I once submitted this link to the front page, which promptly took down HN because it had no caching.
I fired off an email to Scott, frantically telling him "I think I took down HN. If you’re scrambling to figure out what’s wrong, it’s because so-and-so story is on the front page, and you can fix it by booting it off." A minute or two later the site came back to life, so I emailed saying "oh, never mind. I guess it was something else." And to my surprise he emailed back saying you were exactly right, thanks.
Presumably they either added caching, prevented it from going to the front page, froze the list for posterity, or it’s still a ticking time bomb that can take down HN again if you happen to submit it. Either way, maybe the explanation of your missing topcolor is there somewhere.
I fired off an email to Scott, frantically telling him "I think I took down HN. If you’re scrambling to figure out what’s wrong, it’s because so-and-so story is on the front page, and you can fix it by booting it off." A minute or two later the site came back to life, so I emailed saying "oh, never mind. I guess it was something else." And to my surprise he emailed back saying you were exactly right, thanks.
Presumably they either added caching, prevented it from going to the front page, froze the list for posterity, or it’s still a ticking time bomb that can take down HN again if you happen to submit it. Either way, maybe the explanation of your missing topcolor is there somewhere.