It's that the collateral damage of firing off such accusations indiscriminately is too great for that to be ok without evidence.
This is from your own link. He did have evidence.
This is from your own link. He did have evidence.
Astroturfing implies pretending to be something you're not. An example—that we've seen more than once on HN—is people creating separate accounts to reply to themselves, object to their opponents, etc. That sort of thing undermines the community. And people should always email us when stuff going on in the threads doesn't feel right, because we can't read everything and we rely on you all to be the neighborhood watch.
But I don't see how any of this applies to rayiner. He isn't hiding or pretending. (Isn't that the reason those details were findable in the first place?) He just disagrees with most of us. As long one does so civilly, that doesn't undermine the community, it strengthens it.
Questions of astroturfing and abuse of the site are often matters of degree that depend on an account's history. For example, an account that has commented on a wide range of topics is different from an account that always comments on the same one. A throwaway account created to discuss a sensitive personal issue is different from serial throwaways created to break the site guidelines with impunity. And so on.
I feel like you guys need to re-weigh your priorities. Personally accusing someone of abuse and bad faith is the nuclear option. Even when you're right, it should never be used just to score an extra point or two in an argument. What you're not taking into account (but we have to) is the bomb-like damage caused by such accusations themselves. We can't allow that to become even a little bit of a precedent on HN. So except in extreme cases—which this is not—bringing out that artillery is a clear breach of the HN guidelines around civility. And I'm sorry for describing the "nuclear option" as "artillery".
Edit: this reminds me a bit of the rule in parliamentary systems where members are not allowed to call one another liars. Obviously that isn't because no one ever lies; it's to protect the institution, which could easily fall apart under pressure. It's a crossbeam, there for structural purposes. Participants have to abide by it, not for their opponents' sake but for the body as a whole. In practice it isn't a problem. They just have to make their points in another way, indeed a better way.
People disagreeing with you isn't evidence.
It's that the collateral damage of firing off such accusations indiscriminately is too great for that to be ok without evidence.
deal with them not by calling names but by making better arguments.
These are all things the flag killed comment did.
You should also pay attention to who your cherry picked quote was aimed at. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9114355
But we will do so by looking at actual data—something that isn't an option in the HN threads themselves and would mostly be off-topic there.
This is the only part that supports you view, and it's a baseless assertion. Someone did collect evidence and present it and it was on topic.