I probably agree with a lot of the points the author makes but abhor the style and tone this is written in.
Some of your comments are getting killed by software filters. Those are tuned more strictly for new accounts, for reasons which aren't hard to figure out.
I don't think any mods even saw your comments (before now)
It seems like HN comments are shifting from technical focus toward:
* Early Reddit's low-effort but tame "snark"
* Aggressively moralizing posts dismissing sardonic criticism as dangerous mental illness
I haven't seen much of OP's style lately, especially since n-gate[1] went inactive.
I'm wondering whether that's a bad thing. Although the tone is hostile on the surface, there's usually some aspiration toward competence associated with it.
[1]: http://n-gate.com/
> are more a statement about the perceiver than about HN itself
I may have some rose tint to my oldest memories of lurking HN. Not only was I younger, but I was also seeing hours-old threads instead of comments arriving in real-time before any sorting or flagging.
In other words, thank you for maintaining the site all these years.
It's ok though, because the perception "HN isn't what it used to be" is somehow part of the overall system.
I get we are semi-autistic nerds and can't appreciate comedy/satire/sarcasm, but comedy/satire/sarcasm is a potent means of criticism and analysis, especially since we are in an ever-increasing torrent of bullshit.
What qualifies as skepticism versus cynicism is often in the eye of the beholder.