[dharness]

I think there are many ways you could point out a competitor. If a competitor did something different that's notable I think it makes sense to share and explain how the OP could learn from that.

Sometimes 1-liners like "Checkout xyz, been around since 2014" seem a little like an ad leaching off of the original Show HN.

I think it depends strongly on the content and the framing of comment.

[the_watcher]

Agreed - part of getting feedback on a project is being shown other, similar projects that you can learn from.