First, it’s a professional ethics requirement. If there is the possibility of a conflict of interest in our statement, we need to disclose it to avoid misleading anyone.

In addition, there are plenty of ways to figure out where an HN member is employed besides looking at their post history. It’s not necessarily found in publicly available data, but it can be found.

Also, you have to account for future acts. Disclosing early can help insure against accusations about misconduct if you were to out yourself — or someone were to out you — later.