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Original title: "I'm sorry I criticized you Apple. You win"

kgwgk 8y ago
One of these days I'm going to write a bot to keep track of title changes. "Apple is a traditional business" is the current title, for the record. I expect (I hope!) it will be changed again soon, because it doesn't make much sense.
- dang 8y ago
  We changed the title because the original one was arguably linkbait, and the site guidelines call for changing those (see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). When we do that, we try to find a phrase in the article itself that represents what the author is saying. That's what we did here. If there's a better, more representative phrase, we can change it again.
  - kgwgk 8y ago
    "Apple is a rock of common sense in an industry that’s gone rogue" (the subtitle) would be better. "Apple is the perfect tech company for this day and age, an example to the rest of Silicon Valley" (the take-home message in the first line) would be better. The Apple "is a traditional business" remark refers to the main point of this opinion piece, which appears right before that statement: "This is a time when companies whose innovations are more intrusive than useful, more gimmicky than problem-solving, operate with business models that either burn investors’ cash or turn the users into products. "At a time like this, Apple is a rock of common sense, sobriety, dignified engineering supremacy, prudent financial and supply chain management, effective marketing, and customer-oriented retailing." Without the proper context, "Apple is a traditional business" could mean anything and doesn't mean anything at all.
    - dang 8y ago
      "Apple is a rock of common sense in an industry that’s gone rogue" is too baity, even more than the original title we changed. It's guaranteed to provoke objections if we put it in there. Ditto with "perfect tech company"—can you imagine the arguments that would lead to? You're welcome to make a bot to track title changes. People have done this kind of thing from time to time, e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16018430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16018430. IMO the main thing it would show is how much work goes into getting this right, and how hard it is. Edit: Btw I agree with you that the title we changed it to isn't great; I just haven't thought of a better one or seen a better suggestion. If someone has an accurate, neutral title that preferably uses representative language from the article, we'll happily change it again.
      - kgwgk 8y ago
        The problem with opinion articles is that they are not "objective" by definition. A representative title cannot be objective. It's unfortunate that interesting articles (they may be somewhat interesting, if they get to the front page) are devalued by listing them under aseptic, uninteresting, click-repellent titles.

One of these days I'm going to write a bot to keep track of title changes. "Apple is a traditional business" is the current title, for the record. I expect (I hope!) it will be changed again soon, because it doesn't make much sense.

dang 8y ago
We changed the title because the original one was arguably linkbait, and the site guidelines call for changing those (see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). When we do that, we try to find a phrase in the article itself that represents what the author is saying. That's what we did here. If there's a better, more representative phrase, we can change it again.
- kgwgk 8y ago
  "Apple is a rock of common sense in an industry that’s gone rogue" (the subtitle) would be better. "Apple is the perfect tech company for this day and age, an example to the rest of Silicon Valley" (the take-home message in the first line) would be better. The Apple "is a traditional business" remark refers to the main point of this opinion piece, which appears right before that statement: "This is a time when companies whose innovations are more intrusive than useful, more gimmicky than problem-solving, operate with business models that either burn investors’ cash or turn the users into products. "At a time like this, Apple is a rock of common sense, sobriety, dignified engineering supremacy, prudent financial and supply chain management, effective marketing, and customer-oriented retailing." Without the proper context, "Apple is a traditional business" could mean anything and doesn't mean anything at all.
  - dang 8y ago
    "Apple is a rock of common sense in an industry that’s gone rogue" is too baity, even more than the original title we changed. It's guaranteed to provoke objections if we put it in there. Ditto with "perfect tech company"—can you imagine the arguments that would lead to? You're welcome to make a bot to track title changes. People have done this kind of thing from time to time, e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16018430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16018430. IMO the main thing it would show is how much work goes into getting this right, and how hard it is. Edit: Btw I agree with you that the title we changed it to isn't great; I just haven't thought of a better one or seen a better suggestion. If someone has an accurate, neutral title that preferably uses representative language from the article, we'll happily change it again.
    - kgwgk 8y ago
      The problem with opinion articles is that they are not "objective" by definition. A representative title cannot be objective. It's unfortunate that interesting articles (they may be somewhat interesting, if they get to the front page) are devalued by listing them under aseptic, uninteresting, click-repellent titles.