3 ms·

This article screws around with de Zwart's name so much while complaining about another organization's screwing around of his last name is really something.

detaro 6y ago
How does it "screw around" with the name?
- tekknolagi 6y ago
  de Zwart -> De Zwart
- barkingcat 6y ago
  The the name de Zwart appears inconsistently capitalized throughout the article. If you do a matched-case search in the body text, de Zwart appears 3 times, while De Zwart occurs 7 times outside of quotation marks, and other locations (like at the beginning of a sentence) where English rules will capitalize a name. I believe to follow proper Dutch capitalization, it should be similar to, for example: Being a digital rights activist, de Zwart knows this discussion very well, so he starts to meticulously log his attempts to get clarity. However, I can't be sure if in Dutch, a lower case pre-surname is capitalized in circumstances when it's used in a sentence vs as a full name. Without the clarification of rules governing the use of such lower case surnames, I can't be exactly sure whether the capitalization is on purpose or not.
  - detaro 6y ago
    Luckily a large part of this HN discussion already goes into detail about this.
    - barkingcat 6y ago
      For example https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24763789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24763789
TheRealPomax 6y ago
It doesn't, it uses correct contextual capitalisation. "De" is the definite article in Dutch, and in a full name the correct capitalisation is written using lowercase ("Hans de Zwart"). However, when used in isolation it needs to be capitalised so as to differentiate it from "an incorrectly capitalised noun/adjective following the definite article". If English had surnames that started with "the ...", the same rule would be applied, where "Jason the Bouvier" would be the correct full name spelling, but in isolated context, such as "According to The Bouvier, this policy has [...]", capitalisation should be used to make it clear that this is expressly not the definite article.
lsaferite 6y ago
Considering that the person referred to in the article, Hans de Zwart, is the one who translated the Dutch article into English, I'd say he knows how to write his own name.

detaro 6y ago

How does it "screw around" with the name?

tekknolagi 6y ago
de Zwart -> De Zwart
barkingcat 6y ago
The the name de Zwart appears inconsistently capitalized throughout the article. If you do a matched-case search in the body text, de Zwart appears 3 times, while De Zwart occurs 7 times outside of quotation marks, and other locations (like at the beginning of a sentence) where English rules will capitalize a name. I believe to follow proper Dutch capitalization, it should be similar to, for example: Being a digital rights activist, de Zwart knows this discussion very well, so he starts to meticulously log his attempts to get clarity. However, I can't be sure if in Dutch, a lower case pre-surname is capitalized in circumstances when it's used in a sentence vs as a full name. Without the clarification of rules governing the use of such lower case surnames, I can't be exactly sure whether the capitalization is on purpose or not.
- detaro 6y ago
  Luckily a large part of this HN discussion already goes into detail about this.
  - barkingcat 6y ago
    For example https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24763789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24763789

TheRealPomax 6y ago

It doesn't, it uses correct contextual capitalisation. "De" is the definite article in Dutch, and in a full name the correct capitalisation is written using lowercase ("Hans de Zwart"). However, when used in isolation it needs to be capitalised so as to differentiate it from "an incorrectly capitalised noun/adjective following the definite article". If English had surnames that started with "the ...", the same rule would be applied, where "Jason the Bouvier" would be the correct full name spelling, but in isolated context, such as "According to The Bouvier, this policy has [...]", capitalisation should be used to make it clear that this is expressly not the definite article.

lsaferite 6y ago

Considering that the person referred to in the article, Hans de Zwart, is the one who translated the Dutch article into English, I'd say he knows how to write his own name.