Ask PG: Black bar for Neil Armstrong | Hacker News Reader

Ask PG: Black bar for Neil Armstrong

102 pointsgnok9 comments

Could we get out the HN black bar for Neil Armstrong?

This feels tacky. Discussion of the black bar. It's like fight club. You don't talk about it. Look what's happening here: people are actually debating whether or not someone's death deserves the black bar. Can we please stop this?

Whilst I have huge respect and awe for Neil, his life will be celebrated by the people at large.

I think the Black HN bar is best reserved for more obscure but important characters who will have particular meaning for people in this site.

A valid view, (so no downvote) but I disagree. Armstrong faced many life-threatening failures as a test pilot and improvised his way out of them. A stuck thruster on a prototype lander sent it into a spin, and Armstrong offset it with an auxiliary thruster; another prototype rolled onto its side and he had to eject at 200 feet. No matter how much training one has had, the ability to diagnose and improvise under pressure gives him hacker status in my eyes.

I've been on HN for so many years as a lurker and finally member. I don't recall what a "black bar" is? From what I've Googled I guess its some sort of solute to a fallen hero of tech or science? What does it look like?

Yes, that is correct. The orange header bar is usually replaced with a black one when someone of importance to the technology & science field passes.

It looks like a black bar. At the top of the screen.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=644954

I don't know, but this question just strikes me as more than a little entitled. If PG wanted to change the color scheme, I imagine he would choose to do so without the pressure.

Neil Armstrong was a great man, but there are many great men and women who leave us. Where do you draw the line?

Why? This token gesture will achieve what exactly? If someone obscure, but non-the-less important in sci/tech had died, this might be an interesting way to draw attention to a life you might want to brush up on. However, Armstrong, despite his desire for privacy, has never been obscure. Come breakfast tomorrow morning everyone on planet Earth will know he has died.

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