If you haven't been on HN, you'd believe this was some aberration as opposed to the norm. This is a YC run forum, so it's pretty normal for comments to contain software advertisment based comments.

I made a website 8 years ago for a business that was abandoned very early on by lack of time. Last week the first order came in.

Makes me curious, why should organic discovery not be a thing? How should it work?

I get that we don't want to look at promotional messages but do customers want to pay for advertising? I think many would be surprised how expensive it is to buy one customer. Some sectors more absurd than others.

I see lots of ads for things I know cost a tiny fraction of what is asked.

The idea everything is spam seems much to convenient for big business to be a coincidence.

I think we should go back to having a link to our website with each post. That actually makes it worth spending some time helping people.

It’s also the norm to call it out when someone isn’t disclosing their financial interest in something.