In other words... nobody cares about your blog. ;-)
They just care about it for the wrong reasons.
Reasons that can be eliminated by adapting the structure of the content to a modern audience.
They may care about the subject matter of the blog post, but they don't care about the blog post, which is just an excuse for them to rant about the subject matter.
> Reasons that can be eliminated by adapting the structure of the content to a modern audience.
c/modern/lazy
This kind of framing/sweeping generalization doesn’t make sense to me. There will always be people who will rant for the sake of ranting, but this isn’t universal, nor should it be the base assumption about a reader/commentor.
> c/modern/lazy
This carries the problematic generalization further. The modern media environment has drastically impacted people’s attention span.
There are plenty of critical things to be said about the effects of this trend, but painting this as just a matter of laziness misses the bigger picture.
Especially important if you want to create content that encourages people to cultivate attention and stop consuming attention-destroying content.
Writing for a “modern” audience isn’t about catering to lazy people, but recognizing what people are up against in an information landscape that increasingly churns out bad information, making it necessary as a reader to assess the content quickly enough to know if it’s time to move on, because there isn’t enough time or attention in a day to give every post a full read.
I’m not saying lazy readers don’t exist, but that’s not why I think it’s useful to think about content structure.
Nonetheless, many good jokes have a grain of truth. Such commenters who rant for the sake of ranting obviously do exist, as you admit, and they are pervasive.
> making it necessary as a reader to assess the content quickly enough to know if it’s time to move on, because there isn’t enough time or attention in a day to give every post a full read.
It's interesting that you said "move on" rather than "comment", which is precisely the distinction I discussed in another comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36746673 Moving on is fine. The problem is staying and commenting without reading carefully.
But I still don’t understand how come people feel like it is worth to spend time writing comment on something they don’t have time to read through.
Personally, I read the whole thing, kinda scratched my head about the framing of it all, and came here to find what apparently seemed like agreement with my reaction.
It became more clear what the author was going for when he clarified, and in that light, the post makes more sense.
But I think someone lacking that context or familiarity with the author’s style and taking the content a bit too literally at first (like me) is another source of the critical commentary.
Things got a bit off track when this became a thread about people refusing to read, or lacking comprehension. From my perspective there are two ways to read it, and I think this pretty much guarantees some confusion.
A long long time ago, before the Internet and the wide availability of electronic content, I used to read books and would even send physical letters.
Once I entered the corporate world and email, I had people telling me that I have to change my writing style. Pre-modern world and me included would use what I would call the "epistolary" style (long, detailed text). I was taught it by the literature I read or enforced in school by the style of writing I was expected to write. Essentially a bottom-up approach where you start with the premises and gradually build up your conclusion, presented at the end of the "novel".
Well problem's in the modern world nobody has the time to read your novel. I think reformulating "Nobody cares about your blog" to "Nobody has time to read your novel" would be closer to the truth.
It's not that people don't read novels anymore, it's that the quantity of content has increased 100x. Literally there's no time to go in depth over each and every wall of text you are confronted with.
So better adjust your writing style to modernity and use a top-down approach. Start with the conclusion and gradually build up the premises that led you there. Some people might read the whole content if it captures their interest but 99% will just read your summary and skim through the high level part of your content (assuming you stick to the top-down, so it gradually breaks into more and more complex parts).
I'd say there's nothing wrong with the approach and gotta keep up with the times we're living.
If people don't want to read everything you wrote, that's not inherently a problem.
The problem is that people want to comment on things they haven't read, and that's a problem the writer can't solve. Lazy, superficial commenters are a pox on all writing, and the internet has enabled them. It's a feature of modern times because the internet has given superficial, super lazy commenters a platform they never had before. Anyone in the world can sign up for a social media platform and start spewing text with practically no effort or ability.
Long form speakers often do so to obfuscate the content. It's a hiding place.
The only long form I read is fiction.
No, it's a criticism of people who make cheap shots in comments.
Again, if one doesn't have the patience for reading something, that's fine. But just walk away from the article, don't proceed to comment on something one doesn't have the patience to read. That's a disservice both to the author and to the people who did read the text.
"There's too much stuff to read on the internet" is a reason to walk away. It's not a good reason to stick around and comment.
Sure - times have changed - but not necessarily for the better.
And the "pro": you don't care what modern times are like. This is a blog. You get to pick who you write for. If time-short people who only want maximally-concise hand_holding business text are not your target, that's fine. You get to pick how you want to write. You can pick to ensure only better classes of readers.
Shameful.
I’ve stumbled onto so many random blogs and read a post on a topic I’m already familiar with because I hope to find a different perspective on it.
I think some of the feedback here is because that’s not how you explain the cons in the post:
> Here’s a list of why nobody cares about your blog
While you do go on to tell people they shouldn’t care about these cons, I’d go a step further and say these aren’t even real things most people who encounter your blog will think.
Your framing sets this up as a current of negative sentiment out there against which you must steel yourself to write.
A different framing is that this negative sentiment primarily exists in your own mind (mine too), thus not a problem.
I think there’s a meaningful difference between the two, especially if you’re not writing due to anxiety about reception.
The overarching message is great. I just worry that your list kind of reifies the notion that those are real reasons.
This is a perfectly acceptable style.
This is a problem in comprehension. People aren’t thinking.
“these aren’t even real things most people who encounter your blog will think”
But these are real things real people think about a lot when they think about writing or creating and sharing it.
Honestly, the lack of comprehension is a gentle reminder to me that HN isn’t any smarter than any other place. It just tends to lean toward topics I’m interested in, but the people making up the discussion aren’t necessarily smarter.
I'd argue that it's a failing of the engagement-driven information economy.
The Internet is full of posts with lists of hot takes that are completely literal. It is in this landscape that a reader finding a post like this must decide how to interpret what the reader is trying to say.
> It’s clear he doesn’t believe this list of cons
For the reasons outlined, this was not clear at all. It was clear that the author felt someone shouldn't care about these cons, but that is quite different than concluding that the cons aren't even worth believing.
There are times that cons are true, and those cons are outweighed by the pros. There are times when the cons win.
This is a time when the cons are false. Mentioning that would be helpful. This is my primary point.
> But these are real things real people think about a lot when they think about writing or creating and sharing it.
Yes, and my point was that the issue can be very easily solved by just framing it as such with almost zero change to the overall content.
"None of these are true" vs. "You shouldn't care about these cons". It's a small change that completely shifts the meaning of the list and brings more readers onboard.
> Honestly, the lack of comprehension...
And let's say for sake of argument that the primary problem is one of comprehension. That implies a broader trend that requires corrective behaviors, and concluding that "that's just their problem" doesn't seem to be very useful for anyone involved either. If this is the new state of readership, authors have some choices to make.
I deeply support the underlying message the author is trying to convey: write stuff, and don't listen to bad reasons for not writing! I don't want my comments here to be misconstrued otherwise.
Most blog posts are unpaid labor. It's not blogger's job to explain everything to everyone, because blogging is not their job. As a frequent blogger myself, if I had to dumb down my blog posts for the dumbest, most inattentive readers, then that in itself would be a good reason not to blog at all. I'm just not interested in that crap. I write for an "intelligent" audience, and I don't care if that sounds elitist.
If you paid for a product, then you have the right to complain. But with blog posts, you're consuming text for free. You can choose not to consume it fully, and that's fine, but pedantically telling bloggers to change their writing style is stepping over the line. Bloggers have no obligation whatsoever to cater to the inattentive, or whomever you believe they need to cater to.
If everyone was missing the point of a blog post, that would indicate a problem with the writing. But that's not the case here.
I shared a piece of feedback earlier in the thread based on what I saw to be the source of confusion.
I'm not arguing that bloggers have to explain everything to everyone.
I'm not arguing that bloggers have an obligation to cater to the lowest common denominator.
And I'm not arguing that everyone is missing the point.
To bring this back to where I started, in a meta-discussion about people getting confused about the meaning of the words written, the only point I was trying to make was that this is happening for an understandable reason, and this reason goes away entirely with a slight reframing without fundamentally changing anything.
I'm not even arguing that my specific reframing is the best way to do it or that the author must go change anything.
I think my perspective may make more sense if you imagine that I'm trying to understand why people are misunderstanding, and that I find it interesting to explore those reasons. I find this interesting for admittedly selfish reasons: like most bloggers, I want people who care enough to read my stuff to understand the words I write. Discussions like this help clarify where the pitfalls exist.
In a post about writing blog posts, such an exploration seems appropriate.
I agree.
> and this reason goes away entirely with a slight reframing without fundamentally changing anything.
I disagree, because I disagree with your diagnosis of why it's happening.
* Information that's derivative of cutting edge knowledge, but not worth the bother for the academic researchers to work on, especially in the area of turning it into practical things.
* Stuff that can't be documented by the experts because they can't write, unless it's for an audience of fellow experts, or they feel no reason to. Virtually all technical documentation is impenetrable without supporting commentary or explanation, often written by non-experts.
* Practical projects, that might have only one interested user (myself), but whose pieces might be of interest to others. This is most of my blogging.
* Keeping old arts and obscure techniques alive.
* Invitation for critique. Am I wrong? Show me. Make my day.
So far as writing papers or giving interviews, some folks might feel that the "overhead" of doing those things does not justify the benefits. For instance I have no academic career to advance.