If you have evidence of people successfully gaming HN with 'marketing actions', I'd like to see it at hn@ycombinator.com. We work hard to stop that, at least in its abusive forms such as ring-voting.

Abuse exists, of course, but people also imagine it onto everything they see on HN that they happen to dislike. Then they come to the comment threads to post unsubstantiated claims about it. That doesn't help.