Just a few minutes ago, Product Hunt CEO Ryan Hoover posted a tweet and article on Medium acknowledging what he called a terrible fuckup; Product Hunt’s validation programming had made the erroneous assumption that all founders are male by using the article “his” when discussing validated identity.

Screenshot of the tweet to Product Hunt, earlier today 2/19/15

The reaction from Hoover and Product Hunt to the tweet was exactly what it should have been: mortification at such a presumptuous error, speedy rectification of the problem, a personal apology to Allyson (the tweeter), and an immediate blog post owning up to the misstep for others to be mindful of. Frankly I would have been impressed by the first two things; but to see all this unfold in sequence in an expedited manner reaffirmed the reasons I use PH, and why I consider them an example of a company to emulate.

Response tweet by Ryan Hoover to the discovered problem

Screenshot of the corrected response on Product Hunt

I have to give it up to the whole PH team; it’s not easy to admit a mistake, particularly when it’s brought to one’s attention in such a public arena. But they really went above and beyond in their response, and the subsequent Medium piece by Hoover really underscored their commitment to gender equality that I very much respect them for.

Well done PH, take a bow. We should all strive to be as good as this.

Notes

[1] The images used in this post were taken from Ryan Hoover’s original Medium blog post.