Dunno what happened but way in the day tomshardware writers were very knowledgeable and quite witty + smart too. Guess it got sold? I can't pronounce the name of more than 80% of their writers now.
Anglo-saxon names would make it more likely that English is their first language (and therefore more likely to be fluent), which is the language used in these articles.
Firstly because countries like the US are home to many native English speaking people with non-Saxon names, and countries like Ireland in the old world speak English while retaining their native names.
Secondly because many people who learn English as a second language grow up be fluent and can write with ease. I look to places like the Netherlands where students from all over the world are writing theses for their higher education completely in English.
It's not that hard to write in your second language, certainly not to the point that your name could be in any way an indicator of your skill level.
I'm not "going for" anything. I'm letting them know that their phrasing comes across as racist and giving them opportunity to clarify their position. I'm not sure you can speak authoritatively on their meaning either.
Right. To me it came across as the editorial work was now being outsourced. A common cost-cutting practice that would result in: a) many names changing and b) names sounding foreign. The whole racist thing felt like flimsy extrapolation, that's all. Maybe I'm wrong and I'm defending some hardcore racist person, and if that's the case then I'm going to feel really stupid.
The writer in question seems to be a freelancer who started working with them in August 2023, meaning he was pretty new to Tomshardware when he published this in October.
Looks like the usual cost cutting where you replace employees with contractors.
Also, this entire article is based on an Asus advertisement video on YouTube. I'm sure they wouldn't put their best writers on that kind of content.
What does this mean? Only those with Anglo-Saxon heritage make for good writers?