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I'm not a moderator (obviously) but I've noticed that when the article's original title is sufficiently vague (like for this one) the mods allow for a lot of le

I'm not a moderator (obviously) but I've noticed that when the article's original title is sufficiently vague (like for this one) the mods allow for a lot of leeway in the title as long as it is representative of the article.

dredmorbius 5y ago
Nor am I, though I often email HN with issues (titles is a frequent case). The guidelines call for original titles unless excessively long or clickbait, and request no editorialisation: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html The typical options for alternatives are: - Shorten the original title, especially by elmininating superlatives or counts. "Ten things you should know ..." becomes "Things you should know...", "Incredible new light..." becomes "New light ..." - Replace vague terms. "This guy who.,." becomes "<Name of guy>...". Note that this often (though not always) shortens the title. - Substitute an alternative title. The <title> tag might work, if present, otherwise a line picked verbatim from the article if possible. Occasionally gluing two phrases together is justified, as here, where "CCPA Scam" was the obvious substitution for the pronoun "This". The key here is to find something that clearly expresses the significant content / context of the article, without sensationalisation. Different types of submissions have their own challenges. Many commercial pieces are clickbaity, vague, listicles, or sensationalised. Microblogs (Mastodon, Twitter) have no title, and the lede line may not be especially descriptive. Blog titles run the gamut from infuriatingly vague to pretentious to long to overly terse. So long as I think I can make a reasonable argument for a substitution and it improves the headline, I'll propose it. If it's my own submission, I'll include a comment describing any changes made. (The start of this thread was to be that comment except that the article was already submitted.) There's an exception to the clarity rule in practice for major announcements, as in corporate earnings and departures, which are often simply titled "Letter to..." or "<period> Earning statement ...". Rather than highlight the principle point, especially in the first case, HN tends to shy from that, largely to help tamp down hot takes and emotive responses. Which probably does help improve the quality of discourse. (See for example Jeff Bezos's CEO resignation announcement, or Jack Dorsey's.) My suggestions for alternatives are frequently accepted by HN mods, or they'll come up with something close to it.

dredmorbius 5y ago

Nor am I, though I often email HN with issues (titles is a frequent case). The guidelines call for original titles unless excessively long or clickbait, and request no editorialisation: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html The typical options for alternatives are: - Shorten the original title, especially by elmininating superlatives or counts. "Ten things you should know ..." becomes "Things you should know...", "Incredible new light..." becomes "New light ..." - Replace vague terms. "This guy who.,." becomes "<Name of guy>...". Note that this often (though not always) shortens the title. - Substitute an alternative title. The <title> tag might work, if present, otherwise a line picked verbatim from the article if possible. Occasionally gluing two phrases together is justified, as here, where "CCPA Scam" was the obvious substitution for the pronoun "This". The key here is to find something that clearly expresses the significant content / context of the article, without sensationalisation. Different types of submissions have their own challenges. Many commercial pieces are clickbaity, vague, listicles, or sensationalised. Microblogs (Mastodon, Twitter) have no title, and the lede line may not be especially descriptive. Blog titles run the gamut from infuriatingly vague to pretentious to long to overly terse. So long as I think I can make a reasonable argument for a substitution and it improves the headline, I'll propose it. If it's my own submission, I'll include a comment describing any changes made. (The start of this thread was to be that comment except that the article was already submitted.) There's an exception to the clarity rule in practice for major announcements, as in corporate earnings and departures, which are often simply titled "Letter to..." or "<period> Earning statement ...". Rather than highlight the principle point, especially in the first case, HN tends to shy from that, largely to help tamp down hot takes and emotive responses. Which probably does help improve the quality of discourse. (See for example Jeff Bezos's CEO resignation announcement, or Jack Dorsey's.) My suggestions for alternatives are frequently accepted by HN mods, or they'll come up with something close to it.