This is a punny code, and I'm fine - if not happy - that HN doesn't choose to render their underlying unicode symbols. It's very easy to spoof URLs this way, e.g. using a symbol from another language to craft a look-alike URL that can match a reputable site.
Browsers like now Chrome try and alert you if the URL visually looks spoofed (because they do support unicode symbols in the omnibox), but I'm yet to see how well this holds up in production.
And I hope in even 20 years we still can't use emojis here, our language isn't so pitiful that we must regress to brightly coloured symbols.
Browsers like now Chrome try and alert you if the URL visually looks spoofed (because they do support unicode symbols in the omnibox), but I'm yet to see how well this holds up in production.
And I hope in even 20 years we still can't use emojis here, our language isn't so pitiful that we must regress to brightly coloured symbols.