Writing for the Web

UK: A critique of the NPFS website

Via the blog Helpful Technology, a very effective critique of the design and content of the British government's new pandemic flu site. Excerpt:

When the National Pandemic Flu Service launched last week, it was always going to be big. As it transpired, the demand was massive, beyond even what the developers had predicted with over 2,000 requests a second for the homepage. 

When I checked the site later that day (for professional reasons), I was surprised. To be clear: I don’t really know how or why the site looks as it does: I’ve not been involved in that to date, and there’s always internal politics, a technical backstory and a team doing their best behind every government website. But as a lay outsider I started thinking: in a fantasy scenario, how would I have done it?

As it turns out, considerably better than the government. But don't get me going about the problems of corporate webwriting.

A really useful resource for webwriters

If you're writing for websites, you don't have to be a professional journalist to benefit from the Reuters Handbook of Journalism, which is now available online. Even the most casual blogger should try to follow Reuters' 10 Absolutes of ethical journalism.

A blast against clichés

Via The Independent, Robert Fisk brings up points that all webwriters should heed: Tanks roll and guns fall silent, but the clichés go on for ever. Excerpt (but read the whole article):

In real life, do we really call borders "porous" – even when, like the Durand line which divides Afghanistan from present-day Pakistan, few of the people living on the frontier believe it's real? 

In ordinary conversation, do ever refer to "iconic" or "defining moments", even though speech-writers like to sprinkle them around the lexicon of third-rate politicians? 

Indeed, politics provides some of our most woeful clichés. Presidents and prime ministers like to demonstrate "soft power" – a descendant of the old "hitting above our weight" – when they are not on the "campaign trail". 

I have a special "AAAAAGH" for "campaign trail". It was presumably coined in the United States (the "trail" being a giveaway) but it now applies to any election anywhere on earth. MPs or US senators or French presidents are always "fighting for their political life", their arguments often "compelling". Which means what, exactly? 

Every newly inaugurated American president since Truman, it appears, has "hit the ground running".