Political debate on HN has become unavoidable because tech itself has been politicized.

Of course on some level it always was, "everything is political" etc, but a decade ago most participants saw tech as broadly neutral. What was the political valence of Etherpad or Foursquare?

Today, engineers are asked to implement things like the "inclusivity warnings" that just shipped in Google Docs. The scope of "content moderation" has expanded dramatically. Founders are often explicitly partisan in one direction or another.

And the new engagement goes in both directions. The five most valuable companies on earth are all West Coast tech cos now. Political actors of all types are watching and trying to harness or control tech to a much greater extent than last decade.