{"id":1194,"date":"2016-10-24T11:56:30","date_gmt":"2016-10-23T22:56:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1194"},"modified":"2016-10-24T11:56:30","modified_gmt":"2016-10-23T22:56:30","slug":"the-pause-that-does-not-refresh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1194","title":{"rendered":"The pause that does not refresh"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?attachment_id=1192\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1192\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1192\" src=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/Diversion-300x279.jpg\" alt=\"diversion\" width=\"300\" height=\"279\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/Diversion-300x279.jpg 300w, http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/Diversion.jpg 411w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>I began my writing career writing advertising copy, press releases, and short stories.\u00a0 After a couple of years, I added radio plays to my repertoire.\u00a0 After a further five or six years, I started writing opinion pieces for a couple of local newspapers, and columns for a couple of specialist magazines.<\/p>\n<p>At first glance, that might seem like a rather diverse list of tasks.\u00a0 You might expect that each required a different set of skills.\u00a0 But the advice of my very first boss \u2013 the man who introduced me to copywriting \u2013 held true for all of them.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Make it easy for your reader to read,\u2019 Don said.\u00a0 \u2018Use words that they will recognise.\u00a0 And try to ensure that they will not have cause to pause in order to work out what it is that you are trying to say.\u00a0 If they pause once, you are probably in trouble.\u00a0 If they pause twice, you are almost certainly in trouble.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>The \u2018no cause to pause\u2019 rule even applies to radio drama.\u00a0 Radio plays are aural rather than visual.\u00a0 But before they can become aural, the scripts first have to be read by an editor or a producer.\u00a0 And, if those editors and producers can\u2019t \u2018hear\u2019 what you have written, the play will probably not get produced.<\/p>\n<p>Over the years, we have worked with a number of very creative business managers.\u00a0 Some of these managers have almost overflowed with good ideas.\u00a0 But many of the good ideas have failed to see the light of day.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because many of these otherwise-bright managers have never learned to put their ideas down on paper <em>clearly and concisely<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018What\u2019s the point?\u2019 one of them said recently.\u00a0 \u2018It may not be great literature.\u00a0 But if they [the intended readers] have got half a brain, they\u2019ll soon work out what I\u2019m trying to say.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Will they?\u00a0 Or will they pause \u2026 frown \u2026 frown again \u2026 and then decide that it\u2019s just all too difficult?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I began my writing career writing advertising copy, press releases, and short stories.\u00a0 After a couple of years, I added radio plays to my repertoire.\u00a0 After a further five or six years, I started writing opinion pieces for a couple &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/?p=1194\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,5,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1195,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1194\/revisions\/1195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kiwistreet.co.nz\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}