Write concretely, get heard

If you want people to believe you, speak and write concretely.
There are all sorts of ways language can communicate truth. Here are some solid facts for you:
People usually judge that more details mean someone is telling us the truth,
We find stories that are more vivid to be more true,
We even think more raw facts make unlikely events more likely.
But all these involve adding extra details or

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Keep it simple, stupid

The Center for Plain Language, created to turn bureaucratese into English, has a list of simple words that can replace pompous ones. Here they are.


Excess wordsPlain Alternatives

accordinglyso
addresseesyou
as a means ofto
as prescribed byin, under
at a later datelater
at the present timenow, currently
commencebegin, start
constitutesforms, makes up
for the purpose ofto, for
heretoforeuntil,

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Will the Web make us better spellers?

Virginia Heffernan writes:Rushing to publish and overlooking glaring typos may have become part of the new economics of traditional publishing. But on the Web, typos sometimes come with a price. “Spelling mistakes ‘cost millions’ in lost online sales,” said a BBC headline last week. The article cited an analysis of British Web figures that suggested that a single spelling mistake on an e-commerce

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What to do, and not to do, with email

Some advice on using email wisely from author Jonathan Spira:

Don’t email someone, then immediately follow up with an Instant Message, a phone call and a tweet. it wastes your time and interrupts them, maybe while they’re trying to get you an answer.
Don’t combine multiple themes or requests in a single email. It’s too hard to pick out exactly what you want and if they store the information

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How to write good

"Learning to write sound, interesting, sometimes elegant prose is the work of a lifetime. The only way I know to do it is to read a vast deal of the best writing available, prose and poetry, with keen attention, and find a way to make use of this reading in one’s own writing. The first step is to become a slow reader. No good writer is a fast reader, at least not of work with the standing of

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