PG: The biggest source of stress for me at YC was running HN

The key to getting good discussions is to not have a profit motive coupled to eyeballs.

HN doesn't show ads, doesn't care about growth.

Large newspapers had strict firewalls between advertising, journalism and opinion -- but smaller papers had to fold to pressure from advertisers.

Subscription services need eyeballs badly -- but they need paying eyeballs, which means that they need to offer more than just outrage -- but if they don't show at least some of their content for free, they can't grow.

I don't think YC really has "good discussions" as much as "A large group of people that already agree on most topics, communicating about those topics." And this site breeds just as much outrage as the next.

This is a pretty textbook look into a very unreflective echo chamber.

And, I would add, you can't have any significant discussion about topics which this group of people disagree on. For example, you can't say:

* The "free market," even suitably regulated, is not a good allocator of resources.

* Anything about the actual accomplishments of the Soviet Union or China, such as the USSR going from a purely agrarian society to putting a rocket in space in under 50 years, even while criticizing them for their failures (Uyghur concentration camps, etc.)

* Capitalism is not the best economic system, because it leaves too many people behind.

I could go further, but then I'd be accused of "nationalistic flamebait."