alt Hacker NewsHype. HN is _the_ platform to create hype among the early adopter, super-spreader/tech exec kind of people and because of that has an absolutely massive indirect reach.
Just look how often PR reps appear here to reply to accusations - they wouldn't bother at all if this was just some random platform like reddit.
Replies
duckmysick • 10/01/2024
I've hardly seen here any proselytizers from Oracle, Salesforce, IBM and they are dong just fine. Ditto for Amazon/Google/Microsoft/Facebook - they used to be represented more here, but their exodus hardly made any difference.
Gartner has more influence on tech than Hacker News.
DowagerDave • 10/01/2024
maybe 10 years ago, but this is not the case today.
I'm not convinced HN is awash in bots, but there are certainly some inauthentic accounts here.
What if you want to change public opinion about $evilcorp or $evilleader or $evilpolicy? You could explain to people who love contrarian narratives how $evilcorp, $evilleader and $evilpolicy are actually not as bad as mainstreamers believe, and how their competitors and alternatives are actually more evil than most people understand.
HN is an inexpensive and mostly frictionless way to run an inception campaign on people who are generally better connected and respected than the typical blue check on X.
Their objective probably isn't to accumulate karma because karma is mostly worthless.
They really only need enough karma to flag posts contrary to their interests. Even if the flagged posts aren't flagged to death, it doesn't take much to downrank them off the front page.