We literally see this thread every month. The answer is yes, recruiters/founders/managers hire people from HN.

Yes. I've also tried to hire through that thread and was not successful.

No, but have done a good number of interviews from the Who's Hiring threads.

I hired a remote SW engineer who reached out from one of the hiring threads.

Yes I have -- I found my favorite job of my entire career on HN!

Yes, Got contract offers and ended up taking.

Yup. But I didn't take the offer.