How Do You Know if your Writing is Good Enough?
Yes but we both suffer from "Awkward Readability Syndrome", or ARS for those unfamiliar with the disease, Izzy. So we may have a problem judging the work of other Hubbers unless we read their articles aloud.
If that was the result of some type of translation, I just hope they have not paid good money for the programme.
Now what could 'menyingging feelings' be in English?
No, I dare not ask that for fear of what answers it may provoke.
Sometimes it takes people 5 minutes to understand what is written
Quality Assurance - Bedtime Stories
As I've waited out the hurricane I've had the time to do some wheel-spinning over this whole "readability" thing. The following lost post is either the fruits of that wheel-spinning or else the unfortunate and tediously long consequences of it (depending on how anyone would look at it): (Actually, maybe I'm just going a little wild now that the power is back on.
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That list of "too's" above is something people really need to be careful about. What's "too-one-thing-or-another" for one reader (or even group of readers) will be "just right" (or "not enough") for another bunch of readers.
The big thing we're all hearing now is "write with the user in mind". Well, if Google doesn't know how to please 100% of the people 100% of the time (which would be impossible, of course), how can any one writer really know that he's always aiming each and every piece of writing at "THE" user...
We've been told that people who write "a big mix" of Hubs tend to do better in recent days/months (whatever). The person who writes that big mix of Hubs will have very different users for each type of Hubs he writes. Google generally aims to send the kind of stuff for which people search to the right people, but we all know that doesn't/can't always work. The writer who writes for one kind of user can get a better take on what would find "high-quality". The writer who writes the big mix of Hubs is pretty much guaranteed he won't be pleasing a very large number of people who run into one of his Hubs or another (especially if he writes each Hub as if writes each Hub for only one kind of user). That particular matter is one that would require its own, whole, discussion; so moving on in a slightly different direction here...
The following remarks I'm going to make are absolutely blind remarks as far as any, one, writer on here (Hubpages or this thread) goes. (Well, there's one exception to how "blind" goes: Recently, I was "talking" a little with Randy Goodwin after he'd seen the dramatic traffic drop, so I did go to take a quick scan of his subjects, as well as a quick scan of one Hub.) I haven't recently read any Hubs of any of the people on this thread, or who show in the forums in general. I'm basing what my opinions/points only on my own, personal, challenges with aiming to write Hubs that wouldn't be considered "crap" by more people than would seem appropriate for the individual type of Hub, and with my own challenges with regard to which Hubs tend to do better.
I know absolutely nothing about algorithms. When I refer to "readability" I'm only referring to the thing with human tests done by reading aloud. I only scanned Randy's whole Hub, and only read, maybe, a paragraph or two. To be honest, I don't even recall what it was about; so I'm going to make up a subject and a make-believe Hubber for "referring purposes"/example here. Pretend there's a Hubber named "Fred" and that Fred wrote a Hub similar to Randy's, only Fred's Hub was offering information on Boston's history. Pretend, too, that Fred is the one who has had "readability" mentioned as a possible issue.
Fred's Hub is an impressive Hub to me. To me, as a human being who found it, it's what a Hub ought to be. It's extremely informative, and it has real substance to it. I see nothing wrong whatsoever with the style in which it is written because it is intended to be informative, and it does the job well. The writing is absolutely fine. Fred's Hub has so much substance in it (including photographs, as well as information) that I almost wonder if the problem with traffic is, in fact, with algorithms that have mistaken the substance/length of the Hub with what would commonly, and otherwise, be associated with an article of a different nature entirely than one that is aimed at being informative. In other words, I'm wondering if Google's algo's may first "take note" of something like subject-type (in Fred's case, Boston's history" and sense that the article is an information one, rather than, say, a first-person story on living through a natural disaster; and/or whether, instead, it's something simple (like length and/or pictures) that might "make the algo's" measure a Hub against, or by the same standard as, a completely different type of Hub. In other words, might the length and/or pictures (and/or some other elements of Fred's Hub) have misled the bots to "believe" it's not an information Hub and therefore should, instead, by measured by what is being evaluated in terms of elements of readability.
A human being who finds Fred's Hub isn't going to have any problem whatsoever reading it. In fact, the reader of that Hub isn't likely to be looking for all kinds of fancy fluffery and "intimate" familiarity or personal experience. The reader of an information Hub generally wants what presented in that clear way that doesn't include the kind of complexities that might make the aloud version of reading (or the algo's looking for them) seem more "natural". On the Internet, and even off, the only reading aloud that tends to go on might be something like the "robot man" on Kindle that reads aloud to anyone who prefers that. People don't generally read aloud informative, substantial, articles. They may read quickies aloud to someone else.
So, to me, it seems as if even if the bots have some imperfect way of detecting "readability" (at least as could be paralleled by a human's reading aloud and trying to sense level of readability), I'd think there might be the chance that the bots, as they've existed up to the recent days/weeks, don't yet know how to sort out and/or adjust expectations/measurements of, the differences between material written with the intent to provide substantial information and material written to be "fancier" or "more elaborate" in the way it aims to present information. Maybe some measurement of "readability" relates to the length of a piece of writing, and is "fancified" as the substance/length of an article increases???
Even if the thing about Fred's Hub on Boston's history not being as readable as the algo's are looking for were true, is the reading-aloud test even appropriate within the context of Internet writing? What I'd think matters most is whether an article is readable to silent readers who are looking for information. (Somebody could always adjust a piece of writing for the audio-books version.
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One thing I wonder about is whether a subject like "Boston's history" is interpreted differently by the algo's than a subject like, "How I lived through a natural disaster." Do the slgo's, if they're measuring that particular type of "readability", detect how separate something like a "facts-and-just-facts"/information piece from something like an informative, but personal, piece??
I can't help but suspect the problem with "the readability thing" (and people who have solid, well written, Hubs losing traffic) is more a matter of inadequacy in the algorithms (even if they're generally "great" and/or as good as they can be for now). Google, itself, has made it clear that they're always adjusting algo's as they become aware of flaws they didn't previously know about. Right now, I think they're losing some of the best, most informative and substantial, Hubs because their algo's don't yet know how to detect something like, perhaps, the difference between a substantial piece of informative writing and writing that would go into a category OTHER than being "the standard-length, informative, web article". Who knows.. Maybe with material under a certain number of words, the algo's aren't even looking for readability beyond correct grammar.
The subject of the Hub is also something I wonder about. Can the algo's recognize the difference with a subject like "Boston's history"? Really (and this may just be my opinion), a subject like "Boston's history" shouldn't be required to meet some "readability measure" no matter how long the article is. If I'm looking for information on Boston's history, I'm more than happy to find an article that gives the facts without a lot of that "wording fancification" that appears to be part of the measure of what's been more often considered "more readable". Some straight-and-to-the point, factual, information is superior with some types of subjects/purposes. "Boston's History" would be one of those subjects. The one about living through the natural disaster would be a different type of subject and may involve readers' having different expectations. In any case (and I could be wrong because I don't know anything about algorithms at all), I can't help but think Google needs to do some more adjusting, because I really do think (based only what has been going on with some people's Hubs on here) a lot of the best stuff is being lost to searches because (even if my own "theories" about what needs to be adjusted are wrong and completely ignorant with regard to how algorithms work) because the algorithms, as they are right now, are obviously missing something.
If the whole idea that the Internet and technology are "becoming more human" has made Google adjust its algorithms to an "aloud-reading-only" kind of thing, I think they've changed their algorithms too much in one direction and have overlooked the reality that "straight-and-to-the-point", "just-the-facts", information is still pretty much the biggest use of the Internet as far as I can tell. I really don't think anyone is intentionally aiming to make the Internet measure of "quality" the same as the measure of quality in, maybe, great works of classic literature, for example. IF aloud-readability even is the problem at all for someone like Fred, I think, within the context of the Internet and information (and if the aim is quality stuff showing up in searches), the importance of aloud-readability is being over-estimated.
A year or two ago people acted as if writing-in-general was a completely different thing from writing on the Internet, and as if the in-general rules of writing didn't even apply to Internet writing. These days, everybody (a lot of people) seem to be acting as if, all of a sudden, the only writing rules that matter are those rules about writing that apply to writing-in-general. People (and apparently Google's algo's as far as I can tell) need to still figure out when/where different sets of rules apply to different subjects, different types of writing, etc. etc.
If I'm anywhere near correct that the problem is with algorithms not being able to be adequately refined to sort out the kind of differences I suspect may be involved; and if it's just not possible for them to be adjusted in a way that a lot of solid stuff isn't being lost; then maybe there needs to be some manual way that writers/site owners can include something somewhere (for each piece of writing) that lets the bots know what standards should be used for measuring quality.
The other thing I can't help wondering is this: Suppose one person has 500 or 1000 of the same kind of Hubs as "Fred's" (long, well written, and with lots of substance). Is there any chance the bots are interpreting such numbers with the consistency in approach (including, maybe, substantial length) as "REALLY having mastered spam-like techniques"? Maybe the thing with the wide mix of different types of Hubs triggers something to let the bots know there's little of that kind of consistency (for good or ill). Maybe the bots (or Google) hasn't even really figured out that there can be such a thing as an individual writer who will devote the kind of effort required to create a bunch of Hubs that have that degree of both quality and consistency?
I understand that it's not possible to have algorithms that get it right every time, all the time. There's going to be some misses. Based only on some of the kinds of things on HubPages that have lost traffic compared to some of the other kinds of things on here that haven't; I can only guess something similar is likely going on across the Internet. How much decent stuff is missed, and how long the algo's apparently miss on it, is something I have no clue about. My own instinct is that people (including Google) need to be very careful not to overdo it when it comes to trying to apply "general-world writing rules/principles" to Internet writing; because while the Internet/technology worlds are continuing to become more and more one world, the Internet is still (and will always be), a "thing of its own" that may now have come around to growing beyond the old "Internet writing rules" that were separate from the "real-world", conventional, writing rules and started to value those conventional rules; but that will always still need a set of Internet-specific rules that don't particularly apply in the offline world.
A year ago it seemed to me people were too "hook, line, and sinker" into the thing about how "nobody cares about writing on the Internet" or "It isn't enough to just write well on the Internet." This year the big "hook, line, and sinker" thing is "writing quality". People (including Google) need to be careful about not adopting a "hook, line, and sinker" mentality at all; and instead finding what makes for the high quality for each type of, purpose for, writing; because last year (and in the years before that) a lot of people invested too much in last year's "conventional Internet wisdom". This year it looks to me as if a whole lot of people may be starting to invest too much in this newest "conventional Internet wisdom" (if new is ever "conventional"; because in the scheme of both business and writing, the Internet is still a pretty new thing, even if there are more and more people who haven't lived in world in which the Internet didn't exist).
As much as most of us on here like to try to help others by sharing what we think we know about what works and what doesn't, or what earns and what doesn't; when it comes down to it, Hubbers and even Hubs are often just too individual for anyone to assume he has the answers about why someone else is having some problem on here. I think the best anyone can do is know his own issues, aims, strengths, and weaknesses; and do what works for him with any solid information available (even if limited). What's "solid information" and what someone else presents as his own expertise when it comes to other people's writing (or Hub-creating) can be two very different things.
If I were one of the people whose traffic was hit, and I knew for a fact that my Hubs were written in decent grammar and put together with effort and research, I'd be very reluctant to even consider changing anything about them (or what kind of Hubs I wrote, if any, from here on) in an attempt to "please" Google. I just don't think it's wise to fix what isn't broken and to try to adjust to what very likely may, in fact, be what's at least a little bit broken (or at least "off), which could very well still be the algorithms (or at least something completely unrelated to the actual quality of the piece(s) of writing). I just think if Google were to figure out that one thing or another is being missed by its algorithms there's a good chance some adjustments would be made that could result in a whole different bunch of people being sandboxed next week or six months from now.
Who addresses what his traffic problems are how is individual, and is his own business; but one size does't fit all when it comes to these problems, the reason they exist, or how to fix them. I just think people need to be judicious in what decisions they make about what to do, but particularly be careful about adopting the "hook, line, and sinker" thinking that tends to go with "one-size-fits" all approaches to things.Lisa, I ask this with great warmth: this is your post on the issue of readability?!
shogun, I'm not entirely sure what you're getting at, and I'm not at all "taking it personally" or with any kind of offense or other negative reaction (honest); but I'm guessing there's a good chance it's the length of the post you have in mind. (
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Something else I know I do that a lot of people don't think writers should do is use longer sentences with lots of punctuation. (I've had this when I used to occasion try to answer something on Yahoo answers: The window pops up and says, "Whoa. It looks like you have a lot of punctuation there" (or something like that). (God forbid anyone use punctuation, or sentences long enough to require it, on the Internet. ) Anyway, I know a lot of people don't think much of my approach to the writing I do online.
Besides the above two possible (shall we say) flaws for which I'm often known, I'm not above intentionally playing with grammar rules if I think doing that expresses something better (or else is a kind of playful way of expressing something).
All I know is that much of the time one man's "readability" can be another man's "unbearable" , for one reason or another.
So, all else aside, while the above post may not be very readable to a whole lot of people, my claim isn't that that the post is a great example of readability - only, yes, that the post is "on the issue of readability". (Sometimes two completely separate matters. ) (Besides, hey - I'm not the only one on here who talks the talk but doesn't walk the walk, as they say. (and just to make sure you know I don't take your remark in a way you didn't intend it to be taken: or maybe it would be better if I add a: 
,
Not competence...confidence.
That's just their frame of mind, what they're working toward, not what they're doing successfully, or may ever succeed in doing.
People are concerned about quality in this thread. As others have said, quality depends on how you define it. I think it depends on how the "judge" defines it. Who is the judge of quality? Whoever you happen to care about.
If you care how your browsing traffic judges quality, you'll go by their definition, which may rest on how well you entertain them - and that might involve how original, interesting, authoritative and polished your writing is.
If you care how search engine traffic judges quality, you'll go by their definition, which may rest on how well you answer their question - and that may involve how authoritative, clear, trustworthy, quick and easy to read your writing is.
If you want to know how search engines, themselves, judge quality, you'll look to what they say. Bing says they use metrics like bounce rate. Google says they look to their users.
If you care about how a traditional publisher judges quality, then you'll go by their definition and write for the print market, putting your work out there as an example of what you can do.
If you care about how others judge quality...English teachers...your mom...you, yourself...philosophers...supermarket clerks...astronauts...you'll go by their definitions.
Quality is not a marker of success, however you define it. First, because search engines are just in their beginning stages of trying to recognize quality. Second, because aiming for quality and achieving it are two different things - no writer hits it every time. Third, because the "judge" you choose to look at may not be anyone who can help you succeed.
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