I've witnessed plenty of Google apologism on HN, but to be fair I've also witnessed a significant amount of anti-Google bias as well. Either way, saying that HN is deliberately blocking anti-Google sites strikes me as paranoid and needlessly cynical.
Not HN, NH's crowd: by flagging those links. Of course the HN code itself is not biased.
(amended original post)
Of course people will be biased both ways, but I never personally witnessed dead links on Apple, Facebook or Microsoft criticizing discussions, so that's my conclusion from personal experience.
It appears that the first submission had a highly editorialized headline and was submitted by someone who had made no other submissions or comments. Given the gravity of the accusation, I can easily see someone flagging it without even reading it. That would be enough to kill it and then the anti-spam code takes over from there with no conspiracy required, just one or maybe two flags on a story where someone thought the headline was overly editorialized.
Even saying "HN's crowd" is deliberately flagging legitimate links that are critical of Google is cynical as well. I must ask though, if you think HN is filled with people who are so uninterested in legitimate discussion, then why are you posting here? I'm not trying to be accusatory, but to me, posting on a site where people are not interested in honest discussion would feel like a huge waste of time.
You are making my words sound worse than intended. It's not cynical: there cannot be an unbiased community so, by your reasoning, neither you or me should be part of any.
I'm just saying that, by the nature of Google as a company and of this community, the crowd here is more likely to be favorable to Google and take their side on issues, and this is evidenced by my own experience.
