• Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Good places to start

Memoirs of a SLACer

sociological views on life and the liberal arts

Feeds:
Posts
Comments
« Congratulations, give us money!
A sociological view of Fast and Furious 6 »

Writing for the lowest common demonimator

May 23, 2013 by John

Just the Facts:

  • News articles on Edmunds.com feature a “Just the Facts” section that typically repeats the information in the first few sentences of the story.
  • This is stupid.
  • For this exercise in stupidity, and the commitment to keep it up for over a year, I have awarded Edmonds.com the Memoirs of a SLACer Award for Unnecessarily Dumbing Things Down.

Quite a while ago (over a year, as far as I can tell, which is forever in internet time), Edmunds.com adopted a new format for its articles about car news. The “car news” section should not be confused with their car reviews or long-term road tests, where various editors comment on a car over the course of a year, both of which are written in a different style. Articles in Edmunds news section are often little more than reworded press releases, which is problematic its own right. Not content to simply feed readers language crafted by the PR representatives of automakers, however, Edmunds also includes a section at the top of their articles labeled “Just the Facts” with a summary of the key points and a section at the bottom labeled “Edmunds says” where they editorialize about the content with a one-line statement.

The problem with this approach can be seen in a recent story about the possibility that Tesla Motors will repay its government loan this week (which, I admit, is based on a tweet, not a press release).  I have linked to the story in the previous sentence but you should only click on the link if you want to see a picture of Tesla’s Model S electric car, which is admittedly very nice looking, because the article is so short that I will include the whole thing here (and here’s a direct link to the picture of the car!):

Just the Facts:

  • In yet another milestone for the electric start-up, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk said the company may repay its U.S. Department of Energy loan as early as Wednesday.
  • Musk made the announcement in a Twitter message on Monday.
  • Musk also said another announcement about its Supercharger network would be coming next week.

 PALO ALTO, California — In yet another milestone for the electric start-up, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk said the company may repay its U.S. Department of Energy loan as early as Wednesday.

Musk made the announcement in a Twitter message on Monday.

Musk also said another announcement about its Supercharger network would be coming next week.

“Given govt loan repayment this week (prob Wed), Supercharger update will be next week,” Musk tweeted. “Work continuing independent of announcement.”

Musk’s tweets include official company announcements and what essentially are personal journal postings.

He also recently posted: “Petting zoo left a chicken behind at the park. Now we have a pet chicken.”

Tesla has been on a winning streak as of late. Last week, the automaker said it would use $452.4 million from a bond and stock offering to repay the balance of the federal loan with interest. The loan helped to cover the cost of building the Tesla Model S.

Edmunds says: Tesla is on the brink of a major moment in its history.

You may notice from the story itself is short – 157 total words. You may also notice that the “Just the Facts” section is simply the first three lines of the story. The facts then, included at the beginning of a very short story (as journalists have a tendency of doing) are apparently some sort of summary for people who have been watching cable news all day and cannot understand anything that is not preceded by a bullet point. The “facts” themselves are 55 words, or over a third of the entire article!

For its efforts in this area, I hereby award Edmonds.com the Memoirs of a SLACer Award for Unnecessarily Dumbing Things Down. Congratulations, Edmunds!

John says: When visiting Edmunds.com, stick to the reviews and long-term road tests. Get your car news from a source that doesn’t think you’re a complete idiot.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Tumblr
  • More
  • Email
  • Pinterest
  • Reddit

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in Arts and Letters, SLACer Awards, The Electronic Age | Tagged Edmunds Says, Edmunds.com, Just the Facts, Memoirs of a SLACer, Memoirs of a SLACer Award for Unecessarily Dumbing Things Down | 1 Comment

One Response

  1. on June 18, 2013 at 9:52 pm Encyclopedic | Memoirs of a SLACer

    […] exposes the public to our research, likes short, easily digestible statements (possibly in bullet-point form). Finding a comfortable middle ground is a challenge that we have to face if we want to reach […]



Comments are closed.

  • Pages

    • About
    • Contact
    • Good places to start
  • Previous Posts

    May 2013
    M T W T F S S
     12345
    6789101112
    13141516171819
    20212223242526
    2728293031  
    « Apr   Jun »
  • Categories

  • Blogs I Read

    • Conditionally Accepted
    • Crooked Timber
    • Female Science Professor
    • Historiann
    • orgtheory.net
    • scatterplot
    • Small Pond Science
    • Soc'ing Out Loud
    • Sociology in Focus
    • Sociology Source
    • Sociology Toolbox
    • Tenured Radical
    • The Society Pages
    • whatisthewhat
  • Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

  • Meta

    • Register
    • Log in
    • Entries feed
    • Comments feed
    • WordPress.com
  • Site Meter

    Site Meter

Blog at WordPress.com.

WPThemes.


Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • Memoirs of a SLACer
    • Join 117 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Memoirs of a SLACer
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Copy shortlink
    • Report this content
    • View post in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
%d bloggers like this: