I want to call this out, because I feel it's a big issue we have as humans trying to engage in reasoned debate - the idea that an inconsistent or changing view is somehow "weak" or invalidates the argument.

If someone is changing their opinion, that's a good thing. It means they are taking on board new information and not blindly following their original opinion.

If someone appears to have an inconsistent view, perhaps their position is simply more nuanced than the simple "for or against" buckets the debate actively tries to lump all participants into?

Yeah, I was sarcastically pointing out the absurdity of bitching about different people on HN having different responses whilst he himself has slightly different perspectives on subtly different issues...

I don't care that his view is inconsistent, I just think the complaint of people disagreeing with him (in a comment format which encourages disagreement more than agreement) was kinda ridiculous :)

The point I was (clearly too subtly) trying to make is that if you're going to use an imperfect solution in the name of getting it in the hands of more users, you might as well use TOTP and make concessions - it can be more accessible than SMS auth, which has so many problems attached to it, it's hard to understand why it's getting defended on HN anymore.