alt Hacker NewsRight, so it's about the person and how they've qualified themselves, and not about what they've built.
I feel like I've been around these parts for a while, and that is not my experience of what Show HN was originally about, though I'm sure there was always an undercurrent of status hierarchy and approval-seeking, like you suggest.
It's not about status. It's about interest. A joiner is not going to have an interesting conversation about joinery with someone who has put some flatpak furniture together.