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Comment by United857 | Hacker News Reader

I've wondered why we can't comment on YC jobs postings on HN. I imagine commenting would be beneficial for questions/answers about the company or position.

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I asked this a while back. Answer was roughly that job ads aren't substantive and offer little in terms of actual conversation, and repetitive threads that lack substance primarily attract people with previous grievances. This would lead to the same thread happening every time the company posted an ad.

It makes sense that you wouldn't want to encourage ads becoming actual threads.

Because they are officially sponsored YC related ADs.

Although it is a fact, that doesn't really answer why you can't comment on them.

Generally speaking ADs don’t allow comments. Have an example or reasoning why this would make sense?

Some sites do, reddit and twitter for example. Can be useful

Thanks, wasn’t aware either of them intentionally linked ADs to public comment threads.

Have any notable examples?

Comments are usually disabled on Reddit ads. YouTube banner ads for YouTube videos have comments, and it's always hilarious reading them.

for users: How about "I tried it, I like it" or "this product gave me warts", both things it could be useful to know.

for makers of products HN people like: Comments could draw more attention to the product, more clicks, more sales.

for makers of products HN people don't like: No, can't think of a reason why allowing comments on ads would make sense.

The ads are job ads, not product ads. All of your criticisms don't really apply here. I say this as a person who doesn't like them and rather wishes they weren't here.

Nothing stopping any user from creating posts related to an aspect of the content on any of those ADs, but it’s obvious allowing comments for ADs would potentially cause unneeded overhead for the advertiser; clearly if any YC advertisers want to post on HN, they’re free to do so within the guidelines on HN.

HN doesn’t block negative posts about YC companies.

I'd assume its to avoid meta discussions about the companies. In the "whoishiring" threads you often get people complaining about the companies, which the mods then remove.

Nit: generally these get detached and moved, not removed.

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