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Comment by meterplech | Hacker News Reader

It certainly isn't specifically tech, but it does show how much treating a customer properly can have a huge effect on that customer and thus your business. Because of that pilot, Southwest is now getting a ton of great free press. Seems like a great lesson for any startup. Also, the article mentions that the flyer who was delayed was a repeat customer (as he had a number of free flights). You should treat your loyal customers well.

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One of the hallmarks of successful people is that they can derive useful lessons from practically anything. "Is there a lesson in this story?" is a terribly low bar for what should comprise hacker news; it excludes practically nothing.

I agree with you, but I don't think that's what's happening here - the main content of the article is about an interesting and remarkable approach to customer service from a company that every business can learn from. The format for it is as from from "hn material" as you can get, but the content is there. I agree that you can find lessons in practically any story, but I think it's whether or not the core of the story is relevant to hn that distinguishes what's appropriate to post here, not how it appears on the surface.

True, but I know that I come here more for the comments than the stories. The fact that there are people who can learn from almost anything around here makes it even more interesting to come here and get their insight.

So maybe the 'bar' should be set based on the comments: get rid of the stories that trigger lots of griping and keep everything that generates good comments.

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