Hope you enjoyed that ad hominem attack. Because regardless of how you slice it, there's a conflict of interest between presenting this forum as a neutral and supportive environment for entrepreneurs and actively competing with its members.
I don't have any illusions about competition and am inclined to believe if not YC then someone else, but at a minimum this tarnishes the image of YC as an organization which supports underdogs, kicks dirt in the face of any independent Indian hackers hanging out here, and discourages anyone not looking for funding from participating. That's a lot of bad karma to exchange for a token investment of a few thousand USD.
Yes there is a conflict. It doesn't matter who is first. Thats worth nothing in itself.
It matters who is the best at pulling the levers that get exults.
VWO obviously failed at that. Optimizely, at least in this case, won. Play to your strengths, realize the world isn't fair, and move on with it already.
If I were an LP in YC and they held back because of a post on HN I'd (rightly) be pissed as hell. Who expected them to behave differently?
Btw, I'd bet this "scandal" has no effect on either HN or YCs reputation. I also think people are overestimating ghe values of a mention on TechCrunch.
I don't have any illusions about competition and am inclined to believe if not YC then someone else, but at a minimum this tarnishes the image of YC as an organization which supports underdogs, kicks dirt in the face of any independent Indian hackers hanging out here, and discourages anyone not looking for funding from participating. That's a lot of bad karma to exchange for a token investment of a few thousand USD.