They actively "slurped" (their word) as many documents as they could, ignoring things like copyright, into their archive. They brushed a lot of those concerns aside which left a really sour taste.
HN actually used to have a feature to switch PDF links to Scribd ones (not sure if it was manual or automatic)[1]
I have a rule not to read forums which do shady stuff to the content. Maybe it's time to adblock the HN homepage.
Sure the "rules" say to assume with best intentions. That goes along with "obfuscate and redirect". It's easier to point at rules as a club to make an example. But in reality, in the end VCs are themselves toxic.
Look no further than the crowd of businesses and partners YC surrounds itself with.
Banks are super risk adverse (in business 3+ years, with client base and revenue, and collateral).. Versus some shit VCs who'll encourage to "disrupt" (eg: dismiss legal or safety regulations to extract quick profit) with a 1 out of 10 chance of a startup hitting the hockey stick growth.
Lie with the dogs, and you get fleas. I'll leave it to the reader to decide who the dogs and fleas are.