Yeah, I find picking the audience difficult too. For my blog posts, I want to include the details for specialized readers, but also make the post accessible to

Yeah, I find picking the audience difficult too. For my blog posts, I want to include the details for specialized readers, but also make the post accessible to the generally technical readers (roughly the HN crowd). (If I wanted to write for only the first group, I'd write academic papers.) My solutions are to add enough background for someone who isn't an expert (even if it seems repetitive), and to use extensive footnotes for information that most people won't care about. Also, I try to put topics into a broader framework: a few paragraphs on history and why the topic is important. A narrative framework helps too, so even if someone doesn't follow all the details, they get a sense of going on a path e.g. from problem to solution. I also try to break up massive chunks of text with photos or diagrams but worry that I lean on this too heavily. When I read popular books on scientific topics, I try to study the techniques that they use. For example, "An immense world" is crammed full of interesting facts and stories, keeping the book even though it is discussing technical concepts of sensory perception. "Immune" describes the immune system in detail, making heavy use of metaphors and imagery and repeating these throughout the book. Other books focus on the people, moving the technical details into the background. I'm no expert on this, of course. People seem to like my blog posts, though, so I figured I'd share my thoughts.