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The editor that killed this made a mistake. Editor, you should ask yourself: "what would pg do?" I really do not think the answer is kill the story. You, editor
by rms 18y ago
The editor that killed this made a mistake. Editor, you should ask yourself: "what would pg do?" I really do not think the answer is kill the story. You, editor, have been offended by one of the taboo Things You Can't Say and reduced to censorship. Being offensive to a sizable minority is absolutely not a reason to kill a story and without your clarification there is no other reason. The Steve Jobs connection alone should give this story sufficient hacker cred. It certainly is intellectually interesting and is being discussed maturely. Keep in mind that Ask HN stories are already vote weighted.
Fortunately, there has been good discussion anyways and anyone that already commented will continue to see the story. I wouldn't worry about the killing too much.
I can't believe this has never been submitted... I checked with and without the www. subdomain. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=581050 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=581050
- axod 18y agoHow many people flagged it? I'd expect a large number. Just because Steve Jobs tried it, doesn't make it useful. I'm sure some entrepreneurs have killed people or been tried for fraud. Undoubtedly those actions altered them as people, and perhaps even led to their eventual success. But it'd be a mistake to start copying them.
- rms 18y agoIt does seem likely that it was flagged to death without editor intervention. I would hope an editor undeads it, offending a minority of people is not a good reason for a story staying dead.
- axod 18y agoIf stories like that stay about, it'll drive a lot of people away from HN. Which IMHO would be a shame. There's obviously a lot of people who are 'pro drugs', and we've already had more than enough marijuana stories. In terms of actual interestingness, I'm sure anyone who is curious can search on google for first hand accounts of what being on drugs does/feels like. I also find it quite morbid. In the same way I would had the OP had expressed a curiosity to know how it feels to cut off his leg. (I'm not offended, and I don't think most people who flagged it are. I just don't think it's a good post for a site like this). Once again though, be useful to see on each article how many people flagged it.
- swombat 18y agoWell, this particular tack was generating some interesting discussion. Also, taking LSD is not like "cutting off your leg", no matter how much you may believe it to be. If you really want to talk about limbs, then taking LSD is more like growing an extra arm for a few hours. Wouldn't you like to try that in a risk-free manner? I don't think there's been all that many stories about acid. If those became a common occurence, then I'd start flagging them too. As far as I can see, there's only one of these here now.
- donaq 18y agoYou're not offended enough to call the OP an idiot? Flagging or downvoting is one thing, but personal insults are, well, personal. Anyway, apparently even PG thinks that sometimes driving a lot of people away from HN may not necessarily such a bad thing, as evidenced by the Erlang incident. I'm not pro drugs, by the way. I am against addictive and destructive drugs, having seen at first hand what it can do to people. However, I do try to keep an open mind about experimenting if it's just the one time and if it won't cause lasting damage. Lastly: In terms of actual interestingness, I'm sure anyone who is curious can search on google for first hand accounts of what being on drugs does/feels like. The OP did ask us for experiments to try, and there were a lot of interesting suggestions, of which I think not all could have been found on google. That made it interesting for me, on a "I wonder if we could do X while tripping" level, and isn't that sort of mentality what hacking is about?