Brevity is the soul of ignorance

In an 1,800-word article in The Atlantic, former L.A. Times editorial page editor Michael Kinsley reveals what is killing newspapers and driving readers to get their news from the Internet: "It’s that newspaper articles are too long."

Pardon me for swimming against the tide, but I've been doing that for most of my life. When the marketing people keep telling us to give people what they say they want, I reply that people don't know what they want or will lie about it. And is giving people a tabloid-load of gossip, celebrities and entertainment the best thing for of our society?

I recall the classic marketing survey from back in the '50s, I think. People were given a list of books and asked to check-off the ones they'd most like to read. They picked Shakespeare and the Bible and the classics. As a reward for participating in the survey they were given one of the books on the list. They chose mystery novels and potboilers.

Sometimes I think we should not change the newspaper to suit what people want, but change the people. Do we want a nation in which only a third of college graduates can comprehend a newspaper editorial? Do we want a nation in which presidents are chosen by sound bites? When was the last time a candidate wrote a "white paper?" Rory Reid excepted.

Newspapers should write tighter and perhaps dump some of the obligatory boilerplate I've always insisted that reporters include.

Short stories for the short attention-spanned is a recipe of a downward spiral. Is it too late to pull out?