shrug. I thought someone needed to do machine learning as a service, especially that can be accessed from Python, so I upvoted an article on Azure. I think presentation should be separate from data, so I upvoted a comment on posh.
I'm a OS X / Linux person (my name's probably in your distro somewhere) and sometimes Microsoft does good stuff.
And, strangely, I didn't say otherwise. I'm typing this message on Windows. My main development IDE is Visual Studio. My primary RDBMS platform is SQL Server, deploy of course on Windows.
Yeah, the strawman that Microsoft can do no right is pretty easy to knock down, but has absolutely nothing to do with the context of this.
Again, a post on the second page (a ridiculous, extremely low quality post that had to be flagged off the front page) saw my benign comment get -11 within 60 seconds. I've never seen that before, much less for a completely moderate comment. I've seen this extremely pro-Microsoft moderation hit other threads hard, and it seems pretty obvious that it isn't by accident.
The part that 'nailer' is correcting is your statement that "There is absolutely and unequivocally either brigading Microsoft fans, or paid shills, hitting HN hard.". You accused him (and me, and others who voted up this story) of being either a "brigading Microsoft fan" or a "paid shill". Your comments are being downvoted because individual users think that they are rude and false, not because of an organized pro-Microsoft movement.
You accused him (and me, and others who voted up this story) of being either a "brigading Microsoft fan" or a "paid shill".
Sorry, but that's just false as far as I can tell. He cited those things as the reason for his other comment's moderation. Please quote the text from which you draw your conclusions of attribution.
jhou2: the amount of positive press that MS has been garnering recently on HN is impressive
engendered: Don't think it is purely happenstance. There is absolutely and unequivocally either brigading Microsoft fans, or paid shills, hitting HN hard.
My interpretation might be wrong, but I take jhou2's "positive press" to mean stories such as this one appearing on the front page. I interpret 'engendered' as saying that these stories would not appear on the front page if it were not for "brigading Microsoft fans" or "paid shills". Since the story is on the front page because of user upvote, and although there could be dispute about all vs most vs some, I read this to be accusing those who voted up the story as being one of these things.
In my read, he attributes the downvotes on his comments to the same faction, uses this as evidence that the faction exists, and thus can also be held responsible for elevating this and other Microsoft-positive stories to the front page. I think he's wrong, don't think the "brigading Microsoft fan" has much of an influence on HN, and doubt that Microsoft is paying anyone for getting things on the front page.
I'd happily consider evidence to the contrary, but I think the downvotes to engendered's comments are due to other factors, and that the pro-Microsoft stories are appearing more frequently on HN because they periodically act as a positive force. I don't know how prevalent my attitude is, but I find these stories interesting in a "Dog Bites Man" fashion. I am more likely to vote up a good deed done by Microsoft because I find it to be more noteworthy than a good deed done by others.
When startups choose tech these days based on what HN thinks is cool and hip at the day the decission is made, you can't blame tech companies noticing this and trying to turn the odds in their favour.
I'm a OS X / Linux person (my name's probably in your distro somewhere) and sometimes Microsoft does good stuff.