[jstanley]

The Hacker News server is based in the US, but I spend more time reading and responding to articles and comments than I do looking at the HN HTML.

The articles and commenters are from all around the world.

Part of the beauty of the internet is that it does not care about or even see geographical or political borders. Saying the internet is "basically an American institution" makes no sense.

[zdkl]

What you say is true but it's irrelevant if the physical hosting or routing touches US jurisdiction.