Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by n1 on Sunday May 24 2015, @06:06PM   Printer-friendly
from the unedited-perspectives dept.

Myself and other submitters have noticed that articles are being edited to change the tone and intent of our stories.

Soylentil McD has suggested that "Minor edits, spelling corrections, and such, are no problem and to be expected." but "I think soylent editors should adhere to a policy of not putting words in the submitter's mouth".

I agree with that. If the editors want to add their own two cents, they can respond inline like the rest of us. Their role here is to be responsible, not privileged.

The stories we submit are a reflection of our enthusiasms and beliefs, the tone and character of those posts is as much part of the submitter's story as the actual content. The community is what makes sites like SN and Slashdot before it, an eclectic community with a wide range of opinions, styles and passions will always be more active and interesting than a bland monoculture. SN's editors should embrace and encourage that diversity, not sabotage it to appease some corporate interests.

So what do other Soylentils think? Should the submissions be allowed to stand as a clear reflection of the community's intent, or should the editors change our submissions to suit their perception of suitability?

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 24 2015, @09:07PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 24 2015, @09:07PM (#187341)

    I've submitted stuff to this site and seen it slightly edited. This is fine, I had a scoop but didn't understand enough to write a detailed summary - this was improved upon by the edits made.

    However I would like some indication that edits have been made. Not that interesting since I post anonymously, but for those that want to maintain a reputation it's nice for the reader to know that the message has been edited.

    My main beef is not the editing, but the offtopic, non-tech news. This site uses categories but when something offtopic comes along, it's just shoved in a random one, e.g. this article about someone famous for TV stuff: https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=15/05/11/013228 [soylentnews.org]

    It's categorized under "digital liberties".

    Maybe just stick to the categories, and maybe don't publish articles like these if they don't fit the categories.

    If you're still worried you need stuff like this to maintain visitors, put up a category for it! Maybe like Slashdot's "Idle" category. Also makes it easier to filter such articles out programatically.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 24 2015, @10:18PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 24 2015, @10:18PM (#187375)

    Soylent is not a tech news site [soylentnews.org].

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2015, @07:01PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 25 2015, @07:01PM (#187695)

      Looks like we need a non-tech category then.

      Although honestly these non-tech articles make up such a tiny fraction of the whole of articles published, they feel really out of place and come across as a scream for attention.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2015, @12:34AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 26 2015, @12:34AM (#187792)

        Maybe the summaries need to explain in more detail why certain news is tech-related. Or why it's newsworthy.

        It's a bit like the summaries on /. which feature news about a certain company, or technology, without ever explaining what that company/technology is all about. Similarly, the TV personality articles on soylent have this same vibe, an arrogant "you should already know about this". Soylent and /. are US-centric, but it would help to give a bit more info for those who don't live there.