[proveanegative]

>I just feel like this is the one thread where there are much bigger things at stake.

I have no objections to your cause but your current headline is, whether on purpose or not, clickbait. I clicked it because I thought it described an usual event that already happened. I would guess most did for the same reason.

You can't justify clickbait headlines with them having noble causes behind them. It's how you end up with Upworthy.

[sokoloff]

OP's position depends entirely on being regarded as trustworthy. And in the first 11 words, OP lied to us in a pre-meditated fashion.

The clickbait headline is inappropriate and makes me (and I presume many others) much less interested in spending any time on this issue after being duped.

"One weird trick to get someone out of a life sentence..."

"5 things wrong with this case; you won't believe #4!"

This one is no better. Flagged.

[ClintEhrlich]

I hear you. What we're dealing with is essentially the classic deontology versus util debate. Do we judge morality in terms of abstract principles or causal effects? You and I both know that the result of my headline isn't going to be ecoming Upworthy, but you flagged it because you, for better or worse, care about the principle more than the immediate consequence. Basically, rule-based utilitarianism.

You're right, maybe it was kind of a clickbait headline. I'm sorry you felt tricked or let down. Could you suggest a replacement you think would be fair?

I think the thing that distinguishes what I'm doing is that I'm not just asking for you to sign a petition or something. My dad and I worked for ten weeks reviewing thousands of pages of the record in order to create the document I'm sharing here, in the hopes of getting quality feedback. It's a real project that is intimately connected to the skills I use in all other hacking.

I'm trying to use those hacking skills to free an innocent man from prison. I can send you the compendium of exhibits, so you don't have to take my word about any factual assertions in the letter. I put in more than 200 footnotes cites to the record.

If you read the letter, you'll see that Ray Jennings is being wrongfully imprisoned, and has been for ten years. Please don't let my poor judgement in choosing the phrasing of the headline to stop you from looking at the evidence.

Finally, this one IS objectively better because those are tricks in the sense they don't offer something of value. There is no "weird trick" to actually transform yourself, etc. Here, you DO receive something pretty damn rare: conclusive proof a man sitting in prison is innocent.

I'm sad that matters less than the headline.

[sokoloff]

I believe you have good intent. To that end, other headlines that might better balance "grabbing attention" and "not being a lie" are:

"An innocent man is serving a life sentence."

"Imprisoned for life for a murder he didn't commit. Help bouy his spirits while he appeals."

I wish you the best and if the facts are as you believe, I way, way wish the defendant in the case to be freed. There are few things worse than being imprisoned for life for a crime you didn't commit.

The problem with a pure utility argument to support what you did is that you're stating that your cause is worthy of attention and that's what makes it different from the others. I'm sure the others would make a parallel argument that their cause (even if it's just "making money by selling ad views so my kids can eat and have shelter") is also worthy, because the test merely requires the author of the headline to judge whether it's worthy of attention. You genuinely believe, but you're hardly an unbiased judge.

That very quickly escalates to a tragedy of the commons where no one can rise above the cacophony of clickbait screams. Instead, I go by the community guidelines, which include two relevant ones:

"Please don't do things to make titles stand out, like using uppercase or exclamation points, or adding a parenthetical remark saying how great an article is. It's implicit in submitting something that you think it's important."

"please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait."