What's causing it is clear: the community is divided and people have different opinions. This has been the case for a long time, so it's no sudden inrush. There's natural fluctuation, so it sometimes can feel that way.
I posted about this a lot in the last couple of days. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23835613 and the subthread underneath it (which you'll have to uncollapse). You can find other explanations at:
The evidence is extremely clear, by the way. If we'd found any undue influence, we'd say so, but the private data confirms what's already clear from the public record (if you look at other users' commenting histories): people just disagree. The voting patterns don't show anything that the commenting patterns don't.
Hmm interesting. These other people not only seem to disagree but seem to rely on different facts entirely. Perhaps there’s ongoing external disinformation campaigns and many are simply misinformed.
I posted about this a lot in the last couple of days. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23835613 and the subthread underneath it (which you'll have to uncollapse). You can find other explanations at:
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
The evidence is extremely clear, by the way. If we'd found any undue influence, we'd say so, but the private data confirms what's already clear from the public record (if you look at other users' commenting histories): people just disagree. The voting patterns don't show anything that the commenting patterns don't.