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Off-topic but the life story is there to make them eligible to be protected by copyright. IANAL. Source: https://copyrightalliance.org/are-recipes-cookbooks-pr

Off-topic but the life story is there to make them eligible to be protected by copyright. IANAL. Source: https://copyrightalliance.org/are-recipes-cookbooks-protected-by-copyright/ https://copyrightalliance.org/are-recipes-cookbooks-protecte...

flandish 4y ago
Interesting. I always thought it was search engine optimization.
- aidenn0 4y ago
  SEO is definitely a big part of it; Google penalized pages where people closed or navigated away quickly.
  - fbdab103 4y ago
    I immediately bounce from those Stackoverflow clones that keep appearing up at the top of searches. So, I am wondering how much this is still weighted in the scores.
    - jonas21 4y ago
      You might. But many people don't. They just want an answer and don't care if it's a clone or not.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    - gdprrrr 4y ago
      https://github.com/quenhus/uBlock-Origin-dev-filter https://github.com/quenhus/uBlock-Origin-dev-filter
    - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
      Leaked Google code: if(bounced && hosts_doubleclick_ads) pagerank++;
- water-your-self 4y ago
  Its engagement optimization. Adsense pays more if you spend more time on the page
- rmbyrro 4y ago
  SEO makes total sense. I always add grandma keywords when I'm searching for Python stuff on Google. Like: "grandma, how the hell have I still not memorized the API and keep needing to resort to the same doc pages again and again?" Now I trained ChatGPT with grandma letters from when I was young, so it will answer just like if it was my grandma.
- bialpio 4y ago
  No reason why it can't be both. The only way to know for sure is to ask the author of the recipe that you're reading. :)
yunohn 4y ago
When is the last time you heard of online recipe blogs enforcing copyright claims on other blogspam? Ridiculous. The real reason is simple, people who write recipes aren’t robots - they’re expressing their stories and emotions, while explaining how to make food that’s dear to them..
- fsckboy 4y ago
  >people who write recipes aren’t robots - they’re expressing their stories and emotions, while explaining how to make food that’s dear to them.. the people who write recipes aren't robots, they're narcissists and various forms of insecure and seek validation in the form of attention and adulation from others. That's not a bad thing, it's all too human and we should embrace, not stigmatize, the needy, but if all you want is a recipe rather than to be an acolyte it can seem like a big ask. You enjoyed time with your grandparents, and you remember it? Welcome the club! and I remember family as much more complicated than simply being all fun, and I feel like you might be Norman Rockwelling a bit.
  - afiori 4y ago
    The theory that recipes are written to make you scroll at least a full screen to show more ads seems much more plausible
    - fsckboy 4y ago
      yes, but you're cart before horse. The structure of paper newspaper and magazine recipe articles and "prose remembrance" cookbooks is the same. Tweaking that model for online use, very plausible, but it's also the way these "stories" are told anyway.
  - yunohn 4y ago
    > they're narcissists and various forms of insecure and seek validation in the form of attention and adulation from others This is incredibly insensitive and judgemental. Not sure what I expected from HN, I guess... Why are these "narcissistic" people obliged to provide you with formulaic recipes for free? If the cost is perusing over their feel-good story, I feel it's a fair trade-off.
iudqnolq 4y ago
For some reason whenever this comes up there'll be one person saying "I bet you didn't know it's for copyright" and another saying "I bet you didn't know it's for SEO". I've yet to see either prove anything beyond that it's a plausible explanation that could fit the minimal known facts.
- jackthetab 4y ago
  I can't find the reference atm, but Jeff Jarvis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Jarvis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Jarvis) says that this _is_ to get around copyright law; the same technique was being done over a hundred years ago (possibly more, that's why I want to reference!). Instead of blogs, think pamphlets. The More You Know...
- WorldMaker 4y ago
  I feel alone sometimes as seemingly the one person adding "I bet you didn't know it is because blogs sometimes have regular readers and regular readers drive ad revenue more reliably than SEO or concerns about copyright". I think it fits the facts better, by far, but it's really interesting to see how many HN commenters under-estimate the readership of cooking blogs because they only ever interact with recipes as utilitarian data at the end of a specific web search and aren't often themselves the sorts of people who are the regular audience of recipe blogs so they discount that such audiences exist. (I had my cooking show phase and have friends and loved ones that hooked on the stories of some of the bigger name recipe blogs and I love letting them tell me about the sorts of things they are reading. It's amazing the blinders that the general HN commenter sometimes wears without realizing it.)
gigatexal 4y ago
Really? Hmm. Had no idea
account42 4y ago
How does that work though? Surely the life story won't make the recipe itself more copyrightable, so anyone can still extract and copy that.

flandish 4y ago

Interesting. I always thought it was search engine optimization.

aidenn0 4y ago
SEO is definitely a big part of it; Google penalized pages where people closed or navigated away quickly.
- fbdab103 4y ago
  I immediately bounce from those Stackoverflow clones that keep appearing up at the top of searches. So, I am wondering how much this is still weighted in the scores.
  - jonas21 4y ago
    You might. But many people don't. They just want an answer and don't care if it's a clone or not.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - gdprrrr 4y ago
    https://github.com/quenhus/uBlock-Origin-dev-filter https://github.com/quenhus/uBlock-Origin-dev-filter
  - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
    Leaked Google code: if(bounced && hosts_doubleclick_ads) pagerank++;
water-your-self 4y ago
Its engagement optimization. Adsense pays more if you spend more time on the page
rmbyrro 4y ago
SEO makes total sense. I always add grandma keywords when I'm searching for Python stuff on Google. Like: "grandma, how the hell have I still not memorized the API and keep needing to resort to the same doc pages again and again?" Now I trained ChatGPT with grandma letters from when I was young, so it will answer just like if it was my grandma.
bialpio 4y ago
No reason why it can't be both. The only way to know for sure is to ask the author of the recipe that you're reading. :)

yunohn 4y ago

When is the last time you heard of online recipe blogs enforcing copyright claims on other blogspam? Ridiculous. The real reason is simple, people who write recipes aren’t robots - they’re expressing their stories and emotions, while explaining how to make food that’s dear to them..

fsckboy 4y ago
>people who write recipes aren’t robots - they’re expressing their stories and emotions, while explaining how to make food that’s dear to them.. the people who write recipes aren't robots, they're narcissists and various forms of insecure and seek validation in the form of attention and adulation from others. That's not a bad thing, it's all too human and we should embrace, not stigmatize, the needy, but if all you want is a recipe rather than to be an acolyte it can seem like a big ask. You enjoyed time with your grandparents, and you remember it? Welcome the club! and I remember family as much more complicated than simply being all fun, and I feel like you might be Norman Rockwelling a bit.
- afiori 4y ago
  The theory that recipes are written to make you scroll at least a full screen to show more ads seems much more plausible
  - fsckboy 4y ago
    yes, but you're cart before horse. The structure of paper newspaper and magazine recipe articles and "prose remembrance" cookbooks is the same. Tweaking that model for online use, very plausible, but it's also the way these "stories" are told anyway.
- yunohn 4y ago
  > they're narcissists and various forms of insecure and seek validation in the form of attention and adulation from others This is incredibly insensitive and judgemental. Not sure what I expected from HN, I guess... Why are these "narcissistic" people obliged to provide you with formulaic recipes for free? If the cost is perusing over their feel-good story, I feel it's a fair trade-off.

iudqnolq 4y ago

For some reason whenever this comes up there'll be one person saying "I bet you didn't know it's for copyright" and another saying "I bet you didn't know it's for SEO". I've yet to see either prove anything beyond that it's a plausible explanation that could fit the minimal known facts.

jackthetab 4y ago
I can't find the reference atm, but Jeff Jarvis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Jarvis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Jarvis) says that this _is_ to get around copyright law; the same technique was being done over a hundred years ago (possibly more, that's why I want to reference!). Instead of blogs, think pamphlets. The More You Know...
WorldMaker 4y ago
I feel alone sometimes as seemingly the one person adding "I bet you didn't know it is because blogs sometimes have regular readers and regular readers drive ad revenue more reliably than SEO or concerns about copyright". I think it fits the facts better, by far, but it's really interesting to see how many HN commenters under-estimate the readership of cooking blogs because they only ever interact with recipes as utilitarian data at the end of a specific web search and aren't often themselves the sorts of people who are the regular audience of recipe blogs so they discount that such audiences exist. (I had my cooking show phase and have friends and loved ones that hooked on the stories of some of the bigger name recipe blogs and I love letting them tell me about the sorts of things they are reading. It's amazing the blinders that the general HN commenter sometimes wears without realizing it.)

gigatexal 4y ago

Really? Hmm. Had no idea

account42 4y ago

How does that work though? Surely the life story won't make the recipe itself more copyrightable, so anyone can still extract and copy that.