Mary Dash's Writing Tips • Hacker News Board

Re: Mary Dash's Writing Tips

#71

Post by nicbou » Tue, Mar 17, 2020, 9:37 PM UTC

btilly wrote: post #45

Judging by this sample, Mary Dash should be receiving writing tips, not giving them. Do you doubt me? Consider the opening paragraph: Readers prefer active voice sentences, and we should try to use the active voice in most of our business writing to communicate our message most effectively. Active voice clearly identifies the action and who is performing that action. Unfortunately, much of government writing is in th…

I write guides for people who do not speak English fluently. I keep my sentences short, I use simple words, and I use the Oxford comma. It helps a lot.

I moved to Germany when I didn't speak German. The government uses complex language to talk to people who don't speak German. It made me angry, and I wanted to do better.

In my opinion, sentences that start with the condition are easier to read. You already know if they are relevant to you.

For example, "If you meet condition A, you must do B" is easier to parde than "You must do B if you meet condition A".

I also avoid idioms. They are fun, but they are hard to understand.

I have many other tricks, but your two tricks are the most important.

Re: Mary Dash's Writing Tips

#72

Post by cranekam » Tue, Mar 17, 2020, 9:38 PM UTC

smogcutter wrote: post #43

cranekam wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely agree here. In addition, I am reasonably literate and understand all the uncommon words people use instead of everyday ones but I find reading windy prose is tiring . "I purchased a house", "we utilized the spoon", "Steve and myself are going to the pub" all sound a lot more clumsy and showoff-y than "I bought a house", "we used the spoon", "Steve and I are going to the pub".

For what it’s worth, “Steve and myself are going to the pub” is flatly incorrect. Good rule of thumb is that if it you rewrite the sentence with just the pronoun and it sounds wrong, it’s wrong. “Myself is going to the pub” and throwing poor Steve in there doesn’t change that.

Yeah, I know this one is incorrect. I wasn’t sure whether to include it or not but decided to because I think people generally say it for the same reason as the others: to sound fancy.

Re: Mary Dash's Writing Tips

#73

Post by nicbou » Tue, Mar 17, 2020, 9:41 PM UTC

knee-cartilage wrote: post #58

btilly wrote: post #45

Judging by this sample, Mary Dash should be receiving writing tips, not giving them. Do you doubt me? Consider the opening paragraph: Readers prefer active voice sentences, and we should try to use the active voice in most of our business writing to communicate our message most effectively. Active voice clearly identifies the action and who is performing that action. Unfortunately, much of government writing is in th…

do we really need to be putting all our writing down to grade 5 level

It helps. There is a place and a time for clever language. You don't have to make complex topics more complicated with language.

If you are a government service, you will serve people who are not native speakers.

Re: Mary Dash's Writing Tips

#74

Post by potatoyogurt » Wed, Mar 18, 2020, 1:32 AM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #61

potatoyogurt wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

okay, you're right, i wasn't paying attention. shame on me. Still, I think it is a stretch to point to the use of this passive participle as the reason why this sentence works or doesn't work.

> okay, you're right, i wasn't paying attention. shame on me. I find this attitude troubling in combination with the argument made all over this thread that you can tell the people who say not to use passives are full of it because they can't even identify a passive when they're looking at one. (And you're at least flirting with that argument in your comment above.) It's completely true that the advice not to use pas…

I think maybe you're getting the wrong impression about the tone I intend (my fault, I am not putting a lot of effort into tone or careful writing). I realize that what I wrote can be read very passive aggressively. I meant it more just as acknowledging that I made a dumb mistake and chiding myself for it. In person, that would have been clearer.

This week has been busy and stressful and I wrote both comments quickly and off the cuff. It's not that I can't tell that acknowledged is a passive participle, it's just that I didn't even look at it because I was pattern matching against common mistakes I've seen people make. It was only afterwards that I noticed that the parent comment specifically pointed to the word "acknowledged."

> I find this attitude troubling in combination with the argument made all over this thread that you can tell the people who say not to use passives are full of it because they can't even identify a passive when they're looking at one. (And you're at least flirting with that argument in your comment above.)

This is not what I'm saying, and it's not the argument I would make if I were actually making an argument. I said very few words, and not very carefully chosen ones, and you're putting words into my mouth. I made no case for or against passive voice. I just thought I saw a mistake briefly and I was trying to point it out.