apparently the bar for companies is that low that HN is bootlicking the bare minimum. it's honestly hilarious.

this is extremely shady, and I don't know why people are trusting the source directly lol. they wouldn't say they did anything untoward, ever

You are here, so you are also HN. There are also other HN comments here that disagree with the parent post just as you do. Saying what HN does or does not do is almost always going to be provably false and tends to add nothing of value to the conversation. I would even go so far as hypothesizing that on any given controversial topic there tends to be a large divide of opposing opinions on clear display. But maybe I just think that because I'm HN.