Personally, I'd rather see a useful title on Wikipedia submissions (I'm not saying the particular title chosen in this case was useful).
For submissions of magazine or blog articles, the original title policy makes sense usually, because magazine and blog authors or editors choose titles designed to catch the reader's interest.
Wikipedia titles are more names than titles. They are meant to allow people who are already looking for information on the thing in the title. When a Wikipedia article is submitted with the Wikipedia title, there is usually nothing that tells me why I might find it interesting.
I'd like to see HN allow submitters to include a one line statement saying what is interesting about the submission.
Stories are community property; the first person to submit a story doesn't "own" it, and shouldn't have a special right to editorialize the submission.
No, it's not. But that's not how the feature would actually end up getting used, is it? If you could design a simple feature that would resist abuses, 'pg would probably consider it.
Its not so much about editorializing, but rather putting into context.
If e.g. amazon.com is down, that may be news. But a link with the title "Amazon" doesn't convey any information. People will wonder why the OP posted that link.
If the focus is on something on the page, not the page itself, you have to reflect it in the title. Maybe the OP doesn't want to post a trivial tech article, but wants to share that the article has a offensive image next to it.
Maybe the point the OP wants to make is opposite, or tangential to the point of the article. There was a wierd rant from one of the Gnome developers some time ago. I would never have upvoted the page by itself, as it was badly written, and I disagree with its contents. But the given title, which was basically "look, Gnome dev lost his marbles", lifted the post to a meta level, on which I gladly upvoted and shared it.
The current way to do the above is to post a stub on your blog, and link to that, although it is also offically discouraged. I personally think, when it is possible to do something while jumping through hoops, it should just be allowed to do the same thing without the hoops - no one should have to waste time to write a redirection article.
For submissions of magazine or blog articles, the original title policy makes sense usually, because magazine and blog authors or editors choose titles designed to catch the reader's interest.
Wikipedia titles are more names than titles. They are meant to allow people who are already looking for information on the thing in the title. When a Wikipedia article is submitted with the Wikipedia title, there is usually nothing that tells me why I might find it interesting.
I'd like to see HN allow submitters to include a one line statement saying what is interesting about the submission.