So moving to effectively censor criticism that you can't control is justified?
Maybe the problem IS marcan, as Linus suggested.
If you do things that are in the public interest, people are going to have opinions about what you do and on a wide spectrum. If you can't handle that, you probably shouldn't be doing work that's so public and visible. Especially something like maintainer work that is inherently social.
I remember that HN thread[0] and don't think Asahi's version is a good-faith, accurate summary of the contents. IMO they are inaccurately viewing a small number of flagged/dead comments as representative of HN in general.
I call bullshit on that. The Asahi Linux intiative got a lot of respect and praise on this site whenever I looked at those threads. It's very very unlikely that this negative depiction is accurate. Please show a specific example of a thread that got out of hand like that, otherwise this is completely unbelievable.
Otherwise I would suggest that it says a lot when downvoting of comments is not understood as disapproval. And that it is a big warning sign when public devs/maintainers hallucinate hostile intentions to other communities as a whole.
I said opinions on a spectrum. Yes, an extreme end of that spectrum is an extreme response.
This is something you have to put up with some amount of if you do work in public, just like if you were a public figure or celebrity. Being a kernel or even package maintainer is like being a politician.
It sucks, but if your response is to cut off that channel of opinion _entirely_, that says more about you than the people you're silencing.
If something violates HN Guidelines, flag it and dang will see it. If there's anything that should be blatantly obvious by now it's that HN's moderation staff does not have the kind of alt-right bias suggested by your quote.
To think that you can control opinions people have of you in public forums is kind of insane.
Also denying links to their site isn't equivalent to "leaving the room". It's more like demolishing the room entirely, given the way that HN works. If your site can't be linked to it can't be the topic of discussion.
No, to your first two points. 100% of the discussion was happening on HN. The blocking of links from HN was 100% about silencing discussion _happening on HN_.
It has nothing to with "not letting assholes in". Asahi Linux doesn't have a discussion board.
To your third point, also no. HN guidelines keep the content of our posts relevant to the topics they are in. They also guide us to link to original sources, not archive links. Both of these mean that if you can't link to Asahi Linux content, it can't be the topic of discussion unless for some reason it's otherwise newsworthy and was posted elsewhere.
> The blocking of links from HN was 100% about silencing discussion _happening on HN_.
How does blocking HN from linking to a site silence discussion on HN? Because, as you say, "100% of the discussion was happening on HN" which seems to imply that blocking HN from linking didn't actually silence the discussion.
> Both of these mean that if you can't link to Asahi Linux content, it can't be the topic of discussion
You can link to it - you just get the "HN referer" block page just as other people get other block pages (eg. [0], [1]. Haven't noticed people moaning about how those sites are silencing discussion on HN, mind.)
Copy and paste the URL and you can read the link perfectly happily[2].
[0] Much like many of us in Europe get block pages for sites in the US who can't be bothered with GDPR or the cookie law.
[1] Or those of us who aren't subscribed to the various news sites which show a paragraph before putting up a blocker.
Your argument is valid. But the person you are supporting is in favour of "social media brigading". So, there is a fundamental dichotomy here, since by your argument he should be kicked and banned.
Gonna go out on a limb here and guess that he means there are people in the thread pointing out that the VTuber Asahi Lina is blatantly obviously Hector with a voice changer and that it's really weird that he vehemently insists that it isn't him.
It's extra weird to me that people try to live a very public life but then accuse anyone with the slightest amount of criticism of behaving criminally...
And to answer your question of "who?", marcan themselves based on marcan being the one to block HN links.
But more generally, the majority of people posting online (especially streamers, content creators, even just twitter posters) these days seem to be very thin-skinned and will claim that any amount of pushback that they get for their words or actions is an organized harassment campaign.
I think you are generally correct. I think also the personality types who become public makers, etc. tend to also be controlling, so any negative comments / discussion, etc. that they can’t suppress really irks them and often they go to great lengths to try to get rid of it
Yeah it's really weird. Why push your weird subculture into the spotlight and then cry foul when people are weirded out. Kind of feels like it's all about fishing for even more attention.
Holy false equivalence, how is keeping a pseudonimous vtuber identity comparable to verbal abuse, adultery or social media brigading? See, I'm ok with discussing his mistakes as well, but exposing Lina despite being irrelevant, which happens in every thread about her, feels like bigotry. "Heads up, they're one of those!"
Maybe the problem IS marcan, as Linus suggested.
If you do things that are in the public interest, people are going to have opinions about what you do and on a wide spectrum. If you can't handle that, you probably shouldn't be doing work that's so public and visible. Especially something like maintainer work that is inherently social.