DM messaging might open HN up to all sorts of attention it would rather not have. Right now, (almost) all communication on it is public. If some three letter

DM messaging might open HN up to all sorts of attention it would rather not have. Right now, (almost) all communication on it is public. If some three letter authority wants to know what's going on, they can just browse. I'm not particularly defending the behaviour of three letter authorities. Rather, I'm pointing out one implication that comes to mind. (PG could talk to the Reddit people, for one -- our could he? -- to learn what their experience has been with DM's that exist under a similar platform model.) As it stands, I see HN as a fairly minimal and absolute model of "opt in". If you want to be available for private messages, you get and display an email address. Or a URL. Or whatever. What that point of contact is and how it relates to your life, is up to you. If you don't want to field private messages, for whatever reason, you just go with the status quo. No need to actively filter them out, nor to explain that no, you never read crazy_joes message or that at least you didn't take him/her seriously.