In my experience this sense of influence is hugely over-inflated here on HN compared to reality.
And let’s be clear about what the linked article says: one researcher at OpenAI referenced HN as an example of a place where a negative story could surface. Am I surprised that a researcher at OpenAI is familiar with HN? No, obviously not, that career path is right in HN’s typical audience.
I'd say it's the influence is kinda narrow, focused on issues that are important to members and lurkers but not necessarily mainstream.
That's something I hadn't considered; when something appears that gains no traction and vanishes in minutes from the "new" front page, that fleeting 30-45 minute-long residency may well catch the eyes and minds of individuals in a position to look more deeply and act.
> may well catch the eyes and minds of individuals in a position to look more deeply and act.
Of course sometimes that act is "post as many comments as you can to this thread without upvoting it," or "grab about 20 dormant accounts to upvote it, post top-level positive, but dumb, comments, have those same accounts upvote those, and get detected as a voting ring."
Best quote of the year.
Certain opinions, topics, responses get flagged greater now; ones that disagree with a certain political standpoint or that criticize the intel community apparatus get flagged and censored now here. I used to see flagged content where the OP was removed only for bigotry and clearly abusive cases, now its for cases where people feel uncomfortable and strongly disagree.
edit: recently for the first time, I started to feel this is no longer a safe/trusted place for the original hacker ethos it founded itself on.