The parent comment started the distraction it was complaining about. This is common enough on the internet that there's a name for it: concern trolling. Of course I don't mean that the GP was trolling in the classical sense of trying to ruin the thread, but we have to judge these things by effects (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...), not intent, and the effects were clear.
If you care about threads not becoming distracted, the primary thing to cultivate is restraint. There's also downvoting and flagging. And anyone who notices a major distraction in a thread is very welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com so we can look into it. That doesn't have to be a political flamewar—it could be just a generic tangent sitting as the top subthread.
Please don't take HN threads further into political flamewar. It's not what this site is for, and this is extremely off topic no matter how right you are.
> politics aren't focused on making your life worse, or making you feel unwelcome.
Oh they are, I just prefer to focus on good things rather than bad things.
> things are pretty good for you.
Things are pretty good for me, but it's not because of politics.
I'm not refuting your generalization about the slogan and how some people perceive it. It's definitely not good that we're in a situation where this is happening.
Please be very careful about assuming things about other people, else you will fall into the same trap as people of hate. I never indicated that the slogan and its background don't apply to me, and I'm not dismissing it.
I don't want this to become an arguement or be dismissive of anyone's views, I just want to make sure that people don't drag politics into a place where it doesn't belong, and not to make bad assumptions which don't help at all.
> Oh they are, I just prefer to focus on good things rather than bad things.
If you can afford not to focus on them, then trust me, they are absolutely not focused on doing that. Your experiences is very different from those who are actually suffering from them.
> Things are pretty good for me, but it's not because of politics.
Only because you class those things that go in your favour as "not politics" and only those that challenge your position as "politics".
It's become a well-known catch phrase now. It's only a distraction if you find yourself offended by it, which frankly with everything that's going on right now, is pretty thin-skinned.
As it currently stands, 15 out of 24 comments in this thread are about the phrasing in the title. It has demonstrably become a distraction, at least in this post.
It's not just a title, it's what the article is about, making llvm fast again is the whole point of author's effort. He presents reason for regression in this area throughout the time (regressions on compile time are not captured vs ie. regressions on produced binary performance are). This is a problem ie. julia is heavily dependant on llvm compile times and julia authors mention that every time they're bumping llvm version they're scared about how much performance will degrade.
Once again: if you are writing an article about LLVM performance, and you have the choice between the title "Make LLVM fast again" and something else, you will likely have more success with your article if you pick something else.
I'm advising writers that some people reading their content may make this association, so they should avoid the phrase unless that is their deliberate intent.
I personally don't disagree (and don't like that you're being downvoted for making a point), I just think the delta between the two is so small that it's not even worth discussing, let alone self-censoring for.
You read it despite this sensitivity. What audience are you describing that won't read this based on the title? What is the net loss to the author and to them of them missing out on the content because of their decision? What is the long term implication of developing a social contract that requires you avoid any speech that is similar to any speech of political platforms that some portion, potentially a majority, of your audience opposes?
It sounds like a linguistic death spiral to me. Good luck.
Thanks for saying it, even if it lands you at the bottom of the thread. Agreed completely. It's not about "being offended" (whatever that even means) but about being in poor taste. Nobody would be surprised if a post titled "All Drives Matter" elicited strong negative reactions from readers, even if it was "literally about drive selection in a RAID array" or whatever. Consciously or not, this title is doing exactly the same thing.
Language has context and meaning outside of its immediate definition and will affect the perception of your written word. Don't make people think of authoritarianism and kids huddled in cages if you want to share your cool technical insights with the world.
Exactly. It's not associated with Trump - so why not pick a title that doesn't risk people even having to ask that question?
The author of this piece is based in Berlin. I'm certain they weren't thinking about any negative potential connotations that this title could hold - they were just reusing a common phrase.
But why change it then? If the article has no connection, then the people complaining are the issue, they should fix themselves, it's not the author's job to cater to that.
By using this title, it is the author, not readers, that brings politics into the discussion. It has a connection, right there in the title.
Maybe it is just a joke, a way to boost clicks, or some kind of myopic view that says technical people are above politics, a mix of that, none of the above, I don't know.
But let's not pretend it was not made on purpose.
Authors constantly adapt their writing to their audience.
Alternative titles that convey more information, invites no political discussion, and don't break HN guidelines:
- "Speeding up LLVM by 10%"
- "Reducing compilation times for LLVM 11"
- "10 optimisations for LLVM" (ok this one is click-baity)
Alternative titles the author would probably have self-consored to cater to audiences:
- "Guess what LLVM? hash tables faster than linear lookup" (accusatory, rude)
- "LLVM getting a Summer Body" (fatphobic)
- "Honey I Shrunk the Compilation Time", "Oh Hi CTMark" (pop-culture is generational, and frankly those jokes are horrible)
Yes, and it's a pretty terrible one. It normalizes language used by a... let's say very controversial figure. Transplanting it to contexts where it might make some sense serves to validate the original use.
If someone critical of the US President "ironically" uses the phrase, as in "Foo is slow, so let's make Foo fast again", they inadvertently construct or reinforce a notion of "America was not great, which is why we needed to make America great again" -- something they might not agree with. Also, it's just constantly giving more exposure to someone who already has way too much of it. They would be running a political figure's propaganda for them. Many people will want to do that, but also very many people would not want to do it and should think a bit about a slogan's context before adopting it.
(I'm aware that others across the US political spectrum have used the phrase in the past. It doesn't matter, it is currently very strongly associated with one person.)
What would be a terse way to (not ironically) express the notion that some thing X has gotten worse over time, and that we want to return it to a state where it is objectively the same or better than it was before?
Or maybe "Getting LLVM to compile as fast as it used to."
And 10 years ago I would have maybe suggested "Make LLVM fast again" but now it has become so strongly associated with a political party that I avoid it, precisely to avoid turning technical writings into political flamewars.
I mean, America does have serious issues that make it not nearly great as it could be.
Trump doesn't seem to be addressing those issues, but there is nothing wrong with the implication that America has lost some of its lustre.
Just like the author of a post called "Make LLVM Fast Again" may have identified a problem without actually fixing it. The first step to improvement is identifying the problem. LLVM has problems, America has problems. Seems fine to me.
I like it. If it’s intentional and kind of cheeky the way I interpreted it then I see no issue. It’s funnier and less bland than some strictly technical alternative. If it’s just an innocent call to action and just coincidentally happened to be a nod to the campaign slogan then that’s fine, too. There’s really nothing worth pointing out here.
This is a great post full of really interesting technical details. Don't be put off by the title!