Comment by eduction | Hacker News Reader

Comment by eduction | Hacker News Reader

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> It's hard to tell if there's any there-there but, given how this sort of story usually works, the odds seem low.

Not at all. The source links the relevant SEC filing.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1849056/000110465921...

On page 111 the false claim is plainly visible:

“ Prior to joining OpenAI, Mr. Altman served as President of Y Combinator from February 2014 until March 2019. Mr. Altman currently serves as the Chairman of the board of directors of Y Combinator.”

There is also a screenshot in the Business Times story showing the false claim was visible on the AltC website in April. You can go to the AltC site and confirm that Sam is CEO.

The story also includes comment from YC confirming that Sam was never chairman after it was announced he would be.

Dang, what is the basis for your comments on this story? The San Francisco Business Times has been a reliable and fairly pro business local source for years. Hardly tabloid journalism. Can you specify and explain one of the “false claims” you allege?

Crisis of trust in Altman reflects back on Y Combinator. They have significant financial motivation to downplay his behavior regardless of any moderators claims.

Oh, I meant false claims about HN moderation, like the GP comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40711123 ("The mods suppress anything that makes YC or anything they invest in look bad"). That wasn't just completely made up, it's the exact opposite of the truth.

My comment originally included that explicitly, but I was trying to edit it down a bit and thought this would be clear from the context. Since it wasn't, I've added an edit there now.

> it's the exact opposite of the truth.

One can hardly call it the exact opposite of the truth if the feared downweighting of this post actually happened.

It's commendable that it was corrected and that you are attempting to be transparent. But, it sure creates the appearance of a self-protective attempt to moderate.

Yes, I take your point and would have preferred the original downweight to be less for that reason. (Edit: I checked with the mod and originally it was - see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40720026. It looks like user flags made the difference.)

Different mods inevitably make different calls sometimes, though. That doesn't change the fundamental practice, which has been stable for a long time (long before I took over HN long ago).

One thing I often point out in these situations is that "moderate less" (which is what the rule calls for) is not the same thing as "not moderating at all". Most probably the mod in this case was thinking along the lines of "I'm still moderating less in this case than we normally would, but I'll check with dang just in case".

You called the story “flimsy.” How so?

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