4 ms·

For what it's worth: ev: "@TechCrunch @arrington "we have been given the green light by Twitter to post this information" What?! By whom? That's not our unders

For what it's worth: ev: "@TechCrunch @arrington "we have been given the green light by Twitter to post this information" What?! By whom? That's not our understanding" (http://twitter.com/ev/status/2676203744 http://twitter.com/ev/status/2676203744)

icey 17y ago
Well, I would say that does change things significantly. That's what I get for trusting what TC says in their articles.
dfranke 17y ago
Alright, that's pretty damning. As of now, I'm jumping on the "let's ban Techcrunch links from HN" bandwagon.
- TomOfTTB 17y ago
  I think this is probably something that looks worse than it is. I can't see them flat out lying. I suspect they've been talking to marketing who said something like "we really wish you wouldn't publish this but if you're going to please..." followed by some requests as to how the information is presented. They then expressed that sentiment as "Twitter has given us the green light". (Still a bit of misrepresentation but not the flat out lie it appears to be) I could be wrong. But in a world where the CEO of Twitter can so quickly call B#S* I can't envision a scenario where TechCrunch doesn't have some explanation
  - tptacek 17y ago
    I'm not sure how this could look a lot worse than it already is. If they asked really nicely and just annoyed Twitter into allowing this to be published, TechCrunch's actions are still appalling. There's no way around it: what TechCrunch is doing is incentivizing the kinds of attacks Twitter is dealing with. Twitter will survive this, but a lot of the kinds of companies represented on Hacker News won't.
- zimbabwe 17y ago
  As much as I'd love to see this happen (more power to VentureBeat and ReadWriteWeb and, hell, even Mashable), Paul and Mike are friends so it's not happening. As much as I get my hopes up every month when this debate comes up, the guy who controls the bans has been pretty consistent on his position here.
  - nopassrecover 17y ago
    Wow had no idea personal relationships were the factor overriding community pressure.
    - zimbabwe 17y ago
      TechCrunch also gives YCombinator sites tons of write-ups. It's not anything underhanded, just a relationship that both sides benefit from - at the cost of the people who think Hacker News would be better without Arrington's peculiar brand of self-righteous yellow journalism.
- eli 17y ago
  If people stop voting them up, then there's no need to ban them. Banning the domain smacks of censorship. If people at HN want to discuss a TC article, lets give them a place to do it. The answer to ugly speech is more speech, not censorship.
  - dfranke 17y ago
    That's true in the public square. It's not true when you're trying to build and maintain a specialized community. The opposite of censorship is 4chan.
    - eli 17y ago
      Hey, it's a democratic site. People vote up the articles. If the problem is that not enough people know that TechCrunch stinks, then you should add a post about how they stink. I'd vote for that. You basically have to trust that a majority (or at least plurality) of the people here are the sorts of hackers you want to hang out with. If that stops being the case, you've got bigger problems than TC stories.
      - dfranke 17y ago
        Well, a democratic site doesn't imply that there's no censorship; a true democracy would permit the majority to censor the minority. But anyway, even without any editors stepping in to ban certain links, the site doesn't really function according to the wishes of the majority because there's no down arrow on stories. Getting to the top of the front page doesn't require majority support, but just enthusiastic minority support.

icey 17y ago

Well, I would say that does change things significantly. That's what I get for trusting what TC says in their articles.

dfranke 17y ago

Alright, that's pretty damning. As of now, I'm jumping on the "let's ban Techcrunch links from HN" bandwagon.

TomOfTTB 17y ago
I think this is probably something that looks worse than it is. I can't see them flat out lying. I suspect they've been talking to marketing who said something like "we really wish you wouldn't publish this but if you're going to please..." followed by some requests as to how the information is presented. They then expressed that sentiment as "Twitter has given us the green light". (Still a bit of misrepresentation but not the flat out lie it appears to be) I could be wrong. But in a world where the CEO of Twitter can so quickly call B#S* I can't envision a scenario where TechCrunch doesn't have some explanation
- tptacek 17y ago
  I'm not sure how this could look a lot worse than it already is. If they asked really nicely and just annoyed Twitter into allowing this to be published, TechCrunch's actions are still appalling. There's no way around it: what TechCrunch is doing is incentivizing the kinds of attacks Twitter is dealing with. Twitter will survive this, but a lot of the kinds of companies represented on Hacker News won't.
zimbabwe 17y ago
As much as I'd love to see this happen (more power to VentureBeat and ReadWriteWeb and, hell, even Mashable), Paul and Mike are friends so it's not happening. As much as I get my hopes up every month when this debate comes up, the guy who controls the bans has been pretty consistent on his position here.
- nopassrecover 17y ago
  Wow had no idea personal relationships were the factor overriding community pressure.
  - zimbabwe 17y ago
    TechCrunch also gives YCombinator sites tons of write-ups. It's not anything underhanded, just a relationship that both sides benefit from - at the cost of the people who think Hacker News would be better without Arrington's peculiar brand of self-righteous yellow journalism.
eli 17y ago
If people stop voting them up, then there's no need to ban them. Banning the domain smacks of censorship. If people at HN want to discuss a TC article, lets give them a place to do it. The answer to ugly speech is more speech, not censorship.
- dfranke 17y ago
  That's true in the public square. It's not true when you're trying to build and maintain a specialized community. The opposite of censorship is 4chan.
  - eli 17y ago
    Hey, it's a democratic site. People vote up the articles. If the problem is that not enough people know that TechCrunch stinks, then you should add a post about how they stink. I'd vote for that. You basically have to trust that a majority (or at least plurality) of the people here are the sorts of hackers you want to hang out with. If that stops being the case, you've got bigger problems than TC stories.
    - dfranke 17y ago
      Well, a democratic site doesn't imply that there's no censorship; a true democracy would permit the majority to censor the minority. But anyway, even without any editors stepping in to ban certain links, the site doesn't really function according to the wishes of the majority because there's no down arrow on stories. Getting to the top of the front page doesn't require majority support, but just enthusiastic minority support.