Writing & Editing Online -Continuing significance of text: “The text is still what brings various media together” (Foust). -Culture of “instant” gratification “Think of your Web audience as lazy, selfish and ruthless. Web audiences are on a mission – they’re task oriented” (Michael Gold – Journalism Consultant) -Quality of presentation still matters (grammar, spelling, etc.) -Fairness, accuracy, attribution, relevance, newness still matter
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Writing & Editing Online
-Continuing significance of text: “The text is still what brings various media together” (Foust).
-Culture of “instant” gratification
“Think of your Web audience as lazy, selfish and ruthless. Web audiences are on a mission – they’re task oriented” (Michael Gold – Journalism Consultant)
-Quality of presentation still matters (grammar, spelling, etc.)
-Fairness, accuracy, attribution, relevance, newness still matter
Writing & Editing Online
ADAPTING TO THE RUTHLESS WEB AUDIENCE: SOME TECHNIQUES
-Chunking-SHORT sentences with active verbs -SHORT paragraphs (no more than 3 or 4 sentences!)-Bullets-Headlines
- Fair, accurate, compelling, grabbing, short- Must have a verb (or clear implied verb)- Must use AP style: Only first word capitalized (proper
nouns also capitalized)- Straightforward (Avoid puns, wordplay, etc. Nicks
nixes flicks / Mayor cuts funding for film festival)- Must be able to stand on own (Guilty! / Mayor guilty of
embezzlement)- Search engine optimization
-subheadlines/summaries/bold faced headers-Integration of multimedia elements!-Use links
links second only to text in their ability to convey information and meaning to the user.
no “correct” number of links in a particular story; number should be driven by content consideration
goal = not to overwhelm the user with sheer numbers of links, but present best links that help tell story & encourage further exploration:
“Your site shouldn’t feel like an endpoint in the conversation. should feel like the beginning.”
“By sending your users to the best information available on the Web, you’ll keep them coming back for more.”
most relevant, most reliable, most compelling links
link should generally incorporate no more than three to five words
avoid: “Click here to go to there”; [however, it is not always possible to write a main story so that link info will be clear w/o disrupting the flow of the main story]
Clarity: It should be obvious to the user what lies on other end of link