Write, do not cut. What I began to miss in Habr's publications

Avoiding value judgments! Let's split sentences. We throw out the unnecessary. Do not pour water.
Facts. Figures. And without emotion.

An “informational” style, sleek and sleek, covered the technical portals with a head.
Hi postmodern, now our author is dead. Already for real.



For those who don’t know. Information style is a series of editing techniques when a strong text should turn out from any text. Easy to read, without water, without lyrical digressions, without value judgments. More precisely, grades are proposed to be placed by the reader. In fact, it is a squeeze of facts prepared for easy perception.

He is good at news (including technical), press releases, and product descriptions.
Here it is dry, on business and without emotions comes in with a bang.

Once I myself was carried away by him. It seemed to me that this is correct. Why would the reader know my emotions, my thoughts, my problems? I am writing about urban lighting, metering devices, and wireless technologies. What emotions are there? Who cares how I look and what I feel?

Over the past year, I fundamentally changed my mind.

Throughout 2019, I was haunted by the feeling that half of the Habr’s authors reached the book “Write, Cut” and now actively apply tricks from there.

The texts became impersonal, unemotional, licked and calm. Descriptive.
Quietly and steadily invisible author writes me the pros and cons of the next technology. And I find myself on the fact that I do not see this author.

Who is he? A quiet nerd, a lively geek or a bore administrator? Any of these characters has the right to life, and I read articles of such people with pleasure.

However, when I don’t see the author’s personality behind the text, I don’t feel comfortable.

Why is this so important?

Because faith in such a text falls at times.

Maybe it was written by some copywriter who simply reprinted what he found on the Web. And half of his facts are true, and half is nonsense.

Example: LoRaWAN in Russia usually uses 125 kHz channels. Yeah, so far so far so good. Range exceeds 10 km in the city. Teeek. It is clear, again, someone reprints an advertising booklet.

This is alright if I read what I understand. And if I read just to understand? How can I find the place where our invisible copywriter already carries a blizzard?

The easiest answer for me is not to read this. And find a normal article. Where the quiet nerd, zinger-geek or bore administrator does not hide his identity in the text, but uses the same tricks and turns as in life. He writes and does NOT abbreviate.

Yes, it’s hard to read in places. Yes, there can be a lot of water, retreats to the side, lengthy reasoning, and so on. Yes, the author can also carry a blizzard and make mistakes.

But there is the main thing. The experience of a living person. The rake he stepped on. His impressions of technology. His feelings from work. And his opinion. All this shows that a person did something himself before sitting down for an article. Even I can interpret his mistakes correctly, there would be a good description.

Actually, these are the things I always looked for and are looking for on Habré. Personal experience.
And I can find it only in articles with living authors. I hope that on this resource livestock will not die out. I ask and urge the authors not to lose their identity and not get involved in editing. We’ll leave the information style to the news.

PS The article is inspired by the feelings of the author and is his personal opinion. Which, for sure, does not coincide with someone else's personal opinion. This is normal :)

Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/undefined/