The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear • Hacker News Board

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#31

Post by mrob » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:23 PM UTC

moate wrote: post #25

Joe-Z wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not. Calling bullshit out is exactly what I want to see. There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in EDIT: It's 30 links...

What about this title wouldn't give you the information you needed to decide if this is something you may be interested in?

I already know that killer whales attack great white sharks. I'm only interested in reading the article if it's about some other predator, but they deliberately omit the identity from the title to force me to click to find out. That is clickbait.

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#32

Post by navigatesol » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:24 PM UTC

Joe-Z wrote: post #23

kbenson wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question the title raises is answered in the first paragraph, which consists of two sentences. I really wish we could get past this phase of referring to every title that tries to gather interest by using a little bit of mystery as clickbait in a pejorative way. There's a middle ground between writing being manipulative and misleading and writing being fact based and dry.

I do not. Calling bullshit out is exactly what I want to see. There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in EDIT: It's 30 links...

>There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in

Right, because your life is so busy with important things like "scanning HN" that you can't spare 15 seconds finding out what "the predator" is by clicking the link.

>I don't need "a little bit of mystery"

The site doesn't exist to cater to your specific desires.

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#33

Post by navigatesol » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:26 PM UTC

kbenson wrote: post #30

Joe-Z wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not. Calling bullshit out is exactly what I want to see. There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in EDIT: It's 30 links...

Have you considered that the way the title is written can act as another channel for information about the article? Is the informational content the only reason to read something here? I've read plenty of entertaining things here that I have no utilitatlrion use of the information (if there exists one) afterwards. Do I really care that great white sharks are scared of orcas? Will that likely ever be useful to me beyo…

Some people on this site will complain or ask for a TL;DR if the content isn't written like AWS documentation. Is normal.

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#34

Post by Joe-Z » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:27 PM UTC

moate wrote: post #25

Joe-Z wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not. Calling bullshit out is exactly what I want to see. There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in EDIT: It's 30 links...

What about this title wouldn't give you the information you needed to decide if this is something you may be interested in?

I just want to be able to browse a news aggregating site and have a rough idea of what the article is about. So why have me click on the article only to find out "oh, it's about interactions between great whites and orcas" when you can just put that information in the title.

Sure, if I'm clicking on anything fish-related anyway that may not be a problem. But the title as it is phrased now clearly leaves out a key bit of information, namely who this predator is. That's disingenuous and the reason why I support calling it out as clickbait (i.e. "click on this link just to find out what it is actually about!")

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#35

Post by mark_l_watson » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:29 PM UTC

I had a bad experience with a killer whale when I was returning to San Diego from Catalina Island in my rather small Columbia 22 sailboat (this was around 1977).

A killer whale jumped out of the water to the level of the top of my mast 4 times. Each time it landed horizontally right next to my boat, almost tipping the boat over with the splash/wave it created. I laid down in the bottom of the cockpit reaching up to steer my boat and I told my girlfriend to go below decks and lay on the floor to keep our weight as low in the boat as possible. At the top of the 4 jumps out of the water, I saw a black beady little eye staring down at me.

I was very relieved when it left the area.

EDIT: I bought a bigger sailboat

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#36

Post by AzzieElbab » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:33 PM UTC

"One of the whales rammed and killed the shark, and the duo proceeded to eat its liver" - is it hard to get a nice Chianti near the Farallon Islands?

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#37

Post by Joe-Z » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:34 PM UTC

kbenson wrote: post #30

Joe-Z wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not. Calling bullshit out is exactly what I want to see. There's like 20 links on one page of HN for me, I don't need "a little bit of mystery" when I want to scan what I may be interested in EDIT: It's 30 links...

Have you considered that the way the title is written can act as another channel for information about the article? Is the informational content the only reason to read something here? I've read plenty of entertaining things here that I have no utilitatlrion use of the information (if there exists one) afterwards. Do I really care that great white sharks are scared of orcas? Will that likely ever be useful to me beyo…

I also appreciate HN for the interesting things I find out about the world that I would've never otherwise found out. I also not only read it for the informational content but can appreciate good writing.

And yes, of course there should be artistic liberty in choosing an interesting title. But this title I think is just disingenuous. There's nothing lost if you put the key information you clearly left out in the title. It is clearly only worded this way so people click on it to find out who this mysterious predator is. That's why it's called clickbait (kind of funny actually, considering it's a story about marine life... but I digress)

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#38

Post by Shalle135 » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:34 PM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #35

I had a bad experience with a killer whale when I was returning to San Diego from Catalina Island in my rather small Columbia 22 sailboat (this was around 1977). A killer whale jumped out of the water to the level of the top of my mast 4 times. Each time it landed horizontally right next to my boat, almost tipping the boat over with the splash/wave it created. I laid down in the bottom of the cockpit reaching up to s…

I’m not sure about how orcas work. But in Norway you can dive with them (not recommended because you disturb them) and not a single person has been attacked there in recorded history (~200 years).

It may be that it was just curious about you, but heck they might just wanted a snack as well.

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#39

Post by 98codes » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:35 PM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #35

I had a bad experience with a killer whale when I was returning to San Diego from Catalina Island in my rather small Columbia 22 sailboat (this was around 1977). A killer whale jumped out of the water to the level of the top of my mast 4 times. Each time it landed horizontally right next to my boat, almost tipping the boat over with the splash/wave it created. I laid down in the bottom of the cockpit reaching up to s…

mark_l_watson: "We're gonna need a bigger boat"

Re: The Predator That Makes Great White Sharks Flee in Fear

#40

Post by jasonlaramburu » Mon, Apr 22, 2019, 4:38 PM UTC

PorterDuff wrote: post #8

I wonder if lifeboats couldn't carry a little device that sounds (or smells) like a killer whale. Maybe sharks are never really that much of a problem.

Could be useful for surfers as well!