BS: Paragraph Breaks

Subject: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST,Anonymous so as not to be confused with a pe
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 11:17 AM

Hey gang, help these old tired eyes and brain cells-- can we have posts with SHORT paragaphs....

... and ...

with a blank line in between, puh-leeeeze?????

THANKS!

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 11:31 AM

Poor















old



















Soul

























G

























¦¬]

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Don Firth
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 11:57 AM

Well, tell yah what. Sorry to be school marmish about it, but for the sake of having people actually read what you're trying to say, a little attention to formatting can certainly help the readability of a post. Paragraph breaks (a blank line between paragraphs) and, if not strictly rigorous punctuation, at least reasonable use of capitals when they're called for (beginning of sentences, proper names, etc.).

It's damned frustrating to try to read a post that runs close to a full screen, but it's all one paragraph, with no capitals and practically no punctuation. Oftentimes I just skim posts like that or skip them entirely.

Sure, e. e. cummings didn't use capitals in his poems, but your post ain't a poem (usually), and you ain't e. e. cummings. Okay?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 11:58 AM

Paragraph breaks AND punctuation, please:

so i dont have to read stupid runon sentences like this which make no effort to note where thoughts change and other manifestations of the authors stream of conciousness get entangled with his barely comprehensible subject and I want this because im selfish and I dont care who knows it so there!

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Amos
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 12:46 PM

Looks like ya struck a nerve, Guest. Whatever happened to grooving on the Now and going with the flow? Tsk, tsk. :D

Just funning ya, Don.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 12:58 PM

Amos good buddy, them's ol' flower power hippy type concepts, the sort of thing that went out of style, just after motor scooters in Sanfran.
Giok ¦¬]

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Joe Offer
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:12 PM

Original message from: Anonymous so as not to be confused with a pe?????

Hmmmm. What's the rest of that word?
Pedant?

I agree, though. Blank spaces between paragraphs and stanzas are very helpful, and you don't have to know how to do <br> line breaks and <p> paragraph breaks any more....

-Joe Offer, pedantically-

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Don Firth
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:16 PM

Beautifully illustrated, Bill.

To those inclined to be sloppy in typing their posts:

Other than e. e. cummings' poetry, I know of only one other writer of note who didn't use capitals or punctuation:   

archy.

But he was the soul of a verse libre bard reincarnated in the body of a cockroach, and had to type by climbing up on the frame of Don Marquis's typewriter and diving head first at the letter he wanted to type. Since it was impossible for him to hold down the shift key and type a letter at the same time, he had a good reason for not using capitals. Also, to save labor (and cut down on aspirin consumption), archy eschewed punctuation. But he did dive at the space bar to seperate his phrases and clauses, so what he wanted to say was generally pretty clear.

So unless one is a very talented cockroach, there isn't much excuse for not using capitals and punctuation, other than ignorance and/or laziness.

Also, James Joyce was fairly successful at using a "stream of consciousness" style of writing (although there are those who would argue the point). All too often, those who try to write "stream of consciousness" manage to display little more than a tedious dribble of near comatosity.

If one actually wishes to communicate, one should make use of one's Strunk and White.

What!?? You don't even have a copy of Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr. and E. B. White?

Well, that explains a lot!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:16 PM

Saw a book about the life of the above mentioned poet that would have had him spinning in his grave.... it was called:

A Life: E.E. Cummings.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:44 PM

Ahem. I have a copy of Strunk & White on my desk. I never open it, but I've got it.

So.

Short paragraphs.

With blank lines to indicate paragraphs.

Okay.

I can do that.

Would you also like a syllabic count?

Long words confuse people, you know.

Besides, short words have more punch, are pithier.

I know a whole bunch of words like that. Words with four letters. Words like "four" and "five" and "nine."

Hemingway knew about this. We called him "Ernie." It had fewer syllables than "Hemingway." Ernie used to tell us, "Eschew polysyllabication, it obfuscates your limning." And he was right.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Mooh
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:54 PM

Agreed!

Some exceptions, like the local Hullite of note, but otherwise Guest's suggestion is valid.

Peace, Mooh.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST,so as not to be confused with a peDANT
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 01:57 PM

Yes, Joe, -dant.

:~)

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Don Firth
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 02:01 PM

Eats, Shoots, and Leaves by Lynne Truss.

This book is highly instructive, and a real snort to read.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 02:10 PM

Rapaire, I don't want you to think I mean to impugn your style; you're generally very readable.

But I urge you (and everyone else) to get (if you don't have it) The
Elements of Style, and to actually read it. It's "the Little book" (note cap), which pleasantly and easily sets out an approach to a readable and communicative writing style. Easy and entertaining reading, as I assess it, which illustrates and makes good sense out of good writing habits.

After forty years, I'm on my third battered and dogeared copy. And I've given away a number of copies as gifts.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Amos
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 02:39 PM

It's been one of my Bible for forty years. But I ignore it too often.

Giok, there are some things that are so graceful, elegant and perfect inherent in their own natures that they cannot go out of style. Riding a motor-scooter up and down the hills of San Francisco is one of those things.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 03:17 PM

However, Don, the copy I have at home is dog-eared, as is my copy of the AP Style Book. And my copy of a true classic, John O'Hayre's Gobbledygook has gotta go(USGPO, 1966). A quote:

It cannot be adhered to with any reasonable degree of intellectual or moral certainty that the inalienable right man possesses to exercise his political preferences by employing his vote in referendums is rooted in anything other than man's own nature, and is, therefore, properly called a natural right. To hole, for instance, that this natural right can be limited externally by making its exercise dependent on a prior condition of ownership of property is to wrongly suppose that man's natural right to vote is somehow more inherent in and more dependent on the property of man than it is on the nature of man. It is obvious that such belief is unreasonable, for it reverses the order of right intended by nature.

Now, this quote comes from the time of ol' Ben Franklin, who took and rewrote it this way:

To require propert of voters leads us to this dilemma: I own a jackass; I can vote. The jackass dies; I cannot vote. Therefore, the vote represents not me but the jackass.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 03:45 PM

All that erudition, and bifocals too.

I don't even have a Funk and Wagnells, but that's probably my age.

Giok [Who does have an OED]

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 04:55 PM

It cannot be adhered to with any reasonable degree of intellectual or moral certainty that the inalienable right man possesses to exercise his political preferences by employing his vote in referendums is rooted in anything other than man's own nature, and is, therefore, properly called a natural right. To hole, for instance, that this natural right can be limited externally by making its exercise dependent on a prior condition of ownership of property is to wrongly suppose that man's natural right to vote is somehow more inherent in and more dependent on the property of man than it is on the nature of man. It is obvious that such belief is unreasonable, for it reverses the order of right intended by nature.


But if you had broken the paragraph where it makes sense, you might have see a really funny typo.

:~)

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 05:14 PM

Well, that's my typing. I mean, I copied out of a book ferchrissakes! A book. A wireless mechanism for the recording and transmission of knowledge without electricity.

But you're right, it's funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John O'L
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 06:45 PM

I hate to put a bummer on it, but I think your hopes are high if you expect the illiterate to suddenly become literate and the careless to suddenly care.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John O'L
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 06:52 PM

Actually, now that I think of it, Mudcatters are, generally speaking, more literate and readable than people posting to most forums.

(At least the ones I frequent.)

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Mingulay
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 07:07 PM

I think we are more literate and readable because we are mostly from a generation that has not spent it's life and febrile intellectual capacity with a mobile phone in one hand attempting to decipher a garbled and disjointed jumble of numbers and characters purporting to be a text "message".

Luv 2 u all.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John O'L
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 07:17 PM

Yes, agreed, and also, it is becomming harder now for young kids to learn to read because the television educates their concentration span downwards.
(I feel a little self conscious about that sentence. Is it correct? Too bad.)

I help at the local school, listening to kids who are having difficulty learning to read. The single most common problem they have is that they simply can't concentrate for the length of a complex sentence.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 07:35 PM

oh no? we r bttr than u think- u all r jst 2 wordy and

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 07:35 PM

If everyone who appreciates proper writing mechanics would just ignore the posts of those who use the no-caps-no-punctuation style, maybe the perpetrators would get the point after a while.

"gee nobodys responding to any of my posts i wonder why maybe itd help if i used a period every now and then"

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 07:40 PM

Did you ever think maybe that's the way they TALK?

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 08:11 PM

I know I am a fool - I spell out all my words in SMS text messages..... even use puntc - er punctst... all those little dots...

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 10:39 PM

y34h 6u7 u d0n7 5p34k l337 d0 u

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Mar 05 - 10:43 PM

Did you ever think maybe that's the way they TALK?

Hahahahhhhh........ good one!

"Paragraph Breaks, Paramedics Rush to Scene, Attempt Repair"

Film at 11.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST,Mingulay at work
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 05:22 AM

It gives a whole new meaning to calls for "longer sentences".

Kids today do talk like texts, if they can be bothered to talk at all.
I once asked someone's name to be told it was Smiff. When I enquired if that was one f or two, I was met with a stare so blank and devoid of understanding it was cold enough to freeze hell.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Allan C.
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 09:05 AM

My own pet peeve is the use of "and also". Pick one, please, but not both!

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST,Rapaire
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 09:12 AM

hey d00d, try vuing it thru the lenz of today, ya no? and also u haf 2 realize that adspeak and just having a "secret langwij" is needed by every generation.

Sloppy writing, I think, indicates sloppy thinking. But that's just my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 09:20 AM

yes!

I recently copied an interesting post into an email & hit return after every sentance & read it that way cos it was a solid block of text & I couldn't focus on it.

I considered writing a PM to the author, but I couldn't work out how to say what I wanted to say without sounding critical or picky. Formatting & spacing can be done after the ideas have been put on screen so as not to interrupt the flow of ideas. bugger, I still can't get that sentance right.

Even with my new computer glasses I can't comfortably read large blocks of text & sometimes skip posts.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: GUEST,Rapaire
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 09:31 AM

What WILL happen is this (pick one or more):

A d00d writes a grant application. It can neither be read nor understood. A very worthy cause goes unfunded.

A supervisor can't read a safety violation report, and someone is maimed or killed as a result.

Reports on a safety defect are unreadable and incomprehesible, so a dangerous product remains on the market. The resulting lawsuits bankrupt the company.

A CEO can't understand a proposal -- the company loses money and a young person, a bright young person, loses a job.

But here's a actual, real report from "the front."

My friend Mary is director of a law library in a Midwestern law school. As part of her job she teaches legal research. One student came to her and objected to the requirement that his report be in the format universally accepted by the US courts. Other*S* have objected that they need not learn to use print sources, because "it's all on the Internet." And so forth. Mary has been patient...so far. She's only flunked one kid out of law school this year, for he didn't turn in ANY assignments; his argument was that he was "too busy."

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: HuwG
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 09:49 AM

On a slightly related topic, this year's Golden Bull Awards from the Plain English Campaign, based in New Mills not far from me.

Most of these are not quite examples of poor paragraph layout. Usually the Golden Bull winners are talking a language which makes sense only to themselves. This is an condition shared by many, but unfortunately, it seems to be particularly common among those who represent the public face of large organisations.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: skipy
Date: 03 Mar 05 - 04:31 PM

Perhaps there is a market for paragraph repair kits!
I'll check ebay.
Skip




(broken.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Pauline L
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 12:11 AM

While we're discussing.....styles of writing....that we....don't like,...I can't stand excessive use..... of.......dots.....old fashioned law librarians.....people who write long sentences....or speak......like that......

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:34 AM

If everyone who appreciates proper writing mechanics would just ignore the posts of those who use the no-caps-no-punctuation style, maybe the perpetrators would get the point after a while.

"gee nobodys responding to any of my posts i wonder why maybe itd help if i used a period every now and then"


I try and use good punctuation, grammar and formatting, but my most of my posts still get ignored.


Doug C

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 12:10 PM

The elipse (... and yes, my spelling may be off) is a standard punctuation. Lots o' dots (...........) is just lots of dots.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Pauline L
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 01:04 PM

Rapaire, what is "ellipse" in writing? I know it in geometry.

Doug, you omitted a comma. It should be, "good punctuation, grammar, and formatting." I doubt that that's why so many of your posts are ignored. BTW, I'm an English teacher in my spare time, and I have edited many term papers.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Bill D
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 01:27 PM

As the foremost abuser of ellipses in these here parts, I wish I knew exactly why I do it. It is an 'attempt' to make my typing reflect the way I think......a little pause, then resume. I also use '' -- bold, italics, etc. to represent emphasis or to highlight a concept. After 8 years, it has become a real habit, although I try to make my composition clear.

Ellipes are 'supposed' to be used to show that part of a quote has been left out "... i wonder why maybe itd help...", and should only use 3 dots. I often vary the # of dots to show the length of pause...............but I don't break up sentences, I hope, in quite the way you note, Pauline.

I am trying, generally, to watch and adjust my style to better conform.........but if I stop, how will you know it's ME? *grin* (and yeah, I know several people who don't like the *grin*, preferring a ;>) or something. I don't think [s]or [BG] conveys the same feeling....but *shrug*... we all do differ, huh?

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: DougR
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 01:32 PM

Don Firth, 02 March, 11:57 AM (I think)...Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Don Firth wrote something I agree with! Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! :>)
DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Homeless
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:03 PM

Pauline, if you're going to correct Doug, shouldn't you have also said that his sentence should have started, "I try to use"?

Also, I seem to remember from high school that an ellipses is not just three dots, but a dot, space, dot, space, dot sequence. Can one of you with a handy-dandy reference either verify or disprove that?

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:14 PM

The correct term for "..." is ellipsis, short for ellipsis points. The word actually has two meanings, the first being "the omission of a word or words understood in the context."

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:35 PM

In practical terms, in today's times, spaces in ellipses have more to do with fonts than with style rules (I used to work in typography). Some fonts have tighter letter-spacing than others. If ellipses look too tight, they will be letter-spaced in typesetting so they are more visible as ellipses, or a word space will be used as a low-quality quick fix. If they are too loose they may be kerned tighter.

A lot of the style "rules" came to be when mechanical typing of manuscripts was the rule. Even in typesetting, in more recent years, before the advent of WYSIWYG programs (What You See Is What You Get), the "copy" (manuscript) would need to be typed by the customer, saved to disk, and the disk converted at the type shop. Whatever way the customer input the copy, that's what would come out in whatever font they had chosen.

In some cases certain character sets will be style-corrected throughout a piece that is being typeset, by a sort of search/replace function, with the kerning or letter-spacing automatically included in the replacement.

I used to proofread manuscripts converted at the type shop-- from customer inputs submitted on disk, to finished, camera-ready product. A lot of silly inputs got fixed by this search/replace method.

But nowadays we're all fonted, and it makes things a bit less rigid in actual practice.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 02:49 PM

Oh, and for real fun-- after you compose your post, rearrange the paragraphs in a new, random order. Hahahahhhh!!!!!!!!

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Rapparee
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 04:00 PM

I think that some folks who write rearrange the WORDS in a random order.

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: Allan C.
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 05:07 PM

From a previous discussion:


Subject: RE: BS: a new punctuation mark
From: Stilly River Sage - PM
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 02:14 PM

McGrath described exactly the most common instance of how I use the ellipsis here, to indicate I could say more, but am pausing at this point since the meaning has been made.

According to the Modern Language Association (MLA), an ellipsis should technically include spaces between the periods, thus: . . . to be clearly seen. If you use an ellipsis in a quote, it means you're dropping part of the phrase (for space and clear meaning). If you use . . . . (four dots) then the first one is the end of the previous sentence and the next three indicate that more than a few words, perhaps as much as a few sentences or paragraphs, have been dropped. They're trickier to use correctly. At some point you have to decide to simply use two quotes, rather than running two distant bits together as one.

I use the ~ to mean "about" or "approximately." I don't know where I picked it up, but it's pretty commonplace here in the U.S.

SRS





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Subject: RE: BS: a new punctuation mark
From: Don Firth - PM
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 04:31 PM

Actually, there are two forms of the elipsis: three dots ( . . . ), indicating that something has been omitted within a sentence, or sometimes tying two sentences together; and four dots, indicating that the omission comes at the end of a sentence or paragraph, thus. . . .   The latter case is often used informally as a means if indicating an incomplete thought, presuming that the reader can fill in the rest.

Spacing is also regarded as important when typing a manuscript. In the three-dot ellipsis, there should be a space following the last letter of the preceding word, a space between each dot, and a space preceding the first letter of the following word. In the four-dot ellipsis, there should be no space between the last letter of the preceding word and the first dot, but a space between each dot. There should be two spaces following the fourth dot.

Or so says my style manual, which has a good section on preparing manuscripts for publication.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 05:32 PM

I think that some folks who write rearrange the WORDS in a random order.

I think that some WORDS who write rearrange the order in a random folks.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Paragraph Breaks
From: John Hardly
Date: 04 Mar 05 - 05:46 PM

All the greatest literature in the world is nothing more than letters and punctuation arranged into patterns. If one can find a good pattern, one can join the world of writers of fine literature.