4 ms·
>People on HN are already primed to appreciate this style of writing. My perception is the reverse. Probably 60% of the articles linked on this site, day in a
by borepop 6y ago
>People on HN are already primed to appreciate this style of writing.
My perception is the reverse. Probably 60% of the articles linked on this site, day in and day out, are a thicket of impenetrable jargon. Endless blog posts that make no attempt to explain to the non-initiated what the various acronyms mean or why the concepts might matter for a person who is not deeply, deeply immersed in whatever technical field the author is writing about. I wish more people who write about coding/tech would realize that a larger audience is interested in what is going on, but that the communication of the concepts needs to be approachable. This is not just a shortcoming of this field, obviously, as people in all sorts of technical/specialized fields tend to write the same way, speaking only to the in-crowd.
- randcraw 6y agoI think jargonistic writing is typical when trying to impress. Academics have long employed jargon to obfuscate in order to seem more clever and subtle. Expressed simply, ideas seem simple. Among folk who depend on appearing clever, the last thing they want is to appear simple. Insightful ideas are rare. Hiding mundane thoughts in abstruse verbiage leaves questions in the mind of the readership: "I don't see the author's point. But he seems pretty smart. I must have missed something." Vote up. Many well established schools of untestable academic thought are often built on foundations as sandy as these, IMHO.