I generally agree with you, but I think it's bad for the Hacker News community when people don't get thoughtful replies, even when the decision is a "no". It feels the slide away from a small technologist-centric community into the corporate way of doing things is underway.

[Edit: to make it clear, the social contract is different on a job board, because it takes no effort to send a resume and they probably get hundreds of unqualified, spamming applicants. I just hope that isn't what Hacker News has become. I could be wrong, though. Maybe each company does get hundreds of crappy resumes.]