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Is brevity the soul of wit?
Dec. 5th, 2020 03:12 pmMaybe. It depends. What got me pondering the question was this article I just read on Pocket:
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/life-would-be-better-if-we-added-this-line-to-every-email?utm_source=pocket-newtab
When it comes to e-mail, some of us just have to react to that "ding!" of a message landing in their Inbox. Others, like me, turn off the sound effects because we find them annoying. Everything is urgent but hardly any of it is important. Lots of the stuff that purports to be urgent is just more spam. But that line "Please don't write me a novel, I won't read it"? I don't think so.
I agree that in a business context, e-mails should generally be, well, businesslike. If your boss or a co-worker is asking you to do a particular thing or participate in a group project, you'd probably like them to just get to the point. But in a less formal context, I say: By all means write me a novel, I'll probably read it!
In fact, given that most of us have to rely to some extent on electronic communications these days, I'd far rather read a lengthy e-mail than a cryptic text or tweet or vituperative knee-jerk flame-fest on social media! I've read some long e-mails that have still been well-organized. Even the rambling ones can still be interesting or entertaining.
Another interesting implication of that line is that the value of a message or novel is directly proportional to the number of people who read it or the overall extent to which it gets read. If you're a struggling fledgling author, that could very well be the case. And if you send a message to one person, you probably intend that person to read it. But many of us keep diaries and journals and planners and such that are mainly or exclusively for our own eyes or for a select group of people. Some people write things down that are intended for their future selves in, say, ten or twenty years hence.
There are many other implications here. Some are primarily visual learners, some are auditory learners, some are tactile learners, some are kinetic learners... probably we all use a combination of learning styles in different contexts. There's also the matter of reading from a screen vs. reading from a printed book, and the matter of typing into a computer vs. writing longhand with various writing implements. And of sound to text conversion (our telephone answering machine doesn't do a great job of that!) and vice versa. How does all that affect how we process things in our minds?
The medium and the message - the eternal conundrum!
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/life-would-be-better-if-we-added-this-line-to-every-email?utm_source=pocket-newtab
When it comes to e-mail, some of us just have to react to that "ding!" of a message landing in their Inbox. Others, like me, turn off the sound effects because we find them annoying. Everything is urgent but hardly any of it is important. Lots of the stuff that purports to be urgent is just more spam. But that line "Please don't write me a novel, I won't read it"? I don't think so.
I agree that in a business context, e-mails should generally be, well, businesslike. If your boss or a co-worker is asking you to do a particular thing or participate in a group project, you'd probably like them to just get to the point. But in a less formal context, I say: By all means write me a novel, I'll probably read it!
In fact, given that most of us have to rely to some extent on electronic communications these days, I'd far rather read a lengthy e-mail than a cryptic text or tweet or vituperative knee-jerk flame-fest on social media! I've read some long e-mails that have still been well-organized. Even the rambling ones can still be interesting or entertaining.
Another interesting implication of that line is that the value of a message or novel is directly proportional to the number of people who read it or the overall extent to which it gets read. If you're a struggling fledgling author, that could very well be the case. And if you send a message to one person, you probably intend that person to read it. But many of us keep diaries and journals and planners and such that are mainly or exclusively for our own eyes or for a select group of people. Some people write things down that are intended for their future selves in, say, ten or twenty years hence.
There are many other implications here. Some are primarily visual learners, some are auditory learners, some are tactile learners, some are kinetic learners... probably we all use a combination of learning styles in different contexts. There's also the matter of reading from a screen vs. reading from a printed book, and the matter of typing into a computer vs. writing longhand with various writing implements. And of sound to text conversion (our telephone answering machine doesn't do a great job of that!) and vice versa. How does all that affect how we process things in our minds?
The medium and the message - the eternal conundrum!
