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Then maybe it should have been named "How to work more efficiently" instead of click-baity "The 4-Hour Workweek"?

• foogazi 5y ago
  This reminded me of how the early novels had incredibly long titles that correctly summarized the plot For example Robinson Crusoe’s title was: “ The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver'd by Pirates ”
• basisword 5y ago
  What a boring world we'd live in if media products weren't allowed to use catchy titles.
• playpause 5y ago
  It might be more comfy for HN/engineering types if all book titles were completely dry and precise like that, but most 'real' people enjoy a bit of hyperbole, and have no trouble seeing straight through it. It's all part of a game that helps engage them, and they are willing participants in that game – if you can't differentiate this from deception, it's you who has an incomplete picture of things. To most people, the fact that the title "4 hour work week" is a bit of attention-grabbing hyperbole is completely obvious, including those who actually read it and got some value from it. If you think anyone who reads a book like that must be some kind of idiot who takes a literal interpretation of an obviously hyperbolic title, then you probably have a cynical and incomplete understanding of how smart most people are. The truth is, identifying the most literal possible description for something is usually just an aspy trick we engineers like to pull when we are confused by something nuanced.