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by jgrahamc 1547 days ago
No, I'm not. I'm literally on HN responding almost immediately to the OP and emailing marketing saying WTF?
3 comments

I've seen you post here on HN a few times and I think you're genuine here.

However I also think the previous commenter has a point - "we're sorry you're having trouble and we're looking into it" or words to those effect are things anyone who reports issues to big companies hears over and over again and it usually means "we don't give a damn about you and we're not gonna do anything. Suck it, puny human".

For anyone who doesn't recognize you except as a random person who popped up speaking for CloudFlare, it probably seems reasonable to interpret your words as corporate weasel speak, especially on a post accusing your company of potentially illegal behavior. Even if you didn't mean it that way and this does turn out to be an honest and temporary mistake.

For those who want to reduce corporate weasel speak:

Do not criticize those who USE it. It is a symptom of a larger problem.

Rather, criticize people (like many in this thread) who say "you should sue" in response to any problem you have with a corporation. That litigiousness is what makes corporate weasel speak necessary. If the result of acting like a human and saying "oh, my bad" is to get sued (and have a slam dunk case, because they admitted to it!), then people are going to stop saying "my bad" and start saying "that sucks".

This is a cultural choice that we make in the US, and the choice is made in places like this thread. If you want to change it, start here and shame those who say "sue!" after a person encounters a bug trying to unsubscribe.

Or we can all continue to assume that everything is malicious, everyone is in on it, and there are no good people. And we'll continue to get a lot of corporate weasel speak. And we'll deserve it.

FWIW I've since changed my stance on this. My apologies, if that means anything.
I don't agree with this view or the chain - you do a great job.

I do not think when you said "you are having difficulty" that you implied it was the users fault.