt essay after a pointless observation about the name being used as a verb didn’t score as you’d like. Don’t dilute this thread about (legitimately interesting) turfing with your simmering annoyance from being moderated for good reason. We all see what happened, it’s fairly transparent
  - markdown 5y ago
    This is HN, where how startups market and position themselves is discussed just as much as their tech stack is. In the context of a Show HN, pointing out a terrible name is just as relevant as pointing out bad code or a bug. A comment being negative =/= it being "completely shit".
eitland 5y ago
Also dang did that to the other big Show HN story yesterday: "Show HN: I'm 48 and finally learning how to be a game developer" so it seems to be a new thing he does independently of if the post is by a YC company or not.

dang 5y ago

Please don't jump to grandiose conclusions from a couple of data points from the stochastic stream. Given enough randomness (which we certainly have here), you can literally jump to any conclusion that way. This leads to false feelings of generality (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=%22false%20feelings%20of%20generality%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...). The moderation practices haven't changed here for many years. We don't publish a moderation log for a bunch of reasons*, but I'm always happy to answer any questions and usually spend hours a day doing it. * Past explanations if anyone wants more: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20litigious&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...