Hacker News Reader

Comment by OJFord | Hacker News Reader

> It's unclear if anyone was injured during the incident.

'It's unclear if' is a phrase that paints a brilliant picture of an organ's journalistic standing.

It means there's no information either way, what follows is pure speculation, probably false, but the author can put whatever idea they want in our heads, since they've prefaced that it 'may or may not be the case'.

It's unclear if the drones had malicious intent. It's unclear if the author was sober while writing and free of criminal record.

View on HN

I think they're just trying to get ahead of the question everyone wants answered, and they're saying they don't know yet.

How about "there are no reports of injuries"?

That could be misread too though depending on when you're reading it and when you think the article was written in relation to the events. If it's a quick article right after it reads like the original verbiage but if you think it happened a while before the article was written it sounds more authoritative that there were no injuries. The "it is unclear" phrasing makes the ambiguity clear that the author doesn't know if there were any at the time of writing.

And if injuries are later reported people will sneer that 'media always gets it wrong/lies'. If they use plain language and say 'we don't know if anyone was injured yet' then people will sneer that 'I could have wirtten that, they're trying to sensationalize a nothingburger.'

How about: "As of the time of writing, we don't know of any reports of injuries"?

There's no need to use 15 words when 9 will do.

"At the time of writing there are no reports of injuries."

Honestly, that's redundant, because it's obvious in context.

Per the video report, someone went to the hospital with difficulties breathing from fumes.

Oh come on. This is just a stub article, saying two drones had crashed and police are investigating. It's clearly going to be a story of strong local and general interest, and they have limited information and a couple of photographs so the story is only a few sentences long for now.

Ranting about deeper meaning of the words in such a minimal bulletin is nonsensical.

Virtually all journalism is this bad though.

It's unclear if this commenter has read more than just the headlines. Maybe they try to argue for the sake of controversy and outrage culture. Maybe they just don't have a brain.

But seriously, the article text doesn't follow up with any speculation and highlights it is a developing story. According to the latest news on TV, someone actually was insured and is now at the hospital. The details are still unclear however. This is very based reporting for the world we currently live in and I would like to see more news stations follow this style instead of jumping to conclusions.

The sentence I quoted is not in the headline.

It's actually the second to last paragraph of the "article" so proves that you made it at least most of the way through.

It was added as a subheading.

It's literally still in the subheading. Congrats on not reading more than the boldest letters at the very top either.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com