This is a hack. @Sharra-writes can fix it more properly at a later date.

I looked through our "about" docs and I've realized that most of them start with a section that's "About thing." I don't love that, I think it's a little pointless, but it seems to be the format. And then I read your issue again and realized you were initially talking about changing the title. What would you think about doing that, using "About the repository README file" as the title, and leaving "About READMEs" as the section title? Alternatively, if you can come up with another/better section title, I would be very in favor of it. I was kicking around things like "Overview of READMEs" or "Purpose of a README," but I'm not sure "overview" is different enough from "about" to justify breaking the format, and the section as currently written doesn't quite fit a "purpose" heading.

In the meantime, I'm pretty sure we changed things recently so that the URL can match the short title instead of having to match the title, but I need to see if there's anything special I have to do to make that work.

The about section title is indeed annoying.

And yes, I'm more interested in changing the first title than the second. afaict the shortTitle does let me do what I need to avoid trying to rename things all over.

The second About READMEs is actually pretty terrible in this case given the content it "covers" (but doesn't actually cover!):

You can add a README file to a repository to communicate important information about your project. A README, along with a repository license, citation file, contribution guidelines, and a code of conduct, communicates expectations for your project and helps you manage contributions.

Effectively half of the content for the first paragraph in the section has nothing to do with the README file!

I considered:
## Repository Overview

Which might properly cover what's in that paragraph.

If you put your README file in your repository's hidden .github, root, or docs directory, GitHub will recognize and automatically surface your README to repository visitors.

This sentence might not be technically wrong, but I read it as:

• If you put your README file in your repository's hidden .github directory; or
• If you put your README file in your repository's hidden root directory; or
• If you put your README file in your repository's hidden docs directory;
  ...

which isn't what the author was trying to say. I have to endorse your plan to make rewriting this file a project to do very soon.

This paragraph needs a section heading so it can have an anchor:

If you add a README file to the root of a public repository with the same name as your username, that README will automatically appear on your profile page. You can edit your profile README with GitHub Flavored Markdown to create a personalized section on your profile. For more information, see Managing your profile README.

https://docs.github.com/en/repositories/managing-your-repositorys-settings-and-features/customizing-your-repository/about-readmes#relative-links-and-image-paths-in-readme-files

Your link text should be on a single line. The example below will not work.

[Contribution
guidelines for this project](docs/CONTRIBUTING.md)

I hope that statement was correct at some point, but regardless, it doesn't appear to be correct today:

https://github.com/check-spelling-sandbox/ideal-eureka-effective-guacamole?tab=readme-ov-file

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/check-spelling-sandbox/ideal-eureka-effective-guacamole/refs/heads/prerelease/README.md

I'm actually struggling w/ a title for the document.

I considered:

title: About the repository README file

But, I don't think that's really what this document is about.

It's more like "What to put into a repository README file, where to put it, and how it will be seen"

How about:

title: Using a repository README file

That isn't wrong, the document does help you use one. It helps you know where to put it, it helps you know what to put in it, and it helps you understand how others will use/experience it.

Fwiw, I've reverted me change to the ## About READMEs -- I can't think of any good way to handle that, and the page title is more important/problematic than the first item in it, even though that's clearly a mess. 🤷‍♂️

For us, "about" articles are (supposed to be) a particular type/class of article offering a broad overview of a product or feature that's easy to skim and light on details. The problem with them (especially the older ones) is that they've become a catch-all for anything that, for example, support comes to us and says, "This user says we need to document X, and I've opened a PR to add it to the 'about' article." The article has to start with "about," and then someone (me, probably) has to go in and edit it to make sense again.

Last week was a bit of a disaster for me because of a really bad allergy flare-up, but I need to get my queue under control so I can open a PR with my "About forks" revisions, and then I can work on this one.

What if we made the title aspirational for the moment? It has to start with "about," and the content of the article should be an overview of README files, with emphasis on why to use a README/the purpose they serve rather than all the details of how to use them. There will be a little "how," but mostly "why." With that in mind, I think "About the repository README file" is a perfectly good title, but if that direction gives you ideas for a better title...better is always better?

I can't think of a better title. Let's ship it. I can live with it being aspirational.

Fwiw GitHub wasn't cooperating with me, so I wasn't able to edit this file in my fork which is why I used the suggestion thing to apply the change...

I'm sorry you experienced a flare-up.

Feel free to tag me for the About forks changes. I probably can provide feedback (although I currently owe someone a review on a large docs change...)

Since this page has a ToC that's automatically displayed, I see no reason for the section titles to say README when the section content clearly says "well, actually, any markdown file".