I'm assuming that you simply didn't read past the first paragraph? (That's fine, I bet we all do that way too often here) I mean, I have a hard time believing that you really can't tell that a post that states that everybody uses FORTRAN isn't serious.
I care because HN has a way of ruining satire and sarcasm this way. These are only the delightful stylistic devices that they are when you don't say that it's satire (resp sarcasm). I truly wish we'd all "/s" a little less, not more :-)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM
Invariably, someone replies with a comment like "People should be aware that this is not actually an Australian senator, it is the comedian John Clarke impersonating one."
Every. Single. Time.
As if it wouldn't be obvious after watching the first few minutes of the video!
What ever happened to the fun of not realizing something is satire until you're partway into it?
(also, hey skrebbel! :)
Yes and no. Here on HN I see it everyday: good on-topic jokes get downvoted.
I suspect this happens because when people are in "HN mode" there comes a sort of earnestness into their state that makes it hard to detect other tonalities.
P.S. I needed the FORTRAN bit until it dawned on me…
Or even carefully qualified statements! I think folks here drop "most" and "typically" and similar words as they read. You have to write poorly, qualifying everything three times and disavowing a bunch of stuff you obviously aren't saying or even implying anyway, to make sure you don't get a bunch of pointless comments.
Yeah, I've noticed that when I get sarcastic or snarky, it's very often an invitation to being downvoted. I can't tell if it's because people don't get the sarcasm or snarkiness, get it but are offended that I'm using it at all (especially without an "/s"), or are offended that I'm being snarky about [insert sacred technolibertarian cow here]. :)
That said, if you feel like `/s` is ruining the sarcasm for you, the solution is pretty simple. GreaseMonkey [0] should be able to remove it very easily, while adding it would be _a bit_ more challenging.
[0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/greasemonkey/
True. I'm sometimes a source for similarly controversial statements. However, the following line should suffice to indicate the facetiousness of the post:
> This is the same reason that everyone uses FORTRAN.
Everyone does not use FORTRAN, and in fact it is so uncommonly used that it is ridiculous anyone would think otherwise. There are probably quite a lot of people in this industry who've never even heard of FORTRAN.
This is a common form of sarcasm in English, to counter an argument (programming languages should be English-only because there'd be too much fragmentation otherwise) by presenting the same argument in the context of something obviously untrue (that's why everyone uses FORTRAN).
> ...and when writing, people do make mistakes.
Maybe he meant Python, who knows? If only there was a way to signal you are being sarcastic to avoid misunderstandings. Oh wait... /s
That zinger didn't tip it off to you?