When posting a link to an article, I occasionally find that the title of the article doesn't best describe the content, is unnecessarily link-baity, is overly simplistic, or is bombastic.

As a result, I will title my post with what I think is a more-appropriate title for the article. Most of the time these are subtle changes. For example, today I changed the article: 10 questions about Nasa's 'impossible' space drive answered to Questions about Nasa's 'impossible' space drive answered as I find listacles to be annoying, and a question count to be unnecessary.

In other posts, I added some information, changing Scientists threaten to boycott €1.2bn Human Brain Project to Scientists threaten boycott of European commission-funded Human Brain Project, and changing Sony admits defeat in e-reader battle with Amazon to Sony admits defeat in battle with Amazon, discontinues e-reader.

Most of the time these edits are fairly innocuous. However, I wonder thoughts you all might have on the matter.

IMHO, titles are often the weakest part of a journalistic piece, and as they are typically decided by the editor, and not the author of the article, I don't feel compelled to mirror them on my post. Personally, I'd prefer that my feed be comprised of titles that reflect the content behind them, and nothing more.


posted 3548 days ago