Web texts editing: bold your key words term to increase the scannability of your articles

Frederick Giasson

A trick I read in a Sun Microsystems article

79% of web readers scan pages instead of reading them word-for-word. How to increase the scannability of your blog’s posts? By bolding the key term of each paragraphs. This is an editing trick for web texts that I read in an article of Sun Microsystems.

It’s a really simple and evident thing to do when you think about it. So, I’ll start to apply the principle in my posts. The bold key words will be an addition to the new Technorati tags I added to each of my posts. Then my readers will be able to find where in the text these tags refer.

I wish that this new editing trick will be helpful to my readers. Personally I think that the text is really simpler to read. Now we know, in a second, what the post is about by reading the title, sub title and bold terms. Do you have the same feeling? Do you think that this is a good addition and will be helpful for you? Please leave me your feelings about it! The principle will be better with time because I’ll learn how to spot and bold the best terms.

So enjoy it and share your feelings about it!

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The importance of your blog’s posts titles – A message to bloggers; a wish as a reader

Frederick Giasson

Are you a blogger? Do you take care of the titles of your posts? Personally I try to. I don’t know if I’m efficient at it but I try. The title is probably as important as the content of your posts. Why? It’s really simple: most of feed reader software only shows the title of your posts. If the user clicks on it then he’ll read the content; otherwise he’ll not. The first battle is to get subscribers. It’s really not ease but it’s possible. If you get some, the war is not won. After you need your posts read by your subscribed readers. Think about it, what happen if he scans 100 feeds daily with over 200 messages? Will he take care of you posts if the title he read is not attractive, short and relevant with what his under it? I don’t think so.

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It’s why the titles of your posts are so important. It helps you to be read but it also help the reader to scan for what he need and didn’t need to read. I subscribed to many feeds and many authors don’t take care of their titles. I know that I didn’t read really interesting post because the title didn’t catch my attention. It’s sad because I know that I pass beside many interesting posts.

Remarks on Expository Writing in Mathematics – How to write a readable mathematics text

Frederick Giasson

I came across this article from MathForge. It’s a really interesting reading for anyone who needs to write a text on mathematic. It can seem really a specific reading but his goal is more than important. The reader targeted by it is the graduate student in mathematics. Personally I think that this article needs to be read by any university students in sciences. Writing is probably the core skill of all sciences. You need to know how to write your ideas to make them understandable by your peers. It’s essential not just for publication but for everyday works. This assertion is more and more true with the place the Internet is now taking in universities around the world. Some can think that video and voice chat are the future. Personally I don’t think so; even if it will be the case, for the moment, writing is the privileged communication medium.

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The magic of blogging; the pleasure of writing – Personal communications: the underground of blogs

Frederick Giasson

Blogging bring me an unexpected thing. This is the possibility to correspond with really interesting persons. I’m not talking of meeting people on chat system or contact websites. No no no; I’m talking of the old way of correspondence, like 10 or 15 years ago when one of the only services available was emails: the reflected writing, not the writing on the fly.

What I have underestimated is that when a person blog, he’ll share is view of world; his passions; a hobby; his life, etc. If a blogger write about a specific thing, it’s because that he have joy by writing on it, otherwise he would not do it. If a person read his posts, it’s probably because he shares the same view of the world; the same passions; the same hobby or lived the same things. Otherwise, he would not read it. This specific situation is the catalyst of future conversions. They will try too deepening the subjects, off the blog, by email. Then you just enter in the underground of blogs. However, you need to take in count that this situation will only happen with the will of the read; if he initiates the conversion. If the conversation is initiated then things will emerge from them. Then new idea will be written by the bloggers for future readers, etc, etc, etc. You see the cycle? Is this not so beautiful? This is just a way to humans to search for new ideas and concepts in conversations; but in this case, with the help of a new technology.

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On Analog Blog reactions

Frederick Giasson


On Analog Blog reactions

I got some good feedbacks [1][2][3][4]; I got some critics [1][2]; but all are constructive. It’s exactly why I love blogging: it stimulate communications and debates. This post has one purpose: clarify my previous post on Analog Blog.

What I described is a way to link thoughts, ideas and information together. I tried to use the blog concept with papers notes (notebooks, journal, diary; anything that is made of paper) and writing to know if the concepts can be used for this purpose. So, using Moleskines to do my demonstration was a fantasy, nothing much.

If you think that the idea is crazy then it’s your choice and I respect it. But try to tell this to an archivist or an historian. I also can give you a challenge: try to find a specific information in your university courses notes. I personally have over 1500 handwritten sheets, containing many type of information, in around 30 file cabinets. It’s virtually impossible to find anything in a reasonable time without any classification system (and I’m not talking of my 2500 printed sheets of all kinds). I recently talked with a guy that done a master in history. He had a fantastic archiving system to class his reading and to easily recover information in his sources. It was far more crazy that this little “analog blog” system. Was he crazy? Certainly not; it was more than essential for his work.

Yeah computers revolutionize the way we work today. Personal computers are one of the most famous inventions of the 20e century. Personally I never used my laptop in a course. It just doesn’t do the job for me. When I looked at my fellows with their laptops, I never saw them using it for the course but to chat and read forums posts.

I also want to answer to this blogger (thank for your post, it was relevant)

“This strikes me as obviously silly. A blog is, and to be a blog pretty much has to be, a hypertext document displayed on a computer with an internet connection.

The connection is the key to a blog, allowing you to surf away from the blog using its links, and then to surf away from those links, using theirs. The possibility of a non–self–referential, chaotic surf. When you write, however creatively, in a notebook, what you have is — a notebook. Repeat: a notebook. Not a blog. A notebook. Lots of paper? Writing? Hard covers? No USB port? Ah yes, that’ll be a notebook.”

Who say that a link, is necessary an HTML hyperlink on internet? A link is basically a relation between two things. It can be two websites, but it can also be two trains’ stations, two ideas, two people and two airports. All these associations are links. There are systems in place to use these links. It can be a social network, an airport fly system or the internet. Why do I need an internet connection to surf from link to link? Blog is nothing much then a way to display information. The links and the information contained in them are supported by other technologies, mostly derived from XML. A blog is nothing more than this… a way to present information. It’s dull doesn’t it? But the concept of blog, not the electronic implementation we know today, is really more then this. I’ll refer you to this post; read the linked article and you’ll understand a little more on what I want to say about blog’s concept. You need to see distinction between Blogs and the concept of Blogs; they are two things.

It was a little clarification on the purpose of my Analog Blog post.