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[New Rule discussion] No Editorializing Article Titles. The original title of the article must be used.

Edit: This rule seems to be much more nuanced and requires more thought than we had put in, please continue to discuss below.

It is NOT in effect at this time but highly recommend for regional subreddits at least.

The above rule has been added to the instance and will be enforced instance wide. This rule is very common within most existing communities where news articles are shared and avoids sensationalizing the story or attempts at steering discussion by the user posting the article.

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11 comments

  • This seems like exactly the sort of rule that should be applied at the community level. Instance level rules should be kept as minimal as possible.

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  • I am not a fan of this being instance wide. It's so common for linked sites to change headlines. And it removes discretion from the community leaders.

    Sure, recommend that communities like !Winnipeg apply the rule, or whatever. But I'd hate to have to apply it in !Geology -- I just don't want to have to police it.

    And if you have a bot doing the policing, there's going to be so many false positives.

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    • Thank you for the feedback. I've only generally moderated regional subreddits so I would like to understand what communities and in what situations editorializing the title of the article would be appropriate and/or beneficial. While discussing this rule none of us had a concern with it.

      Every decision made is always up for being reassessed after feedback from users, and at least I do and I believe everyone else involved welcomes criticism.

      Edit to respond to the edit:

      • I'm curious in what situation an article link posted in !Geology would need a editorialized title. Why would it be more appropriate in ! Geology than in !Winnipeg?

      • I dislike all forms of bot policing that isn't then verified by a human. Every bot I've seen indeed has way too much false positives.

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      • I would not be opposed to this being a server wide rule in the context of regional communities - it avoids political editorializing, and probably creates a rule uniformity in that context. However, rather than making it site-wide, I'd instead approach those moderators (like myself in Winnipeg), and say: "hey, this is how we'd like the regional communities moderated" and I'll happily assent and apply those rules fairly, 99% of the time ;)

        But for topic oriented communities... The most basic example is to edit the title to remove jargon. Jargon is great if you're a scientist and already know the jargon, but to appeal more widely, you want to tone that down. And often you need the title to be modified to reflect the direct relevance to the community. Sure, you can make a note in the attached text blurb, but that often lands below the cut, or doesn't get read.

        Another example: !geologycareers, for example, assuming it becomes a landing place for r/geologycareers eventually (I moderate that one on reddit), when someone posts a job opening, they will almost always need to modify the title to include the regional relevance.

        In !printSF, if someone is posting a book sale on Amazon and linking to the page directly, the fact that it's a sale is not part of the title. The title should read something like: "[Canada/US] Book one of Foobar's Series is discounted to $1.99 right now." even if directly linking to the book on amazon.

        As a more extreme example: In !spacemusic, pretty much all titles are edited to fit the form Track by Artist (or similar) -- because that's the form.

        So basically, the more the community is topic oriented rather than regionally oriented, the more the title needs to be "BLUF" -- Bottom Line Up Front.

        I would probably relocate some of these topic oriented communities to other servers and try to establish them there if this rule was instance wide.

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  • Since Lemmy titles can be edited, this seems fair. I don't think posters should be required to update titles to match edited headlines however I believe it should be recommended.

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  • what if the original article title is already massively "editorialized" and you're just making it more informative? 🤔 "You WON'T believe what Russia did today!"

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  • I don't mean to be nitpicking but if the rule is zero-tolerance I think we should clear up the edge cases. I hope you don't take this the wrong way.

    • What happens when the original title is misleading or clickbait? Personally I like how HN handles things in this case (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html).
    • How about if you want to ask a question about a news article as the main focus of the post, but also want to include context about the article?
    • Or if you're making the post to discuss a related topic, and include multiple articles?
    • On that note, what even counts as a news article? What if I post a link to a reddit thread about a news article?
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    • You're really making me think here. Thank you!

      What happens when the original title is misleading or clickbait? Personally I like how HN handles things in this case

      Probably should find another source in that case, but as with other examples brought up, I think a situation like this could be dealt with at moderator discretion.

      How about if you want to ask a question about a news article as the main focus of the post, but also want to include context about the article?

      Your question should be in the body of the post not the title really but hard to say without a solid example.

      Or if you’re making the post to discuss a related topic, and include multiple articles?

      Hey an easy question! That would be fine.

      On that note, what even counts as a news article? What if I post a link to a reddit thread about a news article?

      We don't speak of that place here do we?

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