There is this really great South Park episode where one of the characters has the 'ability' to distinct between actual news content and advertisements disguised as news [1].
I feel like this is - sadly - more and more required as well when browsing HN as there seem to be more and more postings where an advertisement is disguised as 'hacker news'.
Can someone enlighten me how the availability of coupon codes for a VPN provider on Amazon is considered news?
It's not a coupon or a promotion. It's an alternative payment method so that Mulvad does not need to store any identifying information about its customers. See https://mullvad.net/en/blog/2022/6/20/were-removing-the-opti... for information about the situation they are mitigating.
I assume in this context it's because HN isn't just an aggregator but is instead also a community, a community in which Mullvad is rather popular with (given previous discussion on the topic). So yes it's an advertisement but it's also relevant news to this community, personally speaking the "News" post here about Mullvad supporting Monero is what finally made me switch over to it, so the news and ad were relevant to me as a part of this community. (and it was relevant without them tracking my every movement, how is that possible??)
I think people here are also interested in the steps Mullvad takes to improve user payment privacy, as again every time "news" about new methods of payment or concealment of user payment history is always met with high praise and interest. (as far as I've seen anyway)
The original blog post is an advertisement, they are advertising a new payment method. Whether or not this specific post on HN linking to the advertisement is also "just an ad" is what's up for debate.
Because mullvad has no info who bought this, so if they get any warrant or anything asking to track someone, they could say they can't technically do that.
But Amazon straight up gives camera access to Ring Doorbells to police without user consent or a court warrant. If you're paranoid and a Mullvad customer, you should probably treat Amazon as if it was a part of the US government.
Non sequiter. All the government could force Amazon to reveal is that you purchased that gift card. They can’t A) prove that you used it vs handing it out as a gift B) tie the purchase to a specific Mullvad account.
The government do get a limit number of potential users. Can this together with fingerprints, ping latency(?) etc. be used together with amazon info to narrow down the vpn user (in theory) or is that impossible?
For example, if mullvad only had 5 users in separate continents, could one measure the latency and crossreference with a amazon buy history to identify the vpn user?
Unless, the card has a visible QR/bar code that is 1 to 1 with the hidden code. Then we are f*ed. Not mentioning this a criticism, I like Mullvad, bought this card a couple of days ago and thought about that case when buying it.
Perhaps news to some, non-news to some. Why do we allow "product launches" on HN? Why let anything with a commercial motive ever appear on this forum? Because HN serves a very broad audience, and consequently allows information that might not pertain to everyone but still deemed valuable by some.
I sometimes find the things being advertised interesting. Not because I want to buy them but rather things being pushed and who pushes them can help stay abreast of what's happening in the world.
A specific example from a little while ago in my life--I saw an article advertisement for Microsoft's sovereign cloud offering. I thought this was interesting because I think the Internet is balkanizing over time and how megacorps try to play in that scenario interests me.
I still don't know that it qualifies as news, to your point, but Amazon involvement, however incidental, in Mullvad is a datapoint I'm glad to have.
The South Park episode discusses advertisements that are disguised as news to get clicks. That’s deceptive and bad.
This is a product announcement from a startup. HN is all about products and startups and this one in particular is popular here. Advertisements aren’t necessarily bad, and as far as ads go, this one is the best kind.
Fun fact: The original name of HN was actually “Startup News”.
HN is pretty explicitly about commerce and specifically tech related to commerce. It's one of the few places I frequent where self-promotion is encouraged.
This is part of what makes HN unique and great in terms of tech news sites.
I don't use a VPN, but am glad to know of product offerings like this. If this is an "ad" then bring it on, I say.
I feel like this is - sadly - more and more required as well when browsing HN as there seem to be more and more postings where an advertisement is disguised as 'hacker news'.
Can someone enlighten me how the availability of coupon codes for a VPN provider on Amazon is considered news?
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7XOCG_P6o4