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by simoncion 2 days ago
I'd call it a "whitepaper".

But most hype-dependent projects need new vocabulary for old concepts to keep people from looking too closely and maybe drawing parallels to "legacy" "unsexy" projects, so whitepapers get called "system cards" and startups get called "labs", and so on.
1 comments
SpicyLemonZest 2 days ago
Couldn't someone else equally well argue that "whitepaper" and "startup" are hyped-up vocabulary for "report" and "unprofitable company"? It kinda seems to me like the cause and effect are in the other direction, and the vocabulary of a particular niche becomes cool and hype-sounding when that niche starts to pull in a lot of money.
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simoncion 4 hours ago
> [Isn't] "whitepaper"... hyped-up vocabulary for "report"[?]

Yes, I agree strongly. I used "whitepaper" because I didn't want my comment to reach back before too many HN readers were born... but I generally use the term "report".

> [Isn't] "startup" ... hyped-up vocabulary for ... "unprofitable company"?

No. It's hyped-up vocabulary for "new, investor-funded company". Many are unprofitable, but they need not be. Old companies will declare themselves to be a startup company, but that's like an eighty-year-old human declaring that he's spry and flexible.

> ...the vocabulary of a particular niche becomes cool and hype-sounding when that niche starts to pull in a lot of money.

It does, yes. But there's more to it. Projects that want to generate hype because they don't stand up to careful scrutiny will invent new jargon for old concepts. This causes people who would rather deeply misunderstand something than appear to not understand something that they think their peers strongly support to fail to discover that the "new, sexy, revolutionary" thing is the same system everyone has been using, just in a new wrapper.

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apsurd 2 days ago
yes at some point language evolves as the new normal, as designed.

My curmudgeon gripe with system card and research preview is really the parroting; so cant blame anthropic for what others do. It’s just… no, prediction markets for dogs doesn’t have a research preview.

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