6 ms·
Startup founders stop using obscenity and cuss words
by njx 14y ago
Startup founders stop using obscenity and cuss words
- diego 14y agoWhy? "Fuck" is an extremely expressive word when used properly. Entrepreneurs must have a thick skin, and know when to use "fuck" and similar words.
- columbo 14y ago>Why? Obviously the only way to answer this is with personal opinion. For me, whenever I see a blog post with "why this fucking sucks" or other language I'm not necessarily offended. However I do feel like I'm suddenly talking to a child. Fuck, Fucking, Fuckshit etc isn't shocking or expressive anymore. It's just an indicator of inexperience. I can't seem to get my point across so instead I'll say I can't seem to get my FUCKING point across.
- Swizec 14y agoWhen writing I often use the word "fuck" or something similar to put a certain feel on a phrase. For effect. Not because it's offensive or a cuss word per se, but because I want the phrase to make a certain sound when the reader reads it. It's a perfectly useful stylistic flourish when used appropriately. (just like deliberately using bad grammar can be ... or emoticons ... or sometimes even putting a delimiting punctuation, but not actually delimiting a sentence)
- pyre 14y agoWe'll know it's out of hand when it's commonplace for marketing copy to say "Fucking use our product, bitch!"
- bane 14y agoI think that happened in the 90s in the video game market. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c1/Daikatana_ad_-_John_Romero_is_about_to_make_you_his_bitch_-_Suck_it_down.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c1/Daikatana_ad_-...
- TillE 14y agoYeah, that was not well-received. Though the problem really isn't the "bad language", it's the deliberate rape metaphor that makes it tasteless at best.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- diego 14y agoI appreciate your assessment of my intelligence based on your knowledge of my history, writing and actions. I fudging appreciate it. Or perhaps you aren't smart enough to use the word "you" correctly.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- ams6110 14y agoUsing obscenities is almost always the lazy way out. Its presence signals that whatever is being said might not be totally serious. It's a marker of casual speech, and emotional thinking.
- diego 14y agoI disagree. George Carlin was a master at it, and he was anything but lazy. As for being a marker of casual speech / emotional thinking, sometimes that's exactly what you want to convey.
- iamwil 14y agoIs that the main point of the article? Is that the most interesting point you can make after reading it? Just because something minor in the article offends some semblence of sensibility in you doesn't make it a good topic of discussion on HN. In fact, it's just a knee-jerk reaction from you, and if anything, you're just trolling.
- dkrich 14y agoThe article is being discussed, and certainly the words that constitute the article are fair game. I use profanity all the time. I love it. I go to the bar to hear casual assessments riddled with profanity. I come to HN to read serious discourse. Once the author sets the tone with a title of that nature, he is speaking to his audience in a condescending way that lacks respect. It's a cheap attempt at eyeball grabbing and that is why it is annoying, not that it offends anybody's sensibilities. It's not professional and after reading the first few sentences I had lost any respect for the author, which is probably unfair but his own fault for poorly choosing his language. He's not a fucking rapper, he's guest-blogging on a tech news site. Use some fucking professionalism.
- dbecker 14y agoI would guess you are in the minority on this one, and vast majority of readers don't care about obscenities.