Webwriting

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• Webwriting
• Niels Hendriks and Liesbeth Huybrechts

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At first

• Assignments on CMC
• Tell me about them

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Then

• Divide the class into two groups
• Group 1 scroll, surf,
• Group 2 scroll, surf,
• Fill in the questionnaire
• I will provide you with the URLS

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First law of Webwriting

• If you dont write for the reader,
• the reader wont read.

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Webwriting

• Whats the fuzz about webwriting?
• Importance of webwriting
• Before we start (web-)writing
• Start writing for the web

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Whats the fuzz about Webwriting

• http//www.pixyland.org/peterpan/
• http//www.timecube.com/
• http//www.geocities.com/betrothed_m/

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Why webwriting? Impact of internet on our lives.

• How ten years of internet changed live
  enormously, Peter Dupont (DM 9/10/04)
• Bye Bye television
• Internet loses credibility
• E-commerce stonger
• Dead of the nerd
• Stay away from me
• Information resource numero uno
• Webchildren
• E-dictature bothers

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• On the web people are sloppyer (and quicker) in
  writing their texts.
• Its a quick medium and therefore everything has
  to be written strongly and correctly
• Journalists/public take texts from the net.
  Therefore organisations of all kind should make
  their texts ready for publication. Sloppyness
  not allowed or journalists/public skip your texts!

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• Students found on line reading of essays very
  hard because
• Text was hard to understand
• Text was boring
• Problem with the credibility of the author
• The arguments werent convincing

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• On line users (surfers) are
• Critical
• Impatient
• Distrusting
• Constantly seeking for information (all meanings)
• Under constant time and emotional pressure
  (Nielsen)
• Time I dont have enough time to do this
• Emotional I need this to have me satisfied
• Lazy search for INSTANT GRATIFICATION
• COGNITIVE BURDEN

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• Nielsen cites a testuser in a research
• When I look at a text that is too long at work,
  where I receive seventy e-mails en fifty voice
  mails a day, I ignore it. If it isnt right in my
  face, I dont read it (Nielsen, p. 122).
• What do you do?

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• What do we do?
• What they actually do most of the time (if were
  lucky) is glance at each new page, scan some of
  the text, and click on the first link that
  catches their interest or vaguely resembles the
  thing theyre looking for. There are usually
  large parts of the page that they dont even look
  at.
• Don't Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to
  Web Usability Steve Krug

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• What we look at?
• Not everything on a page
• Newssites
• Text, especially headings, summaries titles
  (78)
• Images (22)
• TEXT gt IMAGES!!!

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• www.yahoo.com

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• What did you see at first sight?
• Which aspect of this site gets your first
  attention?
• As I click the site away is there a lot that
  didn get your attention?

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• eyes do not move smoothly across the text as we
  read. Instead, the typical reader behavior is to
  look at a word or several words in a group, and
  pause our eyes there briefly. This is called a
  "fixation," and it takes about 0.25 seconds on
  average.
• Poynter.org Keith Rayner

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Whats the fuzz about Webwriting

• Poynter Eyetrack-movie
• Blue dots represent fixations as a fixation gets
  longer, the dot grows. Lines between the blue
  dots are saccades, which are the paths between
  fixations.
• http//www.poynterextra.org/EYETRACK2004/videos.ht
  m

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Whats the fuzz about webwriting

• 79 scan
• 16 read word by word
• 25 lower reading
• So write 50 less text

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Importance of webwriting

• When a page comes up,users focus their attention
  on the center of the window where they read the
  body text first
• Ultimately, users visit your website for its
  content.
• Everything else is just the backdrop.
• (John Morkes and Jakob Nielsen)

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Importance of webwriting

• Paper vs Web
• paper is easier to read than a computer screen
• screens come in a variety of sizes and
  resolutions and are in landscape orientation
• paper is read from start to finish
• web pages can be read in any order
• readers want information now and so scan quickly.
  For print people usually want to read the whole
  document.
• hypertext allows a search to gather information
  from many sources quickly.
• http//www.qld.gov.au/web/writing/introduction/web
  _to_paper.html

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Importance of webwriting

• Reading
• Progression is word by word across the page and
  down.
• Meaning is gathered from the syntax (the way
  words are put together to form phrases or
  clauses) and the ongoing process of reading each
  word.
• Key information is not visually called out.

• Scanning
• Progression is rapid and not in order around the
  page as user looks for specific facts or key
  words and phrases.
• Meaning clusters around key words and phrases as
  the user finds them. There may not be an ongoing
  process of good meaning-making.
• Key information is visually called out.

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Importance of webwriting

• A web of words
• Texts
• Hyperlinks leading to other texts
• Visual text
• Images
• Buttons
• Drop down lists

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Importance of webwriting

• The web complicates reading
• Slower reading 25
• font size
• screen resolution slow reading by about 25.
• Poor design background images - font color
  http//www.georgetown.edu/faculty/bassr/511/projec
  ts/breault/template.htm
• Features such as unnecessary animations can
  interfere with reading

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Before we start (web-)writing

• Whats my vision, my mission,
• Who is my audience?
• What are my goals?
• Short-term
• Long-term
• Strategies to attain that goal?

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Before we start (web-)writing

• Target Audience
• know your users!
• Technical context Internet connection speed,
  browser and operating system, plug-ins, devices
  like PDAs, phones
• Goals and preferences users are goal-driven,
  they visit sites to accomplish something (find
  info, buy something, solve problems
• Online behaviour
• attention economics not too much attention
• paradox of the active user users dont read
  manuals gt there is no such thing as an ideal user

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Start writing for the web

• Concept whats the plan?
• Synopsis summary
• Storyboard
• Subdivide content
• Link pages
• Flowchart visual schematic presentation of the
  content
• Prototype

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Start writing for the web

• My vision my mission?
• Whos my audience?
• Whats my goal?
• Short term
• Long term
• What are my strategies to attain this goal?

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Targetgroup

• Who?
• Likes, Dislikes?
• Background?
• Internet Experience?
• What Computer? What connection to the net?
• Choices?
• Language
• Design

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Targetgroup example

• The pleasure surfer
• -fascinated by new things, information
• -kick out of interaction with strangers
• -mostly regular surfers
• Social surfer
• -Subcategory of pleasure surfers
• -like to communicate with others
• -people we can learn from
• Pragmatic surfer
• -Surfs to find information or to buy
• -Not for pleasure but for result
• -saving time saving money
• Research your surfers!!! Do they like lots of
  pictures or do they like it simple?
  (Klantgerichte onderneming, Wiegran Koth)

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Start writing for the web

• Flowchart

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Before we start (web-)writing

• How to gain your users trust?
• High-quality graphics
• Qualitative webwriting
• Outbound hyperlinks

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Start writing for the web

• In general its all about
• Being concise, scannable, and objective
• Microcontent
• Inverted piramids
• Hypertext structures.

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Start writing for the Web

• Other tips
• Try to enhance credibility
• style guide and spelling checker
• Proofread
• A common thread between conciseness,
  scannability, and objectivity is that each
  reduces the user's cognitive load, which results
  in faster, more efficient processing of
  information. (Morkes Nielsen, 1998)

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Start writing for the web

• Other tips
• Use Facts,figures,examples BE CONCRETE
• Keep your content Updated
• No empty words
• Eg. eigenlijk, bepaalde, heel wat, veel,
  verscheidene, tamelijk, nogal
• Eg. aspect, component, dimensie, element,
  gebeuren, model, situatie, systeem
• Eg. bovengenoemd, hiernavolgend, doch, met
  betrekking tot, om reden van
• No auxiliaries/hulpwerkwoorden
• Active voice
• Sentence 20 words

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Start writing for the web

• Active Passive
• Het seminarie zal woensdag om 0900 beginnen en
  zal worden gegeven door meneer Webber. 
• Beter Het seminarie begint woensdag om 0900u.
  Uw docent is meneer Webber.  (TT ipv
  OnvoltooidToekT)
• Voorbeeld De heer Bakker zal de berichten wel
  gelezen hebben. 
• Beter De heer Bakker heeft de berichten
  waarschijnlijk gelezen. (VVT ipv VoltooidToekT)
• Besluit
• Vermijd (on)voltooid toekomende tijd
• Vermijd teveel passieve vormen
• Vermijd teveel aan hulpwerkwoorden

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Start writing for the web

• Voorbeeld 1 Het vogelperspectief dat tot de
  technische terminologie van fotografie en andere
  beeldende kunsten behoort, impliceert een
  perspectief waarbij het oogpunt zich hoog boven
  het voorwerp bevindt.
• Voorbeeld 2 Een fotograaf die een foto maakt kan
  bijvoorbeeld op een trapladder gaan staan om iets
  van bovenaf te fotograferen. Zon standpunt
  noemen we vogelperspectief.

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Start writing for the web

• Assignment replace abstract formulations/words
  by ordinary words. Explain why.
• Nieuwe media doen steeds vaker hun intrede in de
  werking en het programma van musea en culturele
  instellingen. Er ontstaan nieuwe vormen van
  culturele productie en processen, gebaseerd op
  samenwerking en informatiedeling. De rigide
  afbakeningen tussen kunst en wetenschap/economie
  en tussen massacultuur en high art zijn
  daardoor onderhevig aan snelle erosie. Het
  internet heeft zich opgeworpen als een
  voedingsbodem voor immateriële vormen van
  creativiteit en sociale relaties maar ook als een
  nieuwe industriële ruimte.

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Start writing for the web

• Assignment delete empty words
• Ook het element van de didactische principes in
  elke situatie moet vandaag besproken worden.
• Hier volgt ten slotte een overzicht van de
  behandelingsmethodes die er zijn.
• Het is natuurlijk een feit dat studenten tijdens
  de examens het aspect van hun nachtelijke rust
  minder belangrijk vinden.
• Voor het ogenblik kan het departementshoofd geen
  rekening houden met het gebeuren van de
  studentenfuiven.

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Highlighted keywords
• Two or three levels of headings
• Meaningful sub-headings
• Lists
• One idea per paragraph
• The inverted pyramid style
• Half the normal word count for print.
• Use simple sentence structures
• Opening sentence in a paragraph should be the
  topic sentence
• Use bulleted lists
• Highlight or emphasize key words or phrases

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Bulleted lists whats the easiest to read?

• Anatomy
• Biology
• Biotechnology
• Chemistry
• Microbiology
• Physics
• Zoology

Anatomy Biology Biotechnology Chemistry Microbiolo
gy Physics Zoology
Anatomy Biology Biotechnology Chemistry
Microbiology Physics Zoology
1. New line 2. Bullets
new line 3. No new line no bullets
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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Easiest to read?

Art Journals History Electronic
Books Geography Mathematics
Art Books Geography
Journals History
Electronic Mathematics
2
1
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Start writing for the web scannable text
Topic Format Art
Books Geography Journals
History Electronic
Mathematics

• Not in straight rows, but in columns
• Using a logical listing, not alphabetical

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Microcontent
• Headlines, page titles, subject lines
• 40-60 characters to explain your macrocontent
• must make it absolutely clear what it is all
  about
• No teasing
• they are picked up by some search engines and
  appear as a summary of your site in their results
  page!

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Bad microcontent

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Examples of successful page titles are
• Campsites in southeast Queensland
• Sticky date pudding competition proves popular
• Troubleshooting your PC
•  Examples of poor page titles are
• Microsoft-Where did you think you were going?
• Microsoft software to make you rich.
• The way to my page
• A slight advance on production

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Start writing for the web

• Microcontent tips
• Keep titles short and scannable
• Avoid unnecessary words (welcome to..)
• DONT USE ALL UPPERCASE (HARDER TO SCAN)
• Put important words first
• Dont use articles (a, the)

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Start writing for the web scannable text
http//www.qld.gov.au/web/writing/writing_good_con
tent/scannability.html
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Start writing for the web scannable text
Traditional linear pattern
Introduction
Body
Conclusion
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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Inverted Pyramids
• Conclusion first
• Most important supporting information
• Background information
• Users dont scroll

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Start writing for the webscannable text
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• Chunk your information because
• readers can only hold about 4 - 7 discrete chunks
  of information in short-term memory
• most readers will be annoyed if they have to scan
  long blocks of text.
• How to chunk information
• decide which concepts deserve to be treated in
  separate documents and which don't
• segregate concepts - develop short, focused
  documents about each concept.

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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Chunking
• Use page chunking for non-linear content
• Split information into page-long hyperlinked
  chunks
• Intro page should contain links to content pages
• So that each page focuses on one topic/theme
• Also, provide background info on secondary,
  linked pages

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Start writing for the web scannable text
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Start writing for the web scannable text

• Make use of leads/aankeilers
• What?
• to introduce, to draw attention,
• Purpose?
• Draw attention
• To invite for further reading
• Advantages?
• Dynamic - speed
• Up-to-date
• Have a quick impression? Click for further
  reading
• ?
• Simple plain sentences
• 20 à 50 words
• Linked to full text (literally figuratively)

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Start writing for the webscannable text

• Leads/aankeilers

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Start writing for the web Scannable text

• Highlighting
• Important to highlight key-terms
• bold, italic, color, size
• Dont over highlight--it loses its effectiveness.
• Dont highlight overly long phrases. A scanning
  eye can only pick up 2-3 words at a glance.

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Start writing for the web Scannable text

• Example
• Nizar Trabelsi, een Tunesische ex-voetballer,
  wordt op 13 september 2001 aangehouden in
  Brussel. Speurders hadden bij hem 100 kg zwavel
  en 40 liter aceton gevonden, genoeg om een zware
  bom te maken. De officiële aanklacht poging tot
  vernietiging van gebouwen door middel van
  explosieven. Volgens sommige bronnen maakt
  Trabelsi deel uit van Takfir Wal Hijra, een
  radicale islamitische beweging met wortels in
  Egypte. De organisatie zou banden hebben met het
  Al-Qaedanetwerk van Osama bin Laden. Trabelsi zou
  het gemunt hebben op Amerikaanse doelwitten in
  Europa.
• Highlighted keywords
• Keywords which are visually accentuated

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Start writing for the web Scannable text

• Paragraphs (alineas)
• Voorbeeld 1
• Kritiek op het thuisfront
• Ook na de oorlog kunnen de Amerikaanse en Britse
  troepen geen massavernietigingswapens vinden.
  Mede daardoor groeit op het thuisfront het
  vermoeden dat de Amerikaanse en Britse regeringen
  hun rapporten over Irak hebben aangedikt om de
  publieke opinie warm te maken voor een
  oorlog.In Groot-Brittannië komt de
  communicatieadviseur van premier Tony Blair,
  Alastair Campbell, zwaar onder vuur te liggen als
  in een BBC-reportage het Britse Irak-rapport in
  twijfel trekt. De veiligheidsdiensten zouden niet
  achter de inhoud van dat rapport staan en de
  verklaring dat Saddam Hoessein binnen de 45
  minuten massavernietigingswapens kan inzetten zou
  niet met de waarheid stroken. De bron van de
  reportage, defensiespecialist David Kelly,
  zelfmoord pleegt nadat zijn naam door de regering
  naar buiten is gebracht. De positie van Alastair
  Campbell wordt onhoudbaar en hij stapt op.

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Start writing for the web Scannable text

• Paragraphs (alineas)
• Voorbeeld 2
• Kritiek op het thuisfront
• Ook na de oorlog kunnen de Amerikaanse en Britse
  troepen geen massavernietigingswapens vinden.
  Mede daardoor groeit op het thuisfront het
  vermoeden dat de Amerikaanse en Britse regeringen
  hun rapporten over Irak hebben aangedikt om de
  publieke opinie warm te maken voor een oorlog. In
  Groot-Brittannië komt de communicatieadviseur van
  premier Tony Blair, Alastair Campbell, zwaar
  onder vuur te liggen als in een BBC-reportage het
  Britse Irak-rapport in twijfel trekt. De
  veiligheidsdiensten zouden niet achter de inhoud
  van dat rapport staan en de verklaring dat Saddam
  Hoessein binnen de 45 minuten massavernietigingswa
  pens kan inzetten zou niet met de waarheid
  stroken. De bron van de reportage,
  defensiespecialist David Kelly, zelfmoord pleegt
  nadat zijn naam door de regering naar buiten is
  gebracht. De positie van Alastair Campbell wordt
  onhoudbaar en hij stapt op.

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Start writing for the web Scannable text

• Paragraphs (alineas)
• What?
• Block sentences which belong together
• Overview for the reader
• Lay-out?
• Use white spaces witregels
• Opbouw?
• Begin kernzin met vraag, probleemstelling,
  uitspraak of bewering
• Vervolgens toelichting op kernzin
• Inhoud?
• Wie, wat, waar, wanneer, waarom, welke, waardoor
• Eén idee per alinea

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Start writing for the web be concise

• Every sentence, every phrase, every word has to
  fight for its life (Kilian, Writing for the Web)
• Happy talk instructions must die (Krug, Don't
  Make Me Think)
• Therefore, whenever possible you should
• Omit unnecessary sentences in a paragraph
• Omit unnecessary words in a sentence
• Use a short word over a long one
• Get rid of welcome messages and introductory text
• Dont waste words telling users where they are,
  or what they can do, or how they do it
• Dont waffle on with explanations of whats on
  the site

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Start writing for the webbe concise

• no more than 50 per cent of the text you would
  have used in a hard copy publication
• separate long documents into natural section
  breaks
• strike a balance between useful information and
  making these documents easy and fast to read
• tighten up the language. A common error of
  conciseness is using a series of sentences to
  present of a single complex idea, where combining
  all the information into one might do.

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Start writing for the webbe concise

• test yourself constantly by counting the words in
  each sentence and trying to reduce them as above
  (get creative)
• Do not use dead words
• give examples, background information etc in
  hyperlinks to other pages
• avoid repetition
• present facts clearly
• use simple sentence structures
• use bullet lists

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Start writing for the webbe concise

• Macbeth was very ambitious. This led him to wish
  to become king of Scotland. The witches told him
  that this wish of his would come true. The king
  of Scotland at this time was Duncan. Encouraged
  by his wife, Macbeth murdered Duncan. He was thus
  enabled to succeed Duncan as king. (55 words.)

• BetterEncouraged by his wife, Macbeth achieved
  his ambition and realized the prediction of the
  witches. He murdered Duncan and became king of
  Scotland in his place. (26 words.)

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Start writing for the webobjectivity

• Limit use of promotional writing (marketese)
• Avoid exaggeration, boasting
• Dont make subjective claims or claims without
  hard evidence

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Start writing for the webobjectivity

• Marketese

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• Marketese

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Start writing for the webobjectivity

• link to other sites with supporting or
  substantiating information
• don't use happy marketese
• limit the use of metaphors
• don't use jargon unless it is well known amongst
  your audience and you have included a linked
  glossary 
• don't use bureaucratic language
• don't use corporate speak
• check your spelling
• don't use a pun as humour. International users
  may not understand or worse, be offended.
• add bylines (the authors name) if appropriate or
  other ways of communicating your personality (and
  thus, your credibility)
• update your pages often to get readers to return,
  particularly statistics, dates and examples
• update or remove your pages immediately an
  advertised event has passed. A registration form
  to a conference can be replaced by an event
  report after the lose-by date.

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ASSIGNMENT

• Re-write a text for the web (due week 4)
• Read the following articles on www.useit.com
• Read
• How Users Read on the Web
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html
• Differences Between Print Design and Web Design
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/990124.html
• Why Web Users Scan Instead of Read
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/whyscanning.html
• See next slide

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• Write
• Inverted Pyramids in Cyberspace
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/9606.html
• Be Succinct! (Writing for the Web)
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/9703b.html
• Trust or Bust Communicating Trustworthiness in
  Web Design
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/990307.html
• Using Link Titles to Help Users Predict Where
  They Are Going
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/980111.html
• Microcontent How to Write Headlines, Page
  Titles, and Subject Lines
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/980906.html
• Lower-Literacy Users
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/20050314.html
• Concise, SCANNABLE, and Objective How to Write
  for the Web
• http//www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/writing.htm
  l
• Applying Writing Guidelines to Web Pages
• http//www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/rewriting.h
  tm l
• Web Writing for Many Interest Levels

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• Concise, SCANNABLE, and Objective How to Write
  for the Web
• http//www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/writing.htm
  l
• Applying Writing Guidelines to Web Pages
• http//www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/rewriting.h
  tml
• Web Writing for Many Interest Levels
• http//www.e-gineer.com/articles/web-writing-for-m
  any-interest-levels.phtml
• Eyetracking Study of Web Readers
• http//www.useit.com/alertbox/20000514.html