Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project

Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by normac2 on Monday June 07, 2021 @12:55PM (#27424877)

I'm on a job search, and Replit is one of the places I was going to apply, off of their listings on HN Who is Hiring?. So much for that, and I suspect a lot of devs are going to feel the same. (I don't think I'm good enough to get in, but there're a lot of really good devs who read HN who are.) In a seller's market for developers, this could hurt them in the form of less good talent applying.

That said, my gut feeling as an outsider is that they feel genuinely burnt by a former employee making something similar to their product. Not just cynically trying to smash the competition. Not that that justifies anything—everyone thinks they're the good guy (well, almost everyone).

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by whimsicalism on Monday June 07, 2021 @01:38PM (#27425485)

which is hilarious given that the CEO of repl.it is literally building something similar to a product that he worked on at codeacademy

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by tyingq on Monday June 07, 2021 @02:19PM (#27426081)

This is the absolute best part of this. Re-read his snarky language now knowing this and it's just...funny.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by mmastrac on Monday June 07, 2021 @02:26PM (#27426180)

It's very easy to justify doing something to benefit yourself while writing it off as justified, and getting massively offended when someone does the same thing to your perceived detriment.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by heavyset_go on Monday June 07, 2021 @01:46PM (#27425611)

The irony here is delicious.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by ignoramous on Monday June 07, 2021 @02:52PM (#27426539)

Replit's to be a new-age cloud company (ala fly.io) rather than Lynda.com for code. At least, thats what I gather from its founder's posts on Twitter.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by wutbrodo on Monday June 07, 2021 @01:51PM (#27425695)

> That said, my gut feeling as an outsider is that they feel genuinely burnt by a former employee making something similar to their product. Not just cynically trying to smash the competition. Not that that justifies anything—everyone thinks they're the good guy (well, almost everyone).

Agreed, I think it's totally fair for the CEO to be a little peeved by the project, and the complaint is about how horrible his handling of it was. This is exacerbated by how unfailingly polite and professional the ex-intern is in the (presumably) unabridged email thread.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by vecinu on Monday June 07, 2021 @01:50PM (#27425676)

Not only am I not interested in working for repl.it but I have asked my org to never pay for their products due to this behavior, we should not reward it and money has the loudest voice.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by cwkoss on Monday June 07, 2021 @04:10PM (#27426698)

Would it be against HN's rules to reply to Who's Hiring posts from Replit with a link to this article?

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by dang on Monday June 07, 2021 @05:26PM (#27427198)

Yes, it would be against the rules at the top of the Who Is Hiring threads.

We moderate HN less, not more, when YC or a YC startup is involved [1]. That's why the OP has been at #1 all day - normally we downweight indignation posts at least a little, to compensate for the default tendency to massively upvote them, but we haven't touched this thread in any way. I don't think we'd take that so far as to selectively turn off the Who Is Hiring rules, though. It would set a confusing precedent.

[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by cwkoss on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:15PM (#27427891)

Thanks for the reply - I definitely won't then. I didn't realize replit was a YC company, and understand the value in keeping Who's Hiring threads clean from criticism - could lead to interesting discussion but at the expense of distracting from the purpose of the thread.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by swyx on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:05PM (#27427757)

im very glad that negative coverage of a YC startup is so highly upvoted on HN. we still only have your word for it, but thank you for doing what you can to err on the side of caution when it comes to YC startups.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by cutemonster on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @01:35AM (#27444563)

> only have your word for it,

Plus one of the most upvoted topics ever, 4k votes is a lot.

Btw, indicates that it's one good that HN otherwise downweights indignation posts.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by mmastrac on Monday June 07, 2021 @05:17PM (#27427066)

It would likely go against the spirit of the community to hound a job posting like that. I don't disagree with the sentiment, but turning the hiring posts into any sort of flamewar/off-topic discussion dilutes the value of those threads.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by yjftsjthsd-h on Monday June 07, 2021 @05:29PM (#27427253)

I disagree: If a company posts a job on HN, it is 100% reasonable to point out to the community that working there can come back to bite you.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by version_five on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:31PM (#27428119)

That kind of behavior is what has ruined most social media. The job post threads are great because they are strictly about job posts. They would be much worse if they also included random color commentary. Everyone using this site knows how to research a company. There is literally no upside and a huge downside to what you're advocating.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by cwkoss on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:21PM (#27427982)

I can see how allowing this could discourage companies from posting in these threads. I think it would be interesting to see how a hiring thread including criticism would play out, but appreciate that it would also likely invite a lot of flame wars, astroturfing and unproductive bickering.

A (different) jobs board where the companies posting the jobs do not have control of the comment discussion would be interesting to see - but would need a monetization strategy that ensures it can survive without turning into pay-to-censor junky platforms like Yelp or Glassdoor.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by lynxaegon on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:14PM (#27427883)

I do think it should be allowed to post the link of a related thread. If I see the hiring post on HN, I would like to know more about that company. It's true that I would search the company to find out more about them, but it would be easier to just scroll a bit and find a few threads about them.

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Re:Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project by addison-lee on Monday June 07, 2021 @06:58PM (#27428395)

I don’t see how it would be especially if you pair it with a questionable asking if they treat all former employees like this.

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