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I would not recommend admitting to using a referral scheme on Hacker News. That's not "hacking" or "creative marketing," that's just spam.

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This was actually an awesome design framework that I wanted to SHARE with HN. And the fact that these many sales and comments came off it is an indication that is something that HN readers wanted. There is nothing wrong with using an affiliate link :)

If all I am doing is posting affiliate links then yes that would be spam.

So you follow up with a post on how you made $500 from posting on HN? Classy.

Oh, and using affiliate links without disclosure is, indeed, wrong. Just ask the FTC.

Why all the hate for affiliate links!!! A lot of people on HN are trying to create startups and side projects and many of them consider affiliate marketing for their projects. So it's ok to add it to our marketing plans but posting about it is bad? Like I said, if this was not a relative product/service for HN readers, I would have never posted it.

PS: I do disclose that they are affiliate links in my post. Plus pretty much anyone on HN knows how an affiliate link look like by just looking at the URL.

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