I'm James Stanley. I blog at http://incoherency.co.uk/

I already operate https://smsprivacy.org/ which is essentially a VPN for SMS.

I don't have any way to prove I'm not logging your traffic, but I am a big believer in privacy and promise not to. If you don't trust me, you don't have to use it.

> How do I know you're not logging my traffic and selling it?

The same way you know any VPN company isn't. You just have to take their word for it.

Why is the word of a fly-by-night VPN provider any better than a HN poster?

According to the Supreme Court you don't have any expectation of privacy in information given to a third party so whether the VPN is in the US or not does not matter.

That's an oversimplification of the Third-Party Doctrine, particularly as applied today.