Not really. "Doxing" [1] is from message board culture, but the NYT is not some poster on a message board. To expect them to abide by message board law in their newspaper as if they're just a poster on reddit is like expecting an American to live by Chinese law and custom in America.
[1] At least in the sense of using someone's real name.
The people being nasty are the others responding to my comments. Am I responsible for them?
Obviously this is a touchy subject for some on here because Sam Altman and many other YC alums love this man.
Does that mean I can't post a critical comment?
Hostility is the opposite direction to the curious conversation we want here. Sam, YC, et. al., have nothing to do with this—it's just bog-standard HN moderation. If you don't believe me, here are 5,000 examples: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que....
He decided that they were going to do so regardless of what he did, upended his own life to minimize the damage that'd occur when his name got released, and did so, in order to ensure that his real name and his pseudonym got linked on his own terms, not theirs.
If NYT didn't decide to dox him, the entire second paragraph wouldn't have happened.
He deserved pseudonymity for the same reason you or I deserve pseudonymity.