If he reiterated that jokey response in his "good-faith conversation" with kevin, then kevin made the right call. I'll agree with tptacek though that they should've just said that, instead of talking about voting rings.
Different people. Dan runs HN, and I'm sure he thinks about voting rings all day long. Kevin is from YC, and thinks about founders and fitting into the YC community. I think it's safe to say that they both had very good, but entirely independent, reasons for not wanting to fund pinboard.
