Hacker News Reader

For starters, the guideline against calling names ("piece of shit") and the guideline against fulminating.

HN is supposed to be, above all, for curious conversation. No doubt people do reprehensible things, but taking revenge on them for it in internet comments simply isn't curious conversation. It's not a question of whether you're right or not—you may well be completely right—but it's not what this site is for.

View on HN

That's not unreasonable. I perhaps could have worded it more neutrally. Though IMO scumbags need to be called scumbags.

It's not about "taking revenge", it's about setting the record straight. As mentioned, I don't think this person should be lionised. And I think that the constant idolisation of this (bad) person does the industry and history a disservice. And I think that there are people who might be curious about the facts of this person's track record if they were alerted to them. By a comment like mine.

I know it feels like one is correcting something and therefore "setting the record straight", but you can provide correct information without breaking the site guidelines.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com