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The Plain English Campaign is not a useful authority on English usage. They are a group of prigs and pedants who issue press releases about alleged errors by fa
by williamsmj 6y ago
The Plain English Campaign is not a useful authority on English usage. They are a group of prigs and pedants who issue press releases about alleged errors by famous people in the hope they will receive coverage in the British press and bring in work for their consulting business.
I'm distressed to learn they now expound at book length and I'm surprised to see this garbage taken seriously by HN.
See, e.g. http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002229.html http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002229.h..., https://web.archive.org/web/20110510090548/http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2004/03/plain_english_b.html https://web.archive.org/web/20110510090548/http://oliverkamm....
- ajarmst 6y agoOne problem with plain writing using simple sentence structure, common words and conversational grammar is that it's boring. It has its place: technical writing where facts need to be presented completely and unambiguously as well as writing for non-native speakers are two examples. However, if your goal is to educate, entertain, convince, communicate with passion, or simply express yourself in a way that permits subtlety or complexity, then it's tremendously constraining---and even more boring to write than it is to read.