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I flagged this. No politics on HN, not even from PG.

tzs 14y ago
I wouldn't consider this to be politics. It is not advocating a political position, or discussing the merits of a political position, or advocating or discussing the merits of particular politicians. Rather, it is about how a particular demographic that is of particular interest on HN but that is not covered much in the mainstream press is leaning. The distinction is subtle, but I think important. For instance, an article on Romney's attempt to take all sides on all issues so as to appeal to whatever audience he is speaking to at the moment would be inappropriate politics if the theme of the article is that Romney's campaign is setting the record as the most dishonest campaign in Presidential history. On the other hand, if the theme of the article was that in the age of the internet, when we have near instant access to news, and anything a politician says is widely reported, you might expect that the "all things to all people" approach would be a terrible failure, and yet it is working well for Romney, and so the article tries to explore WHY this is so, I'd say that would be quite appropriate for HN. It raises an interesting question of whether widespread access to information actually helps people make better decisions, or just makes it easier for them to find information to reinforce their preexisting beliefs and contrary information gets ignored. It could be the launching point of some very interesting non-political discussion.
- tptacek 14y ago
  The demographic here is "people will who answer questions like this from Paul Graham". It's not exactly a representative sample. We don't even know its operator vs. investor makeup. Some of the people in the sample don't even live in the Valley. But the headline... I flagged it after 'ssclafani did, hoping it might just vanish (I've since unflagged it), but for what it's worth: I don't so much think it's radically inappropriate for HN (though it sets a disquieting precedent, because the world is full of cohorts that someone can claim are interesting to HN), just that it's not particularly valuable, and a little transparent. (For whatever it's worth, I'm an Obama supporter).
  - Jd 14y ago
    Additionally, when there is a potentially negative association with a particular political choice (i.e. the choice of something other than pg's preferred option), one will obviously refuse to report, and will usually not make one's refusal explicit. That is to say, that even were we to assume that the 32 people pg asked were utterly representative of the startup community as a whole (which I don't think we have grounds to do, esp. given pg's own sensationalist headline), we have every reason to suspect that the 9 people who have refused to answer (including explicitly and implicitly) may have an answer other than the expected norm. Take that into account, and you have 15 Obama 6 Romney 9 Refuse to answer Where does that leave us? Well, with more questions than answers, to start with.
- Jd 14y ago
  > It is not advocating a political position From the OP: "I prefer Obama too." That's a political position, pure and simple. In fact, it is as good as an endorsement (and a somewhat sneaky one given that it comes at the end of a seemingly innocuous survey -- oh, la di da, I was interviewing my friends about economic growth since we know about it, being "startup leaders" and all, and what do you know, most of us support Obama. Oh, and by the way, so do I.).

tzs 14y ago

I wouldn't consider this to be politics. It is not advocating a political position, or discussing the merits of a political position, or advocating or discussing the merits of particular politicians. Rather, it is about how a particular demographic that is of particular interest on HN but that is not covered much in the mainstream press is leaning. The distinction is subtle, but I think important. For instance, an article on Romney's attempt to take all sides on all issues so as to appeal to whatever audience he is speaking to at the moment would be inappropriate politics if the theme of the article is that Romney's campaign is setting the record as the most dishonest campaign in Presidential history. On the other hand, if the theme of the article was that in the age of the internet, when we have near instant access to news, and anything a politician says is widely reported, you might expect that the "all things to all people" approach would be a terrible failure, and yet it is working well for Romney, and so the article tries to explore WHY this is so, I'd say that would be quite appropriate for HN. It raises an interesting question of whether widespread access to information actually helps people make better decisions, or just makes it easier for them to find information to reinforce their preexisting beliefs and contrary information gets ignored. It could be the launching point of some very interesting non-political discussion.

tptacek 14y ago
The demographic here is "people will who answer questions like this from Paul Graham". It's not exactly a representative sample. We don't even know its operator vs. investor makeup. Some of the people in the sample don't even live in the Valley. But the headline... I flagged it after 'ssclafani did, hoping it might just vanish (I've since unflagged it), but for what it's worth: I don't so much think it's radically inappropriate for HN (though it sets a disquieting precedent, because the world is full of cohorts that someone can claim are interesting to HN), just that it's not particularly valuable, and a little transparent. (For whatever it's worth, I'm an Obama supporter).
- Jd 14y ago
  Additionally, when there is a potentially negative association with a particular political choice (i.e. the choice of something other than pg's preferred option), one will obviously refuse to report, and will usually not make one's refusal explicit. That is to say, that even were we to assume that the 32 people pg asked were utterly representative of the startup community as a whole (which I don't think we have grounds to do, esp. given pg's own sensationalist headline), we have every reason to suspect that the 9 people who have refused to answer (including explicitly and implicitly) may have an answer other than the expected norm. Take that into account, and you have 15 Obama 6 Romney 9 Refuse to answer Where does that leave us? Well, with more questions than answers, to start with.
Jd 14y ago
> It is not advocating a political position From the OP: "I prefer Obama too." That's a political position, pure and simple. In fact, it is as good as an endorsement (and a somewhat sneaky one given that it comes at the end of a seemingly innocuous survey -- oh, la di da, I was interviewing my friends about economic growth since we know about it, being "startup leaders" and all, and what do you know, most of us support Obama. Oh, and by the way, so do I.).