Hacker News Reader

When I first came here 15 years ago it was always more about "Bay Area Startup News" than Hacker News, it has definitely always had a heavy capitalist slant. I'd go as far as to say it has more anti-capitalist sentiment now than it ever has had before.

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Not what I remember - we had TechCrunch for that. Hacker News was for hacking - we used to flood the front page with Erlang articles whenever things went off track.

Also pro/anti capitalism isn’t the issue - narrow mindedness and a lack or empathy is.

Founders who used to post on HN are no longer here. (They are on bookface.)

There has been an increase in anti-capitalist sentiment on this orange site in over a decade. But in 2026, the majority here (mostly in Europe) are always upset when they need to pay for their tools.

"Open source" is the biggest excuse for developers and some HNers to never pay for anything. This appears to be unique in this industry.

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