Bad and Good on the Internet
Greetings again. I hope that all is going well for you.
Unfortunately, a few days ago something didn’t go well: Much to our horror, someone sent many members of the AuthorAID community a highly inappropriate e-mail message via the AuthorAID website.
We feel terrible about this incident, and we have removed from the AuthorAID community the person who caused the problem. We thank those who told us that the problem existed. And we hope that such a problem will not occur again.
The Internet is indeed powerful. Used inappropriately—as in the incident last week—it can waste time and cause distress. Used appropriately, however, it can be a wonderful tool—enabling researchers to collaborate at long distances, helping families to keep in touch, and more.
For some of us, using the Internet well includes writing effective text for the Web. Recently our local chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators had a workshop largely on this topic.
Here is some of the workshop speaker’s advice on writing for the Web:
- In general, limit each sentence to 20 words or less.
- Include at most 3 or 4 sentences per paragraph.
- Use bulleted lists. However, don’t turn all the content into bulleted lists.
- Write short, informative hyperlinks (for example, AuthorAID Resource Library, not Please see http://www.authoraid.info/resource-library or Click here).
Wishing everyone a good week! And to those who soon will celebrate Christmas, happy holiday! —Barbara