4 ms·

* Italy buries first quake victims * Romania blamed over Moldova riots * Ten arrested in UK anti-terrorism raids * Villagers hurt in West Bank clash

by pbhj 17y ago

* Italy buries first quake victims * Romania blamed over Moldova riots * Ten arrested in UK anti-terrorism raids * Villagers hurt in West Bank clash * Mass Thai protest over leadership * Iran accuses journalist of spying 2 of those are poor for one of the criteria given IMO. * West Bank clash, villagers hurt * UK anti-terrorism raids, ten arrested These front-load the headlines better so that if you know you don't like "West Bank" articles you can skip the other ~20 characters and jump to the next line. I don't think they are less readable either. I have to confess I lengthened a headline from "Spiders reanimated" to "Spider Nightmare: Spiders resurrected from the dead" the other day ( http://digg.com/general_sciences/Spider_Nightmare_Spiders_resurrected_from_the_dead http://digg.com/general_sciences/Spider_Nightmare_Spiders_re... ).. it felt so dirty and multiply redundant, and didn't get me any Diggs as National Geographic pipped me by 14 minutes with the story.

Elepsis 17y ago
One of the guidelines nearly every publication practices for its headlines is that each one should have a verb (one thing that the BBC also does well in the above examples). The verb enables a reader to quickly grasp the "action" in the story and gives people a better understanding of the central point of the article. Your rewrite does little more than remove the verbs, making the headlines less clear, in my opinion.
- iain 17y ago
  Actually, he removed the prepositions, not the verbs. I wouldn't mind the front-loading as much if he didn't remove the prepositions, but to me those two rearranged sentences sound awkward regardless. I wonder if the journalists who write the articles choose the headlines, or if the BBC has a `Headline Phraser' job.
  - Elepsis 17y ago
    Good point -- it doesn't remove the verbs entirely. However, it removes them from their natural place in the sentence and puts them somewhere where they're likely to be missed entirely. By front-loading the headline with only the nouns, he puts what is arguably the most important part--what _happened_--at the end. But you are right that the awkwardness is mostly due to a lack of prepositions.

by pbhj 17y ago

Elepsis 17y ago

One of the guidelines nearly every publication practices for its headlines is that each one should have a verb (one thing that the BBC also does well in the above examples). The verb enables a reader to quickly grasp the "action" in the story and gives people a better understanding of the central point of the article. Your rewrite does little more than remove the verbs, making the headlines less clear, in my opinion.

iain 17y ago
Actually, he removed the prepositions, not the verbs. I wouldn't mind the front-loading as much if he didn't remove the prepositions, but to me those two rearranged sentences sound awkward regardless. I wonder if the journalists who write the articles choose the headlines, or if the BBC has a `Headline Phraser' job.
- Elepsis 17y ago
  Good point -- it doesn't remove the verbs entirely. However, it removes them from their natural place in the sentence and puts them somewhere where they're likely to be missed entirely. By front-loading the headline with only the nouns, he puts what is arguably the most important part--what _happened_--at the end. But you are right that the awkwardness is mostly due to a lack of prepositions.