Are you just mad that dislikes were removed from YouTube? I don't see what that has to do with any of those statements.
Pretty sure they're saying that the YT developers would break their cool hack if they knew about it, because they want to keep their jobs (eg, getting paid, or "making money"). Sounds like the OP wants to view all developers as adhering to some Platonic ideal version of a "hacker ethic" where they wouldn't do something like that for a reason as banal as money.
I can sympathise with this position, but I acknowledge the reality that - at the end of the day - people are usually going to prioritize buying food, paying rent, etc., over adherence to abstract ethical principles. That's unfortunate in many ways, but hunger is a powerful motivation.
Are you just mad that dislikes were removed from YouTube? I don't see what that has to do with any of those statements.
I get the impression that the OP thing was lamenting the YT thing both specifically and as an example of a general class of similar situations... places where you have to hold back from sharing a neat hack because if you shared it, somebody would come along and ruin it.
It's also naive to think that YouTube developers don't already know about said hacks / workarounds.
Naive, or just abstract? I think most of us can agree that at some level of abstraction we would prefer that people put ideals and principles over banal concerns like money. It simply happens to be the case that, as of today, we don't live in a world that makes it easy to live that way.
Let's also not get too caught up in this Youtube thing. If I'm interpreting this correctly, that was just an example of a more general idea, not the sole topic of discussion.
It's also naive to think that YouTube developers don't already know about said hacks / workarounds.
Sure, but that doesn't mean they're going to prioritize dealing with it, unless somebody calls attention to it by, for example, posting about it on HN. I think the OP has a valid point that sometimes people have some $THING they might sorta want to talk about, but ultimately decide not to post here, because undue attention could be detrimental to $THING.
If some of these workarounds are published and become popular, then there is a risk the original devs would shut it all down, so the optimal strategy is to fly under the radar and tell no one, thus maximizing benefit for yourself even though it’s clear others could potentially benefit.