6 ms·

This article does not belong on HN.

by bvod 9y ago

seizethecheese 9y ago
Variants of this comment pop up a lot. HN is a democracy. By definition, if it makes it to the front page, it belongs there.
- mark_edward 9y ago
  HN is an oligarchy, the mods have a lot of arbitrary and invisibly operating power, they're not elected, not subjected to popular control. I'm not necessarily complaining, it's what make the site what it is, but it's definitely not a democracy.
  - seizethecheese 9y ago
    The mods don't place things on the front page, but they can remove them. It's democracy with some control.
wehere1 9y ago
lmao your life must be so boring do you inject monads into your eyeballs so your fragile mind won't be subjected to non-programming content?
3131s 9y ago
Actually it does revolve around a guy who essentially hacked the laws around tenancy through extreme cleverness, and social engineered his way through a very peculiar life. This story is really wild and it looks like you and many others didn't actually read it before commenting. It's one of the best longform pieces that I've read in a while.
- bvod 9y ago
  Actually I read the whole thing - it was written really well. But it's far from extremely clever what he did. Anyone who's studied tenancy law for more than a few days could do the same. The only difference he had was being sociopathic enough to do so - a point which the article makes in the end when he turns out to be a murderer. Furthermore, none of the above are in any way related to engineering or hackernews, and it's completely off topic for this site.
  - 3131s 9y ago
    Eh, I've been on HN a long time and you are definitely on the wrong side of the consensus on this issue.
jwilk 9y ago
From the HN guidelines: On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. [...] Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it.

This article does not belong on HN.

by bvod 9y ago

This article does not belong on HN.

Variants of this comment pop up a lot. HN is a democracy. By definition, if it makes it to the front page, it belongs there.

mark_edward 9y ago
HN is an oligarchy, the mods have a lot of arbitrary and invisibly operating power, they're not elected, not subjected to popular control. I'm not necessarily complaining, it's what make the site what it is, but it's definitely not a democracy.
- seizethecheese 9y ago
  The mods don't place things on the front page, but they can remove them. It's democracy with some control.

wehere1 9y ago

lmao your life must be so boring do you inject monads into your eyeballs so your fragile mind won't be subjected to non-programming content?

3131s 9y ago

Actually it does revolve around a guy who essentially hacked the laws around tenancy through extreme cleverness, and social engineered his way through a very peculiar life. This story is really wild and it looks like you and many others didn't actually read it before commenting. It's one of the best longform pieces that I've read in a while.

bvod 9y ago
Actually I read the whole thing - it was written really well. But it's far from extremely clever what he did. Anyone who's studied tenancy law for more than a few days could do the same. The only difference he had was being sociopathic enough to do so - a point which the article makes in the end when he turns out to be a murderer. Furthermore, none of the above are in any way related to engineering or hackernews, and it's completely off topic for this site.
- 3131s 9y ago
  Eh, I've been on HN a long time and you are definitely on the wrong side of the consensus on this issue.

jwilk 9y ago

From the HN guidelines: On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. [...] Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it.