alt Hacker NewsThis is standard HN moderation. The title was linkbait, so we changed it.
From https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html: "Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait". Note the unless.
When we do this, we try to find a representative phrase from the article itself that accurately and neutrally represents what the article is about. There is nearly always one of those if you look for it. In this way, we (mostly) avoid having to make up wording of our own, which is something we don't like to do.
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
Replies
What’s the definition of linkbait in this case? I can’t find a good definition online, as the best I can find is “content designed to attract backlinks”, which this does not appear to be / isn’t related to the title?
Thank you for your service, dang. You do a great job keeping HN a great site. I disagree with your decision regarding changing the title, though. Yes, it's tongue-in-cheek, but I wouldn't call it bait.
I wonder how HN anno 1968 would have moderated "Go To Statement Considered Harmful". *
* Amusing side note: Dijkstra's submitted title was actually "A Case Against the Goto Statement" but the editor editorialized it.