Interactive techniques of exposition will increase the viability of online publishing.

---

There is a piece of conventional wisdom that says that people won’t read anything online that's longer than about 350 words.  This is only partly true.

In the typical way of presenting longer material, the absence of pages to physically turn deprives people of a sense of making progress in their reading.  They become like kids in the back seat of a car, continually moaning, “Are we almost there yet?”

This all changes when a better presentation method is used. 

Online material can be absorbed much more effectively when it is broken up into short, self-contained segments of no more than a few paragraphs, each described by a brief summary statement.  These "chunks" can then be  presented in a way that lets the user continually choose whether to read a particular section, or settle for just the summary. 

In this mode of presentation, users have been shown to happily read material of 2,000 and even 3,000 words in length—because choosing to read one more section is like choosing to eat just one more salted peanut.

The new presentation technique is already developed and in use.  You are reading an example of it.

Its benefits go far beyond just being able to induce people to read longer material online.

© COPYRIGHT 2003 ROBERT WINTER.  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

---

More Specifics

	The new exposition techniques let users skim or delve as they please.
	Electronically presented materials can be more effectively interrelated with one another.
	The new online exposition techniques enable material to be effectively assembled "from parts."
	The new electronic exposition techniques will combine to create more effective ways of propagating thought than have yet been seen.