[_dps]

I agree that defining "political" is itself partly political. Having said that, and just as my 2 cents, I think the experiment was not run long enough to be conclusive.

People always complain with changes. I think it's reasonable to believe that people who actively want politics on HN would be on the noisier end of the spectrum of complainers. Any attempt to get these conversations off HN was bound, initially, to cause a loud and pointed reaction from one subset of users.

But people also adapt and forget. I think there's a real chance that after, say, 6-8 weeks, HN would have established a "new normal" and people would know that it's not a place to discuss the outrage of the week, just as it's already known it's not a place to discuss the latest celebrity-dancing-baking-show scandals.

I'll reiterate that it's a very tricky problem. But I don't agree that there was conclusive evidence that the political detox "didn't work" -- it was canceled long before a steady state was reached.