Reminds me a bit of terrible zero-tolerance rules that you see in schools nowadays. It's easier to enforce a "simple policy" with no exceptions than to make judgements, but that doesn't mean it's better.
This re-titling, if I understand correctly, is already a manual process, right?
So this is less "Hey PG, could you wash my dishes and do my laundry" and more "Hey PG, could you please stop loading up my dishwasher with dirty socks?" The labor is already being done, but at least one of the people doing it seems to be doing it in cases where it is detrimental.
It's more like PG agreeing to do your laundry, but under the condition that he will put all colors together, regardless of your wishes, instructions or special sorting of laundry before you give it to him. He's willing to do some work for you, just not as much as you would like. It may even seem like he does more work, when clothes that were pre-sorted into single load sized chunks end up mixed together, but that's his process. If you want sorted laundry, use a different service.
I guess what I should be saying is that this laundry service is ripe for disruption by a more flexible newcomer. But I wouldn't say that, because that would be a low, cheap joke that would prevent me from looking too long at myself in the mirror.
To be clear, my issue is not the HN policy (as far as I understand it). I am 100% A-Okay with HN moderators reverting editorialized titles.
My issue is with the HN moderator[s] who are not using common sense while executing this policy. When an informative title gets changed to an information-free title, it is detrimental to the site. The point of using moderators to do this instead of auto-reverting all titles is so that the moderators can use some judgement. That is great, so long as they actually do that.
There is nobody doing this work for HN that doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt, and then some. HN doesn't have a lot of moderators; it is intimately intertwined with YC the firm (something I've pointed out on HN before). Moderating it is a tricky problem.
This is an unfair comment. You're essentially turning a healthy, non-personal discussion on how best to evolve HN submission policies into one where its the dissenters vs. PG.
Worse, you then tack on hypothetical (and frankly ridiculous) extensions like making coffee or doing laundry (both are personal tasks with no relevance to the HN community).
I'd like to believe the community is mature enough to debate this issue without having to be subtly threatened with PG's authority.
