Checking to see if a headline accurately reflects the article is a poor decision procedure for detecting the presence or absence of spin. The most you can say,

Checking to see if a headline accurately reflects the article is a poor decision procedure for detecting the presence or absence of spin. The most you can say, when they match, is that the headline and the article might have similar spin. But no need to presume, the article is right there. It makes no statement at all about the Microsoft's motivations, let alone the sincerity of them. The phrase "in earnest", on the other hand, asserts a frame for interpreting the event - the same function served by the word "derailing" in the HN headline. Interpretive frames are the very essence of spin.