Comment by jsnell
10 years ago
Let's be clear; this wasn't just somebody tweeting about their Apply HN. It was explicit and repeated requests to vote specifically for him, going to a couple of orders of magnitude more followers than a normal person would have. What would be ridiculous is for the results to be determined by who has the biggest social networking presence.
> It was explicit and repeated requests to vote specifically for him
Where, exactly? His Twitter feed contains a single link to each of his original Apply HN and the later poll (plus one link-less joke about the poll). I mean, yes, he has a big following, and yes, he promoted his application (which everyone involved admits he would not have done if he had thought it was against the rules). But "explicit and repeated" makes it sound like a lot more than one (humorous) tweet per poll.
And it's not like he used a personal account, either. That one doesn't mention it at all. It's just @Pinboard - and frankly, it would be weird if you didn't think current customers would want to support you in growing your business.
Three tweets that contained a link that solicited votes, which is almost certainly three more than the median applicant. It'd be more if you also counted links without the requests to vote.
https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/727255170594131968 https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/720802750317993984 https://twitter.com/Pinboard/status/719599297604390912
And sorry, claiming they were just jokes can't be a free pass. Everything about that application was framed as a joke from start to finish.
Dude, any election is a social thing. To pretend otherwise is to kid yourself. If you don't want a popularity contest across social networks, don't have public voting - simple as.