>Do you think the "you can't mention astroturfing" rule is really serving HN these days?

yes, i think so.

because, unfortunately, complaining about bots (or astroturfing, or whatever) doesn't stop them. so we end up with threads that have both the potential bot/astroturfing/whatever activity and complaints, which further drowns out any interesting comments.

That is actually a great point. I have no rebuttal.