Comment by CWuestefeld
13 years ago
I hate this kind of reporting. I read through the entire first page without the slightest clue as to what the article is actually about -- I'm pretty sure it's not all just for one guy's life story.
But by that point I was tired of reading, and quit.
Cut it out with the pathos and human interest, and get some of the real point in there quicker.
No.
Don't worry, 57 blogs will distill it down to the core 5 points and post them in a bulleted list with a link-bait title by Friday. But writing is much more than 'get to the point as fast as possible'. These kind of stories are far more interesting than the quick summary articles found on most shitty websites. If you don't like the style, then don't click through to the New Yorker, New York Times, etc.
> But writing is much more than 'get to the point as fast as possible'.
I agree with you, but my personal reading sweet spot is to get to the point a bit faster than the author of this piece did.
Cut it out with the pathos and human interest, and get some of the real point in there quicker.
Maybe you could slow down and read the part about how slowing down is good for you.
While slowing down IS great, I do sympathize with the desire to get my information without "human interest" and the infotainment slant that tends to skew pertinent facts.
This sort of thinking is actually a large part of the piece.. I'd highly recommend giving it an honest and unaffected read, it's thought-provoking stuff
It's not that I'm mister "New-York-City always pushing to not waste a minute". My complaint is primarily that the structure pretends to be human-centered, in fact it's nothing but a formula.
Modern news reporting dictates that the journalist kick off with something personally identifiable, and only then ease into the facts. The reasons for this are obvious, I think: readers are more likely to connect with, and thus read, a story that they find strikes a chord with them personally; so let's try to cast about with some pathos, and maybe we'll hit some notes in that chord.
But just as with seeing reported gore or pr0n on reddit, repetition of the same formula over time loses its valence with the reader.
I'm tired of that formula in article after article. I want the journalists to find new ways to accomplish it.
It's not this article specifically; this is just one example. It struck me at this time, though, because it's pretty long, and I got through a pretty good chunk of it without a single direct reference to the article's thesis, so it was quite egregious.
I completely agree. If I follow an interesting link, read an interesting opening paragraph or two, and then hit a paragraph that completely changes the subject with something like "Paul Steve, a little hobbit of a man, sits before me sipping a glass of warm tea as he gazes out across the morning Texas plains", then I scroll way down to verify the page 1/10 before getting the hell out of Dodge.
I was the complete opposite. I found the story compelling and interesting from the get go. Had they opened with stats from a study, I probably would have stopped there. The personal story hooked me.
I'm not sure why are you saying it's unclear what the article is about, IMO the headline elegantly explains the subject and basic idea, while also giving some notion about the style. I was turned off by the anecdata that the article begins with, but I didn't expect hard science anyway. Having finished it, I find it interesting and well-written. =)
I read through the entire first page without the slightest clue as to what the article is actually about
The last paragraph on the front page tells you exactly what the article is about. Opening with an human anecdote is a common trope in long-form journalism, because that's what a majority of people want before they will put in the time to read several thousand words about mortality statistics.
I guess you're the Samos type.
I usually start at the 3rd or 4th paragraph to cut through the BS. If it sounds interesting, then I'll go back and read the beginning.
Since this is a board for computer folks, this type of opinion is not surprising. :)