5 ms·

It wasn't by me! Maybe it's over a character limit for titles? Maybe done by mods.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
leetrout 6y ago
Yes. Tons of titles are changed all the time. https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/ https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/
- dvtrn 6y ago
  I understand mods edit titles and have said so to “de-editorialize/sensationalize” them but I’m seeing a lot of purely style changes; capitalization removal. Some are changes entirely from perfectly fine and comprehensible titles that aren’t even sensationalized headlines Others still add or remove a word that don’t really do anything for the title except change the inflection slightly to one the author may not even want perceived from their writing. Whom does that sort of edit serve? Merely curious.
  - aspenmayer 6y ago
    It serves the will of HN according to justifications I’ve seen. It’s debatable if it is always is helpful in any individual instance, but it’s usually well-intentioned from what I can tell. Yet it also seems to turn the volume down on topics that are of outsize influence or import on society, to my reading. It second-guesses the intent of the author, and second-guesses the reading comprehension of the reader. It treats us all like clickbait vote bots.
    - qwertygnu 6y ago
      I'm seeing things being changed in a lot of directions here: It’s not just cars that make pollution. It’s the roads they drive on, too ↓ Study suggests that fresh asphalt is a significant source of air pollution and Atul Gawande on COVID and healthcare logistics ↓ We can solve the coronavirus-test mess now if we want to and The problem with C compatibility in C++ ↓ The problem with C --- (Sorry for formatting) Idk it seems a bit more than trying to de-editorialize.
      - dvtrn 6y ago
        These edits are especially weird to me: 20:30 A woman who gave the world antiviral drugs ↓ 21:40 Gertrude Elion, a woman who gave the world antiviral drugs ↓ 22:40 The woman who gave the world antiviral drugs Like, at what point is well enough alone for a headline that was already succinct, descriptive and well formed and why keep coming back an hour later-after presumably more people have seen the article and may want to come back later-to change the title again? @dang (if you come across this): is HN remotely interested, for the curiosity satiating edification of the community-if no other reason-in sharing the decision calculus for these kinds of title edits?
        dang 6y ago
        But you've omitted the last title in that sequence, which is the one we ended up with (Gertrude Elion's “antiviral odyssey”). There's a partial explanation here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24359017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24359017 What you're seeing in that sequence is trial and error. Sometimes it takes a few tries before we find a solution that feels like it balances the different concerns. That's not particularly common, though, plus most of those exploratory edits are quickly overwritten by later edits, so Peter's app doesn't pick them up. I'm happy in principle to satiate anyone's curiosity about this kind of thing—the only trouble is that it takes a surprising amount of time to write out such explanations in details, and unfortunately that time is just not often not available. What I can tell you is that (1) there is nearly always a specific reason for every title edit we do, and there are probably at least a hundred different considerations that come into it, based on 10+ years of experience at this point—this is a surprisingly complex subdomain!, and (2) we're highly responsive to user complaints about titles (or mod edits) in specific cases. Not just because we want users to be happy, but also because this has proven to be the only way to minimize the dreaded title fever (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20%22title%20fever%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...) —which, btw, has had an outbreak in this very thread. I've written longer explanations in the past about how we approach title editing in general. One is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20429573 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20429573. If there are questions I'd be happy to answer them—but again, the more general the question, the more time/energy it takes to answer, so I may not be able to. Actually I enjoy engaging with users about HN title edits because, of all the things we do, it's by far the best worked out. It's far more consistent than people think it is. Why does something consistent appear so inconsistent? Because it's more complicated than it seems. Why is title editing so complicated? Because titles are the biggest single influence on the site, and users are astonishingly passionate about them.
- evo_9 6y ago
  Yeah it's the mods. Easily the most annoying thing about HN these days. I really wonder if they consider the original author at all, and how they are editing their piece for them without permission. I get that there are a lot of shitty 'click-bait' titles but that's just how it goes. Once you start changing those you're down the path of changing any title submission for who knows what reason(s). I've seen it over-and-over and I really don't get it. HN is so hands-off generally this behavior is truly puzzling.
- sneak 6y ago
  Wow, this is cool. Is this your site? If so, could you email me? (My email is in my profile.)
  - leetrout 6y ago
    It is from Peter Cooper. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21617016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21617016
baud147258 6y ago
There's a character limit on title, which could have been editorialized as: "Reddit gets its app to 50m downloads by making the web mobile UX miserable"
- drummer 6y ago
  And by forcing users to download the app when they try to browse the website. It was like that for months.
anbotero 6y ago
Most definitely done by mods. It was like the original moments ago

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Yes. Tons of titles are changed all the time. https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/ https://hackernewstitles.netlify.app/

dvtrn 6y ago
I understand mods edit titles and have said so to “de-editorialize/sensationalize” them but I’m seeing a lot of purely style changes; capitalization removal. Some are changes entirely from perfectly fine and comprehensible titles that aren’t even sensationalized headlines Others still add or remove a word that don’t really do anything for the title except change the inflection slightly to one the author may not even want perceived from their writing. Whom does that sort of edit serve? Merely curious.
- aspenmayer 6y ago
  It serves the will of HN according to justifications I’ve seen. It’s debatable if it is always is helpful in any individual instance, but it’s usually well-intentioned from what I can tell. Yet it also seems to turn the volume down on topics that are of outsize influence or import on society, to my reading. It second-guesses the intent of the author, and second-guesses the reading comprehension of the reader. It treats us all like clickbait vote bots.
  - qwertygnu 6y ago
    I'm seeing things being changed in a lot of directions here: It’s not just cars that make pollution. It’s the roads they drive on, too ↓ Study suggests that fresh asphalt is a significant source of air pollution and Atul Gawande on COVID and healthcare logistics ↓ We can solve the coronavirus-test mess now if we want to and The problem with C compatibility in C++ ↓ The problem with C --- (Sorry for formatting) Idk it seems a bit more than trying to de-editorialize.
    - dvtrn 6y ago
      These edits are especially weird to me: 20:30 A woman who gave the world antiviral drugs ↓ 21:40 Gertrude Elion, a woman who gave the world antiviral drugs ↓ 22:40 The woman who gave the world antiviral drugs Like, at what point is well enough alone for a headline that was already succinct, descriptive and well formed and why keep coming back an hour later-after presumably more people have seen the article and may want to come back later-to change the title again? @dang (if you come across this): is HN remotely interested, for the curiosity satiating edification of the community-if no other reason-in sharing the decision calculus for these kinds of title edits?
      - dang 6y ago
        But you've omitted the last title in that sequence, which is the one we ended up with (Gertrude Elion's “antiviral odyssey”). There's a partial explanation here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24359017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24359017 What you're seeing in that sequence is trial and error. Sometimes it takes a few tries before we find a solution that feels like it balances the different concerns. That's not particularly common, though, plus most of those exploratory edits are quickly overwritten by later edits, so Peter's app doesn't pick them up. I'm happy in principle to satiate anyone's curiosity about this kind of thing—the only trouble is that it takes a surprising amount of time to write out such explanations in details, and unfortunately that time is just not often not available. What I can tell you is that (1) there is nearly always a specific reason for every title edit we do, and there are probably at least a hundred different considerations that come into it, based on 10+ years of experience at this point—this is a surprisingly complex subdomain!, and (2) we're highly responsive to user complaints about titles (or mod edits) in specific cases. Not just because we want users to be happy, but also because this has proven to be the only way to minimize the dreaded title fever (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20%22title%20fever%22&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...) —which, btw, has had an outbreak in this very thread. I've written longer explanations in the past about how we approach title editing in general. One is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20429573 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20429573. If there are questions I'd be happy to answer them—but again, the more general the question, the more time/energy it takes to answer, so I may not be able to. Actually I enjoy engaging with users about HN title edits because, of all the things we do, it's by far the best worked out. It's far more consistent than people think it is. Why does something consistent appear so inconsistent? Because it's more complicated than it seems. Why is title editing so complicated? Because titles are the biggest single influence on the site, and users are astonishingly passionate about them.
evo_9 6y ago
Yeah it's the mods. Easily the most annoying thing about HN these days. I really wonder if they consider the original author at all, and how they are editing their piece for them without permission. I get that there are a lot of shitty 'click-bait' titles but that's just how it goes. Once you start changing those you're down the path of changing any title submission for who knows what reason(s). I've seen it over-and-over and I really don't get it. HN is so hands-off generally this behavior is truly puzzling.
sneak 6y ago
Wow, this is cool. Is this your site? If so, could you email me? (My email is in my profile.)
- leetrout 6y ago
  It is from Peter Cooper. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21617016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21617016

baud147258 6y ago

There's a character limit on title, which could have been editorialized as: "Reddit gets its app to 50m downloads by making the web mobile UX miserable"

drummer 6y ago
And by forcing users to download the app when they try to browse the website. It was like that for months.

anbotero 6y ago

Most definitely done by mods. It was like the original moments ago