i know reddit and other news agencies have been doing this for awhile now, where they make an ad look like a regular post in order to trick you into clicking on it. in most cases though they subtly distinguish it by putting some sort of text which most newcomers glance over. i believe on reddit they put "sponsored" on the post, you get the idea.
however, i just saw a story on the front page stating: "Ecommerce is taking over the world - Join EasyPost" or something. there was no upvote arrow and only a hide link under the listing title. i can only conclude that HN has finally caved and started posting ads to the site and displaying them like posts in order to trick us into clicking them :(
personally i think this sucks since this was the only news site that i could reliably come to and avoid such trickery. i guess everyone sells out at some point?
