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senordevnyctoday at 7:19 AM4 repliesview on HN

It’s completely reasonable to take a moral stance that you’d rather see your business fail and shut down than do X, even if X is lucrative.

But don’t expect the market to care. Don’t write a blog post whining about your morals, when the market is telling you loud and clear they want X. The market doesn’t give a shit about your idiosyncratic moral stance.

Edit: I’m not arguing that people shouldn’t take a moral stance, even a costly one, but it makes for a really poor sales pitch. In my experience this kind of desperate post will hurt business more than help it. If people don’t want what you’re selling, find something else to sell.


Replies

PaulDavisThe1sttoday at 4:16 PM

The age old question: do people get what they want, or do they want what they (can) get?

Put differently, is "the market" shaped by the desires of consumers, or by the machinations of producers?

easyThrowawaytoday at 8:49 AM

> when the market is telling you loud and clear they want X

Does it tho? Articles like [1] or [2] seem to be at odd with this interpretation. If it were any different we wouldn't be talking about the "AI bubble" after all.

[1]https://www.pcmag.com/news/microsoft-exec-asks-why-arent-mor...

[2]https://fortune.com/2025/08/18/mit-report-95-percent-generat...

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DonHopkinstoday at 2:55 PM

Some people maintain that JavaScript is evil too, and make a big deal out of telling everyone they avoid it on moral grounds as often as they can work it into the conversation, as if they were vegans who wanted everyone to know that and respect them for it.

So is it rational for a web design company to take a moral stance that they won't use JavaScript?

Is there a market for that, with enough clients who want their JavaScript-free work?

Are there really enough companies that morally hate JavaScript enough to hire them, at the expense of their web site's usability and functionality, and their own users who aren't as laser focused on performatively not using JavaScript and letting everyone know about it as they are?

nothrabannosirtoday at 7:24 AM

[flagged]

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