Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of” • Hacker News Board

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#401

Post by sebzim4500 » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:33 PM UTC

jzb wrote: post #358

cogitoergofutuo wrote: post #307

I love these one-person crusades against present reality. Words mean whatever a critical mass of people want them to mean. For example, the usage of the present tense here: "Composed of" and "consists of" are better alternatives. is incorrect. It should read: Composed of" and "consists of" were better alternatives. This thread is literally a clout ATM machine for a group comprised of pedants.

Allow me to quote you back to you. "It’s also not really serverless to begin with, because at the end of the day code is being executed on a physical device that many of us might call a “server” [1] A critical mass of people have adopted the term serverless. Therefore, the term means whatever they want it to mean, right? No sense in swimming against the tide here, correct? Yes, words mean what people want them to mea…

Just because he's a hypocrite doesn't mean he's wrong in this instance.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#402

Post by kolinko » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:34 PM UTC

SilasX wrote: post #386

jzb wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Allow me to quote you back to you. "It’s also not really serverless to begin with, because at the end of the day code is being executed on a physical device that many of us might call a “server” [1] A critical mass of people have adopted the term serverless. Therefore, the term means whatever they want it to mean, right? No sense in swimming against the tide here, correct? Yes, words mean what people want them to mea…

Semi-related, it always bothered me that we use the term "wireless" for something that still has wires (just not between the endpoints). Though I don't object, or have a better alternative, and I get the logic of calling it wireless.

"Radio" would be a proper replacement for "wireless".

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#403

Post by dataflow » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:35 PM UTC

amelius wrote: post #397

dataflow wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is telling a billion people what to do though? We're just talking about what word to use in an article edited by a handful of people. The billion people can keep using whatever words they want.

The billion people prefer to read the language that they also use, in all its glory. What you're defending is a bit like replacing all female TV hosts by men and then saying that nobody surely is against men on TV.

Do you really believe the loss society would suffer from editing "comprised of" in Wikipedia articles is actually comparable to what it would suffer if they discriminated against half the population on TV?

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#404

Post by oezi » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:36 PM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #244

prepend wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like the editor is just fishing for a reason to make lots of edits and backed into logic so their stuff doesn’t get reverted. I love wikis and knowledge bases but this is exactly the kind of stuff that detracts. On one case, who cares what this person does with their time. On the other case, it wastes the attention of 90k authors who need to figure out whether they care and have their writing style overridde…

> On the other case, it wastes the attention of 90k authors who need to figure out whether they care and have their writing style overridden by a rando. On the other hand, if you're editing wikipedia and you expect your writing to not be subject to rando edits, you won't last long.

Rando edits by pedantic a*-hats who don't care about the actual topic but their weird crusade. /s

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#405

Post by nitwit005 » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:38 PM UTC

dataflow wrote: post #352

cogitoergofutuo wrote: post #307

I love these one-person crusades against present reality. Words mean whatever a critical mass of people want them to mean. For example, the usage of the present tense here: "Composed of" and "consists of" are better alternatives. is incorrect. It should read: Composed of" and "consists of" were better alternatives. This thread is literally a clout ATM machine for a group comprised of pedants.

What I don't quite understand is the resistance. It's a fact that some people (and I mean readers, not the editors) don't like, understand, and/or accept the new meaning of this word, whether we like it or not. Whereas everyone should be agreeing that the alternatives are fine. So if you have an alternative everyone is fine with... it seems like a no-brainer to use it? When you have something that everyone is happy w…

I dislike the way you communicate. It's wrong. I don't care if a majority of people agree with you. That doesn't matter.

Can't see why anyone would be annoyed.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#406

Post by cogitoergofutuo » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:38 PM UTC

jzb wrote: post #358

cogitoergofutuo wrote: post #307

I love these one-person crusades against present reality. Words mean whatever a critical mass of people want them to mean. For example, the usage of the present tense here: "Composed of" and "consists of" are better alternatives. is incorrect. It should read: Composed of" and "consists of" were better alternatives. This thread is literally a clout ATM machine for a group comprised of pedants.

Allow me to quote you back to you. "It’s also not really serverless to begin with, because at the end of the day code is being executed on a physical device that many of us might call a “server” [1] A critical mass of people have adopted the term serverless. Therefore, the term means whatever they want it to mean, right? No sense in swimming against the tide here, correct? Yes, words mean what people want them to mea…

That’s great example! That post is an unserious riff as a response to another post that meant to assert the correctness an individual’s personal definition of a term on what I found to be tenuous pedantic grounds.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#407

Post by nirvdrum » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:39 PM UTC

cogitoergofutuo wrote: post #307

I love these one-person crusades against present reality. Words mean whatever a critical mass of people want them to mean. For example, the usage of the present tense here: "Composed of" and "consists of" are better alternatives. is incorrect. It should read: Composed of" and "consists of" were better alternatives. This thread is literally a clout ATM machine for a group comprised of pedants.

If words don't matter, then ignore the edits. People tend to copy what they see. If they see it written with the original definition, maybe that's what the hivemind will adopt. I don't see a problem with that and I don't see the point in attacking people that care. I'm sure you have things in your life you care about.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#408

Post by nirvdrum » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:40 PM UTC

woooooo wrote: post #364

dataflow wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't quite understand is the resistance. It's a fact that some people (and I mean readers, not the editors) don't like, understand, and/or accept the new meaning of this word, whether we like it or not. Whereas everyone should be agreeing that the alternatives are fine. So if you have an alternative everyone is fine with... it seems like a no-brainer to use it? When you have something that everyone is happy w…

There are a billion of us speaking the language. It's a little presumptuous to tell a billion people what to do and there should probably be some amount of default resistance.

Wouldn't this argument cut both ways? Presumably the people that started using the phrase incorrectly were bucking the trend.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#409

Post by nitwit005 » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:41 PM UTC

s1artibartfast wrote: post #361

Retric wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Semantic drift means it is no longer the wrong word.

What do you call the intermediate stage where half of people have one definition and other half have a different one?

That's the period where teachers tell millions of students that "can I" is wrong, you should say "may I".

The teachers lost that battle, like they'll lose all the similar battles to come, because they were trying to enforce communicating like old people.

Re: Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

#410

Post by gnulinux » Sat, May 06, 2023, 5:43 PM UTC

nirvdrum wrote: post #407

cogitoergofutuo wrote: post #307

I love these one-person crusades against present reality. Words mean whatever a critical mass of people want them to mean. For example, the usage of the present tense here: "Composed of" and "consists of" are better alternatives. is incorrect. It should read: Composed of" and "consists of" were better alternatives. This thread is literally a clout ATM machine for a group comprised of pedants.

If words don't matter, then ignore the edits. People tend to copy what they see. If they see it written with the original definition, maybe that's what the hivemind will adopt. I don't see a problem with that and I don't see the point in attacking people that care. I'm sure you have things in your life you care about.

No, the point is words do matter, and they mean what people think they mean. Not people from 100 years ago from a prestige university who wrote a dictionary. Languages are fluid, they change and when they do change the present reality is the way the language is spoken.