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How about the second example? The linked article is decidedly not a technical specification or even a discussion about any details of OpenStreetMap's Data Mode

by teddyh 4y ago

How about the second example? The linked article is decidedly not a technical specification or even a discussion about any details of OpenStreetMap's Data Model. The article lacks any snippets of code or map data. It is quite clearly a defense of the simplicity of OpenStreetMap's data model (using analogies and anecdotes) as reflected by the article’s title. How, then, could one possibly justify the title change?

dang 4y ago
Sorry for the delay in replying. I think you have a stronger case about that example. Most likely we changed the title to make it less baity—"In Defense of" doesn't really add much information except "Fight", and that's a bad way to prime a thread. Having now read more of the article, though, I agree with you that the title edit changed the focus in a misleading way. I've changed it back now. Maybe "The simplicity of OpenStreetMap's data model", or something like that, might have been an ok compromise, but it's too late to matter. Moderation is guesswork. Inevitably, we guess wrong sometimes. The best thing is for users to tell us when we've got something wrong, because then we can correct it. In the future, if you would let us know at hn@ycombinator.com instead of posting in the thread, where we're unlikely to see it, we can correct things while the thread is still live. We do that all the time (many times a day), but we can't correct mistakes we don't know about!
- teddyh 4y ago
  > Most likely we changed the title to make it less baity—"In Defense of" doesn't really add much information except "Fight", and that's a bad way to prime a thread. Such words also signals value, since they signal that someone has something significant to contribute to the conversation. For an extensive discussion about how such words signal value, see Larry McEnerney’s lecture The Craft of Writing Effectively: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM A more value-signalling title with less “Fight” might have been “The benefits of simplicity in OpenStreetMap's data model”.
  - dang 4y ago
    > The benefits of simplicity in OpenStreetMap's data model That would have been a great edit. I won't bother doing it now since it's too late to matter, but if you come up with any of those in the future, I'd love to hear about them.

by teddyh 4y ago

dang 4y ago

Sorry for the delay in replying. I think you have a stronger case about that example. Most likely we changed the title to make it less baity—"In Defense of" doesn't really add much information except "Fight", and that's a bad way to prime a thread. Having now read more of the article, though, I agree with you that the title edit changed the focus in a misleading way. I've changed it back now. Maybe "The simplicity of OpenStreetMap's data model", or something like that, might have been an ok compromise, but it's too late to matter. Moderation is guesswork. Inevitably, we guess wrong sometimes. The best thing is for users to tell us when we've got something wrong, because then we can correct it. In the future, if you would let us know at hn@ycombinator.com instead of posting in the thread, where we're unlikely to see it, we can correct things while the thread is still live. We do that all the time (many times a day), but we can't correct mistakes we don't know about!

teddyh 4y ago
> Most likely we changed the title to make it less baity—"In Defense of" doesn't really add much information except "Fight", and that's a bad way to prime a thread. Such words also signals value, since they signal that someone has something significant to contribute to the conversation. For an extensive discussion about how such words signal value, see Larry McEnerney’s lecture The Craft of Writing Effectively: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtIzMaLkCaM A more value-signalling title with less “Fight” might have been “The benefits of simplicity in OpenStreetMap's data model”.
- dang 4y ago
  > The benefits of simplicity in OpenStreetMap's data model That would have been a great edit. I won't bother doing it now since it's too late to matter, but if you come up with any of those in the future, I'd love to hear about them.