Short-Form Articles: Off-Putting or Perfect?
A short-form analysis of the short form. Meta, right?
I’ve seen a lot of short-form articles in my feed recently. Some writers exclusively publish short-form pieces, and there are now entire publications dedicated to the format. I’m still not sure how I feel about the short-form, though.
I love the concept of short-form articles, of cutting out the fluff and getting straight to the point. On Medium, though, as odd as it may sound, I mostly read for that fluff.
“Unnecessary” words, personal anecdotes that, while sometimes irrelevant, are shamelessly entertaining… More than concrete facts, those are the things that I look for in a Medium article.
I find most short-form articles to be a bit off-putting exactly because of that lack of fluff. Short-form Medium stories don’t talk to me as much as longer articles do.
That doesn’t mean short-form articles are a bad idea, though. For articles intended solely to convey information, conciseness is key.
For other types of articles, however, like product reviews or opinion pieces… Well, excuse me. I’m almost out of words and I still haven’t added an image.
