[Sigia-l] width limits for a body of text

[paula.thornton]

Hmmm. Here's where bringing in a strategic perspective pays off. The first
answer is always, "It depends".

The point is that the length of the line is irrelevant until you understand
the intent of the text. I think it might have been George who came up with 3
primary interaction activities (didn't you have it in your Miami Beach
presentation earlier this month George), but while my memory fails me, let's
just use my standbys: finding, doing.

If an individual has still not 'arrived' at the point of 'doing' (meaning
that they've accomplished their 'find' and can now move forward with their
original intent for coming to the site), they are still in 'finding' mode.
They ability (how their mind is 'focused') and willingness to read are
different than if they had 'arrived' at the thing they were looking for. In
the early phase they are scanning to look for scents to follow: relevancy.
While length is relevant, clarity is even more relevant.

Clarity is a 'quality' issue that we often do not address. But those of us
with technical writing backgrounds can attest: a short line can have a lot
of 'noise' that makes it nearly nonsensical, and a long line can have very
clear, distinct phraseology that makes it easy to peruse.

So how about we stop trying to oversimplify the work and get serious about
all of the skills we either need to master or defer to our colleague who
have those skills?