> except when you get someone else's comment or response sandwiched between two items of the thread?
Can you give an example? When I look at Twitter threads, I see the main thread presented contiguously. If I want to look at replies, I have to scroll to the bottom or click on an individual tweet.
Maybe I’ve seen a sandwiched reply once or twice, long ago, but I haven’t seen it in a long time. Maybe there’s been an UI change, or maybe it’s the fact that you can post an entire Twitter thread in one click.
> Ad-blockers are amazing. Brave's Speed Reader also give you every blog or article already formatted with a clean, js-free stylesheet.
Most people do not use ad blockers. I use different browsers, different computers and mobile devices. Shall I go through all the steps necessary to configure ad blockers on every device and browser combination I have?
> And also appealing to the lowest common denominator. It's like the McDonalds of an informational diet.
Your information diet should be varied. It’s okay to eat at McDonald’s, but you will probably have a bad time if you have every single meal there. It is okay to read threads on Twitter, but you should not get all of your news there.
The content I read on Twitter is definitely not lowest common denominator content. It is generally highly technical, specialized content that is simply written for 280-character chunks.
> Twitter encourages soundbites and shallow thinking, and I think we should do better.
Blogs and journals encourage people to waste words on the page and ramble on without getting to the point. It’s sloppy writing, and I think we can do better.
I’m not trying to be cute here; this is a serious problem and you should treat it as a serious problem. You should write and consume long-form content, but you should also write and consume short-form content. Professors and grad students have a perennial problem writing abstracts and summaries for their journal articles because they have underdeveloped short-form writing skills. They often assume that their readers are fellow experts in the relevant field, and can figure out that the research is important based on its content.
The result? The research remains buried, because the professors and grad students doing the research can’t effectively summarize it or explain it to people outside the field. They give long-winded explanations that never get to the point, or assume that their audience has all of the relevant context. If they used Twitter more, they would likely find it easier to explain their research to people outside their own field. The reason is simple—brevity and clarity take practice.
This isn’t an example that I made up or picked out of thin air, this is a recurring complaint I hear from people working in communications in academia. A professor will say, “My research is important, maybe a journalist would be interested in reporting on it.” Then the communications department asks, “Can you give us a two-sentence summary of what your research is about?” It should be easy!
I like to think that academic papers can be clear and comprehensible, and don’t need to fall into the traps of traditional academic writing styles (obfuscated, incomprehensible, verbose). Likewise, Twitter threads can contain meaningful content, and don’t have to just consist of a series of quotable sound bites.
except when you get someone else's comment or response sandwiched between two items of the thread?
> because the page is constantly trying to hijack the browser to show ads.
Ad-blockers are amazing. Brave's Speed Reader also give you every blog or article already formatted with a clean, js-free stylesheet.
> This style of writing is bland and simplistic but also clear.
And also appealing to the lowest common denominator. It's like the McDonalds of an informational diet.
> Twitter encourages clarity and brevity, and I like it.
Twitter encourages soundbites and shallow thinking, and I think we should do better.