> I've seen a few cases where a post title used profanity in a way that's arguably unnecessary
I think that's pretty much what he means, but you can't blame the author since it seems to work. People here are passionate, especially when it comes to articles related to the human side of software development. Profanity can tap into that emotion fairly well.
Ahh, so you were. For some reason I got the impression that you were justifying the use of swearing because of the response it generates while not making the connection between that and outright baiting.
I think that's pretty much what he means, but you can't blame the author since it seems to work. People here are passionate, especially when it comes to articles related to the human side of software development. Profanity can tap into that emotion fairly well.