I would go even further and add -- "over-the-top" or "showboating" relative to what? I think it's more that the consensus style of much business communication,

I would go even further and add -- "over-the-top" or "showboating" relative to what? I think it's more that the consensus style of much business communication, technical documentation, and academic literature is very sparse and dry and focused. Which is most definitely a style and not a baseline which represents some sort of "normal". You can make the argument that the style of the blog post supports its content and purpose by showing and emphasizing the outrage with Simon felt/feels. So yeah, labelling it as "bad writing" is ridiculous. Agreed. : ). Sorry for the rant - I have strong feelings about the written word : ).