3 ms·
Some things take a lot of space to explain. But as a general rule, if you can trim it without losing content you should. That's a golden rule of good writing.
by 0x12 15y ago
Some things take a lot of space to explain. But as a general rule, if you can trim it without losing content you should. That's a golden rule of good writing.
If you get paid by the word you might disagree with that.
- pknerd 15y agoIts not trimming. If any of you have used Quora, it has a feature of summarized the entire thread. It is summarized by one of the people like you and me. The excerpt is then voted up and voted down. I have similar thing in mind.
- corin_ 15y agoIt really depends entirely what you're writing, which is why I hate people who say stuff like "that's a golden rule of good writing". I can disprove you instantly by saying something like "Charles Dickens". When your aim is to just portray information as quickly as possible (so yes, often that is the case with blogs submitted to HN) then sure. But as another example look at the New Yorker, they have some of the best articles written and they are great because they tell the story well, not because they give you the TLDR version.
- 0x12 15y agoWe're talking about articles here, see title.
- corin_ 15y agoYour quote was "of good writing", without specifying context. Sure, because it was in this particular thread maybe you meant that context to be implied, but I have seen people make that same statement without the context too, hence my assumption. Either way, I still hold the New Yorker up as an example that it isn't always the case for articles, either.
- pknerd 15y agoThe point is, provide a quick way to find the crux of the article/blogposts/anything before getting into it.