Simon's post focuses more on the startup/AI Village that caused the issue with citations and quotes, which has been lost in the discussion due to Rob Pike's initial heated message. It is not redundant.
But if that's value added, why frame it under the heading of popular drama/rage farming? To capture more attention? Do you believe the pop culture news sites would be interested if it discussed the idea and "experiment" without mentioning the rage bait?
How do you propose he should have framed it in a way that it is still helpful to the reader?