Possibly the underlying reason for the indirection is because that particular domain is banned on HN; check https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=dev.to with showdead turned on.
The second reason is I've never had a slashdot submission accepted and I saw that after posting this the page suggested I share it to increase chances of the editors picking it up, but I don't really use social media so I though hey why not HN.