Comment by toomanyrichies | Hacker News Reader

Comment by toomanyrichies | Hacker News Reader

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> "Accenture ... would cut ... 19,000 jobs" is in the first paragraph

OK, but the actual title is... in the title itself. I think the bigger question is, why did OP feel the need to make this edit? HN guidelines state "...please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize." [1]

> you know exactly what they mean

I didn't, at least not when I first read the headline. As mentioned in other comments, the use of "would" implies a condition, i.e. "Accenture would cut 19k jobs if ____ (some condition were met)." In grammar, it's called the 2nd conditional. [2] That's how "would" is normally used in this context. And if we assume that OP followed the HN guidelines, we'll assume that's what the article is about.

As it turns out, that's not what the article actually says. In this case, I had to click into the article to find that out. By itself, that's only a few wasted seconds. Not a huge deal, but it's not exactly a good thing either. More broadly, if we don't call this kind of thing out when it happens, it will tend to happen more often, and that will affect the user experience of this site.

Maintaining a minimum standard of grammar in headlines is one of the ways we keep this site usable. If English isn't OP's first language, maybe they should be more careful with English-language edits. I don't think that's asking too much.

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

2. https://www.perfect-english-grammar.com/second-conditional.h...

This is actually standard usage of the conditional tense in Indian English.

https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/222166/which-dia...

That's good to know, but it still doesn't justify editing the original title.

it can be argued the title of the article on reuters is misleading or inaccurate, because the cuts are not complete

op meant to say "will", which would have made for a less ambiguous title. but confusing that with "would" is a common mistake, and it's especially forgivable since "would" was used in the introductory paragraph in a way that appears non-conditional

i don't think a simple translation error warrants a bunch of slippery-sloping about The Rules and telling them "if your English isn't perfect, maybe work on that before posting here"

> "if your English isn't perfect, maybe work on that before posting here"

That isn't what I said, is it? I welcome their posts. But if English isn't their first language, maybe they should trust the English-language abilities of the journalist who wrote the headline, rather than thinking they know better or trying to editorialize.

> it can be argued the title of the article on reuters is misleading or inaccurate, because the cuts are not complete

That's not necessarily true. News headlines have a number of grammatical idiosyncracies, of which the use of present-tense to refer to past (or future) actions is one. [1] They're kind of a grammatical minefield, which is all the more reason to trust the original headline author instead of editorializing.

1. https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/learning/general...

While I agree that there's not a good reason for OP to have changed the title, both OP and the journalist are Indian, and saying the OP should 'trust the English-language abilities of the journalist who wrote the headline' is a bit ignorant.

> saying the OP should 'trust the English-language abilities of the journalist who wrote the headline' is a bit ignorant.

Serious question- how is this ignorant? I genuinely don't see how that follows from what I said, since nothing in my comment implies that Indians have inherently inferior English-language communication skills, or that Indian-English is somehow inferior to the vernacular I use. It simply states that one individual (i.e. OP) should have trusted the abilities of another individual (Chavi Mehta, the journalist).

> both OP and the journalist are Indian

I really don't see how the journalist's ethnicity is relevant, and I'd love some clarification on why you do. Regardless of where they're from, they were hired by Reuters, a news outlet which publishes content in English. I'd be willing to bet that they were vetted for this job at least in part on their ability to write in the vernacular used by Reuters. OP had no reason to doubt the effectiveness of that process, and should therefore have "trusted the English-language abilities of the journalist...", as I said.

OP themself was a bit ignorant (of the HN guidelines, not in the sense that you mean) when they edited the headline. It's also a bit arrogant for them to assume they're better at crafting headlines than the entire team responsible for publishing the story (the journalist, their editor, the Reuters proofreaders, etc.).

All that said, I've already invested way more effort into this conversation than is warranted by OP's (relatively minor) faux pas. I decline to continue participating.

> nothing in my comment implies that Indians have inherently inferior English-language communication skills

I’m not sure how implying English is not their first language does not call English language communication skills into question. Incidentally, you are likely correct, as very few Indians speak English as a first language.

> I really don't see how the journalist's ethnicity is relevant, and I'd love some clarification on why you do.

Ethnicity is not relevant, cultural context is. Likely neither OP nor the journalist speak English as a first language.

> It's also a bit arrogant for them to assume they're better at crafting headlines than the entire team responsible for publishing the story

Reuters is a news agency. Their headlines are supposed to be uneditorialised almost by definition. It’s not about being “better at crafting headlines”, it’s about adding an editorial slant to a neutral headline. I agree that it was the wrong thing to do, but news outlets the world over will “craft” different headlines for this story based on the same wire story.

> I decline to continue participating.

OK.

It could be perfectly correct (if rather quaint) meaning Accenture (personified) would like or wishes to cut jobs. As in Accenture would that these people were no longer employed, or would rather fire than keep them.

That's kind of a stretch though, wouldn't you agree? I would be hard-pressed to name a major news source that typically constructs their headlines this way.

In any case, it still doesn't explain the intent behind editing the original title. I would argue that "this headline needs more quaintness" is not a valid reason to editorialize here.

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