Home > Archive > 2010 > July > 8

How would I use subtext?

Thursday, July 08, 2010 at 5:49 AM.

It is a feature that gives a reader more information about a particular paragraph.

I was going to demonstrate it, but now I can't see how it's accomplished in the editor. I suppose I thought it would just happen if I indented.

You can see it working in the post linked above.

Update: Actually it worked all along but I was looking for it on the home page and it only appears on the story page. Just click on the plus sign beside the first paragraph.

It's a neat idea, very original. You don't see much originality in tech, really, for all the smart people working in it. It's like movies or TV in that way. Notice what's popular and make something like it. Twitter was a breakthrough and consequently very hard to understand when it started. I know I stared at it dumbly when I first heard about it, and for several months after getting an account about three and a half years ago.

Aid to skimmers is the obvious application, I suppose. I can't tell because when I perceive there's something there I can't see, I have to see it, like a cat who hates a closed door even if there's nothing behind it they want to get at. I also can't stand not to read footnotes. Sometimes I'll pre-read the footnotes before reading a chapter of a book so they don't distract me as much.

Sites could create their own context for it. Like, for a tech site that has to speak to both users and developers it could come to mean that users need not click on the plus signs, it's all geek and code or formulas down there.

News sites could use it for background info, to catch readers up on an unfolding story, with the visible text showing just the latest developments.

I'd hate to hide pictures or a video behind an extra click because I like to see non-text objects on my page.

About the author

My sites