On social media, maybe. I would expect HN to maintain the distinction where "brick" means it won't work at all due to a software malfunction, and can't be rest

On social media, maybe. I would expect HN to maintain the distinction where "brick" means it won't work at all due to a software malfunction, and can't be restored to a working state via a hard reset button or software update via WiFi/USB. Its technical meaning to engineers hasn't changed, and HN is a technical site full of engineers.