5 ms·
What was wrong with the better original title "The Chinese paddlefish, one of world's largest fish, has gone extinct"
by okareaman 5y ago
What was wrong with the better original title "The Chinese paddlefish, one of world's largest fish, has gone extinct"
- Enginerrrd 5y agoPerhaps because that title completely omits any form of attribution, which as the article suggests, is largely because of the Gezhouba Dam which completely cut paddlefish off from their only spawning grounds. Why would you want to omit that part? That said, this title is a poor attempt at communication.
- okareaman 5y agoI thought the guide was to use the original title
- ClumsyPilot 5y agoWell now you have a title that's, to me, incomprehensible
- GordonS 5y agoIt's not just you - the new title makes no sense at all to me either. It reads as a jumbled collection of random words :/
- travisgriggs 5y ago"The paddlefish has been dammed to extinction"
- philshem 5y agoYou’re hired
- Chris2048 5y agoThere's nothing wrong with: The Chinese paddlefish, one of world's largest fish, has gone extinct *because of Yangtze dam* The problem is this part: Paddlefish, largest, from spawn, now extinct
- secondcoming 5y agoGrammar, largest, from original, now incomprehensible
- Kaibeezy 5y agoHN’s hyperbole filter definitely takes out “world’s” on the first pass, but you can put it back. Example: I touched off a bit of a “seems bait-y” pas de deux/do-si-do with the bot/mods re a BBC headline a while back. It’s towards the bottom (where it surely belongs) of this thread - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26552375 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26552375
- gadf 5y agoI'm sorry, this shit cracks me up so much. I'm glad that everyone got so much out of the title!
- rsynnott 5y ago> Perhaps because that title completely omits any form of attribution Though even there, it's... not great, as most people will probably read Yangtze dam as the Three Gorges Dam.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- mattmaroon 5y ago98% of the time someone changes the title of the article to which they are linking they make it worse.
- doggodaddo78 5y agoCooks, many, title
- csa 5y agoMy guess is that the title that the submitter originally suggested (with dam info that is not in the original title) was over the 80-character limit for HN titles, so they shortened it to the current existing (and confusing) title. For reference when it inevitably gets changed, it’s currently “Yangtze dam separates Paddlefish, largest, from spawn, now extinct”. Original title is: The Chinese paddlefish, one of world's largest fish, has gone extinct Subtitle is: Native to China’s Yangtze River, these fish grew 23 feet in length, but haven’t been spotted since 2003.
- tptacek 5y agoNothing; that's what the title should be. The guidelines ask you to use the original title, and not try to summarize the article yourself in the submission title.
- riffic 5y agoHas anyone ever considered that maybe the HN guidelines are wrong here?
- notatoad 5y agothe HN guidelines often lead to some stupid titles, but i think this is one of those times that show why the guidelines are good. The original headline accurately represents the content of the article. the edited version is an incomprehensible mess.
- pvg 5y agoIn great detail, over the better part of a decade, yes. You can find some of the rationale here and a few more searches will dig up more discussions about it than even an olympic-level messageboard-hardened person could possibly bear https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=%22level%20playing%20field%22%20by%3Adang&sort=byPopularity&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- dredmorbius 5y agoHN has guidelines, not rules, and there are times when they can be bent. For titles, finding (or manufacturing) one that's clearer based on actual article text is a common alternative. I've suggested "Chinese paddlefish has gone extinct due to overfishing and dams" to the moderators. (Much of that phrase occurs within the article.)
- tptacek 5y agoI don't think we disagree. The important point is that it's not the job (or the privilege) of the submitter to determine for everyone else what the most important angle on the story is. Titles are community property. That's exactly what went wrong here.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]