I don't think progressive disclosure applies in the cases the author is discussing.
Slide 8: "Most of the writing in the world is for information." Readers looking for information aren't interested in being teased to keep reading. That's a recipe for 'unhooking' them. They want to know what the author thinks they should know.
Agree. Adopting a less helpful structure in the name of manipulating the reader, is surely incompatible with unselfish writing. From the article:
> I’m not going to demand that you put up with my quirks (bad spelling, bad organization, sloppiness). I’m going to package the information so that it enters your heads as easily as possible.
If we were discussing fiction writing, that would be different. Fiction writers aren't aiming for maximally efficient communication.
I feel like progressive disclosure is such a broad term that anything can be made to fall under it...any book written, show filmed, movie created is progressively disclosing information/story.
FWIW plenty of informational books pussyfoot just to get a bigger piece out, there is fluff, anecdotes, tangents, but humans understand through storytelling, and ultimately that is usually a good way to go about sharing ideas.
Progressive disclosure isn't what's keeping me hooked on the meaning of the registers of your chip. People asking about the status of my open bug is doing that. Give me a table.
I agree. Sometimes a transition statement is better. Sometimes one must present evidence, then summarize. This is just my summary of the full 120-slide PowerPoint.
> > Key takeaways: 1. One of the best ways to improve your writing is to learn how to cut out words that are not necessary
I think it's funny the summarized version is that statement.
Because, in the presentation, they progressively cut down that exact statement to arrive at:
"To improve your writing, cut out unnecessary words."
> I believe you meant, "1. Cut out unnecessary words."
I think your version cuts out a little too much. It loses the why and becomes an unexplained imperative.
I don't know; "absolutely" can add emphasis. Advising someone not to use it because "agree" covers it anyway feels like trying to suppress their personality. We're communicating, not playing language golf.
I feel that it dilutes the meaning of whatever comes after. "I agree" conveys a stronger tone than "I absolutely agree". Same as "I love you" is more powerful than "I absolutely love you". I see it as a filler word that doesn't add anything to the sentence. It's subjective I know. Also I would add that if you "absolutely [verb]" all the time you might as well [verb].
I try to remove common enhancing adverbs when writing emails at work. Removing "very," "definitely," "absolutely," etc. makes professional communication come across more authoritatively and clearly. I still use adverbs to be clear, but they need to communicate something specific that is otherwise hard to articulate.
There's a Chrome Extension for Gmail and Outlook for web that helps you send more confident emails by warning you when you use words which undermine your message.
I think some people overexpress in general, regardless of the medium. I think it comes from an excess of "passion", which is like permanent exageration. I am prone to it, that's why I know, and I try to keep it under control.
> I think it comes from an excess of "passion", which is like permanent exageration. I am prone to it, that's why I know, and I try to keep it under control.
We thank you.
I suffer from the opposite problem—extremely deadpan personality. I insert exclamation points randomly in emails to seem human.
These contexts don't change the idea in rule 1, but they do change the definition of what is "necessary". There are words that "dilute" a message and are not necessary to convey the literal meaning. But usually we don't want just the literal meaning of things, we want a certain level of dilution. Without it, prose can be clear and specific, but at the same time becomes dense and unreadable. Lots of academic writing is like that.
There are words that are necessary for the _overall effect_, even if not necessary for the literal communication goal of a set of words.
To be clear, this is just a simple summary of the source. I agree with your statement, though. In fact, as Rudolf Flesch said in his book, How To Write Speak And Think More Effectively, "So here we have the secret of plain conversational talk: it is not difficult ideas expressed in easy language, it is rather abstractions embedded in small talk. It is heavy stuff packed with excelsior. If you want to be better understood you don’t have to leave out or change your important ideas; you just use more excelsior. It’s as simple as that." The point his is making that the few clear simple points can be packed with some excelsior to improve clarity.
There will be exceptions to all these rules at the expert level, but less expert people should probably follow them.
I was reminded of this recently after reading an essay by a high schooler. The essay was actually pretty insightful, but I couldn't help but notice the way in which the words that the author said seemed to be a great deal more than strictly necessary to communicate the point that he was trying to make to the audience that he was speaking to at the time he was writing the essay.
I believe those points can also be applicable for speaking also, especially in interviews where you are expected to give canned responses in a STAR format.
I just wanted to clarify that these are the main points extracted from the PowerPoint linked. I actually do write for a living, but most of what I write is proprietary for closed distribution.
1. One of the best ways to improve your writing is to learn how to cut out words that are not necessary
2. Stuffy writing is bad writing! It lowers the power of your brain and mine!
3. What words should you never use in writing? Words whose exact meanings you don’t know! Never use a word unless you know EXACTLY what it means
4. If your writing is nonsense, maybe your thoughts are nonsense too!
5. To keep things clear and readable: Put the main point of each paragraph in its first sentence
6. Pretend you’re writing a textbook! That’s how I ended up writing so many books...Organizing knowledge Learning is a lot like writing a book
7. I often write the introduction last, after I know what it will introduce!
8. Never draw the reader’s eye to anything that is not the main point