[WEB4LIB] RE: "Style" sheets

[Jimm Wetherbee]

Regarding does and does not qualify as a foolish consistency.

Our site is small and so I am the sole editor (which is somewhat scary).  As
such, I do edit the copy I am given and try to be consistent with
expressions.  For instance, I prefer "a.m." to "AM" and "web-site" to either
"web site" or "website."  So I change them; why, because I can, and because
it does give a somewhat cleaner look.  On the other hand, because most
people are easily able to process "a.m." and "AM" as the same thing, I would
not insist that everyone publish these consistently if there were multiple
editors.  These would be "foolish consistencies." Because adhering to them
does not add to one's ability to understand the content of the site.

Where consistency becomes a real issue is when one runs across terms or
usages that are not immediately seen as equivalent.  Here I try (and often
fail) to adhere to consistency in part because there is no guide.  For
instance, our list of periodicals is called the "PLL" or Periodical Location
List.  Both terms are used interchangeably between librarian and patron and
it shows up on the web-site.  In such cases I try to place both terms in
close proximity where one would likely entire them first and then move to
the (or perhaps *my*) preferred term once one moves deeper into the site.
The web, being non-linear, doesn't always work that way.  Here a style guide
or manual would be helpful, as a way to remove ambiguity.  This would hardly
be seen as foolish.  Indeed the most nit-picking part of style guides (the
format used to cite documents) is perhaps the best example how such guides
remove ambiguity by giving a very precise description of the source in
question and doing so in such a manner that is fairly easy to understand.

--jimm

| > Don't forget the old adage: "Consistency is the bugaboo of small minds."
| > I
| > think such things as requiring web or Web to be consistent are counter
| > productive and overly bureaucratic.  It is nitpicking at its worst.
| >
| > Bill Drew
| 
| Emerson actually wrote, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little
| minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines."
| 
| He meant what he wrote: he was deriding "foolish" consistency.
| 
| I would find it tiresome and distracting if any of the serious
| publications
| I read used the "ransom note" school of copyediting, with random and
| capricious word usage.  It gets even worse for anything read online,
| because
| reading online in general is just a little harder than reading paper.
| 
| A reader shouldn't have to process and merge variations on the same term,
| and shouldn't be muddled with yawning inconsistencies in grammar and tone,
| either. Nattering about the Web, as I am doing on this list, can be
| casual;
| writing for readers demands the kind of attention that can only come from
| formal rules-making and serious editorial control. Pick a style guide,
| pick
| a dictionary, and run with it. Find a gap in the rules? Write your own,
| and
| stick with your guns.
| 
| As for productivity, my scorn for Wired came less from the ruling (long
| overdue, though I'll wait until I see wider adoption) than from the
| oblique
| and unhelpful reference to an exception for the "official World Wide Web."
| 
| Some of the Web4Lib readers have written me off-list to tell me their
| tales
| of woe, in which entire academic departments ground to a halt while
| debating
| Style A versus Style B. I have been there.
| 
| Easy-to-follow rules facilitate delegation and speed work effort. Rules
| also
| make it less likely that a senior editor with a head trip can yank
| everyone's chain by making random and unpredictable changes and decisions.
| For example, it is kind to the reader, the writer, and the editor to adopt
| the rule of the "final comma," also known as the Harvard or Oxford comma
| (or, I suppose, the LII comma): "style, grammar, content, and punctuation
| are important." "CSS, XML, and HTML." "Emerson, Thoreau, and Crawford."
| Any
| time wasted debating commas is true foolishness.
| 
| Keep in mind how little readers have to go on in assessing the credibility
| of online resources. Sloppy and inconsistent style works against
| establishing the authority of your content. You don't want that, do you?
| 
| Karen G. Schneider
| kgs at bluehighways.com
| 
| 
| 
| 
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