
Ask HN: Why does HN remove the word “Why” from the start of a title? - farazzz
Try it: make a post with a title like “Why I [rest of title]” - the title will be automatically converted to “I [rest of title]”, but you can add it back in an edit.<p>It also only seems to do it when “Why” is followed by “I”.<p>Is the reasoning behind this documented anywhere? Possibly to prevent click bait?
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gus_massa
It's not documented, but most features here are not documented. The most
similar part of the guidelines is:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

> _If the original title includes the name of the site, please take it out,
> because the site name will be displayed after the link._

> _If the original title begins with a number or number + gratuitous
> adjective, we 'd appreciate it if you'd crop it. E.g. translate "10 Ways To
> Do X" to "How To Do X," and "14 Amazing Ys" to "Ys." Exception: when the
> number is meaningful, e.g. "The 5 Platonic Solids."_

For an official reply you can contact the mods hn@ycombinator.com

My guess is that most articles with a title like " _I ate a banana every day_
" are not just an assertion, but they have some kind of justification and are
equivalent to " _Why I ate a banana every day_ ", and HN prefer the minimalist
version.

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arduinomancer
Interesting.

I wonder why they don’t like the ones with numbers. Maybe those types of
articles tend to be click bait?

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gus_massa
Still guessing … I think that the title of most listicles start with a number,
like "42 arbitrary chosen food to eat on Tuesday!!!"

(HN used to filter the "!" too. Probably the filter is still there.)

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quickthrower2
What about this title:

Why I? Analysis of the 9th letter of the alphabet.

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gadders
"Why I - How people from Newcastle greet each other, written phonetically."

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thisone
Y eye man

