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    Sparkle_MotionJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:08pm

    I Vote Big.

    I am also chanting USA! USA! as loudly as I can.

    Who is with me?!?

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      ê¹€́¹˜́ „!Sparkle_Motion
      7/24/13 5:11pm

      I'm with you, Brave Patriot!

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      Sparkle_Motionê¹€́¹˜́ „!
      7/24/13 5:14pm

      The Spirit of Washington Is With Us! Madison and Gouverneur Morris Too!

      Remember the clarion call: First they came for our headlines, then they came for our . . . !

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    JohninLAJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:09pm

    Did Denton just refer to USA Today as a respectable media organization? Hmmm.

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      John CookJohninLA
      7/24/13 5:11pm

      He did!

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      JohninLAJohn Cook
      7/24/13 5:15pm

      6. Respectable media organizations like The Economist and USA Today use sentence case without any loss of authority.

      I cannot imagine a better argument for maintaining the current style.

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    Jesus DiazJohn Cook
    7/25/13 2:28am

    I've been discussing with John and other Gawker Media editors online about this, so I got curious and I checked sentence case vs title case in the top 30 newspapers in America by order of circulation:

    1. USA Today: Sentence case

    2. WSJ: Title case

    3. NYT: TC

    4. LA Times: SC

    5. Washington Post: SC

    6. Chicago Tribune: SC

    7. NY Daily News: SC

    8. Philadelphia Inquirer: SC

    9. The Denver Post: SC

    10. Houston Chronicle: SC

    11. NY Post: SC

    12. Detroit Free Press: SC

    13. Dallas Morning News: SC

    14. Star Tribune (Minneapolis): SC

    15. Boston Globe: SC

    16. The Star Ledger (NJ): SC

    17. Journal-Constitution (Atlanta): SC

    18. The Arizona Republic: SC

    19. Long Island Newsday: SC

    20. San Francisco Chronicle: SC

    21. Cleveland Plain Dealer: SC

    22. Seattle PI: SC

    23. St. Louis Post-Dispatch: SC

    24. St. Petersburg Times SC (and all upper case for top stories)

    25. San Diego Union-Tribue: SC (and all upper case for top stories)

    26. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: SC

    27. The Baltimore Sun: SC

    28. Miami Herald: SC

    29. The Oregonian: SC

    30. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: SC

    The data above is for both online and print. I was surprised, so I went to the oldest newspapers in America, the guardians of tradition, I supposed:

    1785. The Augusta Chronicle: SC

    1785. The Poughkeepsie Journal: SC

    1786. Daily Hampshire Gazette: SC

    1786. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: SC

    1789. The Berkshire Eagle: SC

    1792. The Recorder: SC

    1792. The Keene Sentinel: SC

    1794. Rutland Herald: SC

    1796. Norwich Bulletin: SC

    I can keep on going. Again, both online and print.

    The top TV sites are not much different:

    CNN: SC

    MSNBC: SC

    NBC News: SC

    ABC News: TC

    CBS News: SC

    TMZ: TC

    Al Jazeera: SC

    Fox News: TC

    Fox Sports: SC

    BBC News: SC (I included this because it was international).

    Agencies:

    Reuters: SC

    AP: All upper case

    So the question here is: Why is Gawker Media site using title case? Just to be contrarian? The guardians of a tradition* that nobody follows anymore except the NYT, the WSJ and Fox News?

    * A tradition that was not such a tradition in the first place, looking at the old images of front pages—it was mixed, and the really old ones used upper case.

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      Brent RoseJesus Diaz
      7/25/13 2:54am

      Game changer, Jeezy. Game changer.

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      Jesus DiazBrent Rose
      7/25/13 2:58am

      Hopefully! I really don't see any reason why we should join the NYT and Fox News to be the sole guardians of this arbitrary tradition that not even the oldest newspapers in America follow. Especially when we are one of the biggest culprits of killing traditional newspapering in the first place.

      It just seems silly to me.

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    Max Rivlin-NadlerJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:39pm

    i vote for little letters because the shift key is so, so far away.

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      John CookMax Rivlin-Nadler
      7/24/13 10:51pm

      max whose side are you on here

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      Mercury: The Sweetest Of The Transition MetalsMax Rivlin-Nadler
      7/25/13 6:35am

      But that's why we get two! (kinda like nipples, sometimes you just can't reach the other one)

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    SuperHybridSystem3John Cook
    7/24/13 5:07pm

    Conversational tone has nothing to do with it. I want conversational in the post, but authoritative statement of what the breezy conversation will be about still helps attract my eye, visually speaking.

    And i09 has suffered — it looks weak. Not as compelling. Sort of like someone was sighing about the future as they try to draw me in.

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      wellingtonbearSuperHybridSystem3
      7/24/13 5:09pm

      This said it.

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      humanetornadoSuperHybridSystem3
      7/24/13 5:16pm

      This so much.

      Everytime I see an i09 thing crossposted somewhere all I can think is "Jesus they must have the worst writers over at that site."

      Big man on editorial campus needs to tell them to get their shit together, because all lowercase titles just makes your site look like it is being written by some 13 year old working on their livejournal.

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    raincoasterJohn Cook
    7/24/13 7:36pm

    I think Neetzan's posts cry out for headlines in ALL CAPS!

    CUTE CRITTER DOES THAT THING

    ETHNIC PERSON DANCES

    FAMOUS CELEBRITY DOES FACEPLANT

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      Jesus Diazraincoaster
      7/25/13 5:02am

      It's a possibility. Some newspapers use all caps. In the past, the tradition was all caps too. But not, 28 out of the top 30 American newspapers use sentence case, no headline case.

      http://gawker.com/ive-been-discu…

      It's a lie. Only the NYT and the WSJ use headline case at this point. Even the oldest newspapers in America use sentence case for both online and print.

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      raincoasterJesus Diaz
      7/25/13 5:44am

      Sigh. I miss the Weekly World News. Even though their sentences were in, you know, sentence structure, they somehow gave the impression of being in ALL CAPS.

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    TNGunnerJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:09pm

    When I was in j-school, they always told us that "up and down" headlines were actually more readable... and there was research to back that up. Of course, I never saw that research... and I was in school a lonnnggg time ago. I kind of like the title case style, regardless.

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      Ken LayneTNGunner
      7/24/13 11:56pm

      The fact that the fading institution of the Journalism College is referred to by its own adherents as j-school is all one needs to know about these arcane practitioners.

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      TNGunnerKen Layne
      7/30/13 12:57am

      I graduated in '82. The slang at the time was "j-school." As my old linguistics prof used to say: "There may be someone out there who speaks standard English, but I don't know nobody who talks it."

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    olalJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:10pm

    European here. As much as I'd like to see you forced under the yoke of our Euro ways by any means necessary, I have to say the USA tradition is a good one for you. Your writers use the format to make some headlines really funny, where you're playing with unconventional language within that conventional structure.

    The sentence-case style might be more conversational, but that's its only advantage. It's also very dry and emotionless, and it will interfere with jokey headlines. It might be good for Gizmodo and Kotaku, but not for Gawker and Jezebel.

    Maintain the status quo, please.

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      HashTagYoloisbackolal
      7/24/13 5:14pm

      where you're playing with unconventional language within that conventional structure.

      What kind of European are you?? And where did you learn to think and verbalize like that?

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      olalHashTagYoloisback
      7/24/13 5:15pm

      I'm English, and I've been drinking a lot of Scotch.

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    Beer, Titties and Left TurnsJohn Cook
    7/24/13 5:22pm

    Title Case. For the love of God, Title Case. I get that this is more conversational, but you are titling an article, not having a conversation. The conversational aspect of Gawker comes in the comments, where we can quite literally have a conversation, as opposed to merely being conversational. Additionally, half the time headlines aren't even full sentences, which is fine because you're writing headlines, not sentences, but it exemplifies the fact that you should be using Title Case as opposed to Sentence case.

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      DennyCraneJohn Cook
      7/24/13 5:13pm

      In this case, I prefer adherence to tradition. News has gotten increasingly conversational, yes, but your headline isn't part of the "conversation," so to speak. It's an announcement to the reader that This Is What This Conversation Is About.

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        Jesus DiazDennyCrane
        7/25/13 5:00am

        Reality check: the tradition doesn't exist anymore.

        http://gawker.com/ive-been-discu…

        It's a lie. Only the NYT and the WSJ use headline case at this point. Even the oldest newspapers in America use sentence case for both online and print.

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