[dang]

It's simple: all this fever about GoodMusk vs. BadMusk has become bone-crushingly tedious. When that happens with anything, nothing can redeem it and it's off topic on Hacker News.

I definitely don't mean to pick on you personally. Dozens of HN users have been filling the threads with this lately and it needs to stop. We literally can't moderate it all, and the Elonian Provocation is large enough to be capable of swamping this site entirely.

[dekhn]

Hmm. I don't agree. I think we're on the turn of the tide where the hacker community and the media will stop fawning over him if we repeatedly and politely point out that he's an attention-seeking person but that doesn't mean he needs to have news coverage.

[dang]

I can think of at least two problems with that. One is that people don't really change their minds this way; all they do is dig their heels in and object harder. The other is that HN could be smothered under the weight of this material even while opinion is working itself to convergence. The Muskian Market can stay wrong longer than this site can stay solvent.

[kadenshep]

>nothing can redeem it and it's off topic on Hacker News.

That seems largely contradictory to the hacker ethos, no?

[dang]

It's a fair question, but the answer is no, because of the tragedy of the commons. That is, you may be right at the individual level, but it's unfortunately common for the sum total of individual effects to become something completely contrary to what any of the individuals would want. We have to manage the site at that sum-total level. This means telling people "don't do the things that produce lousy systemic effects", even though any one of those things might be fine when considered independently.

[kadenshep]

Wouldn't the correct thing to do in that case then would be to wholesale delete pro/anti musk threads that specifically revolve around him as a CEO?

Right now it seems like current moderation tactics are encouraging a "lie hard and fast" mode, so the truth can't catch up -- so to speak. Essentially the moderation policy is acting as a floodgate that only closes when perspectives that negate the "pro" side of things are brought into play.

This is apparent in what was allowed to be posted without question and in how you, intentionally or not, only replied to anti-musk threads. There were at least 4 threads, that I just looked at now at the time of this post, that were both not flagged by the community nor set straight from a moderator that were purely composed of vague personal attacks (it would have been better if they had just been forthright with it).

I understand that HN has limited resources and you clearly value the integrity of this forum, I just think certain perspectives unfairly caught your attention more than they should have.