Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

60%
+1 −0
Q&A Do 'text walls' scare off readers?

Harry Potter is not a wall of text. It uses line breaks, paragraphs, headings and chapters. thats the opposite of a "wall of text", which simply means "a lot of text without formatting, line breaks...

posted 7y ago by Polygnome‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T06:10:00Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/26906
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Polygnome‭ · 2019-12-08T06:10:00Z (almost 5 years ago)
Harry Potter is **not** a wall of text. It uses line breaks, paragraphs, headings and chapters. thats the opposite of a "wall of text", which simply means "a lot of text without formatting, line breaks, paragraphs or any typesetting whatsoever".

As long as you properly format your answers, long answers are not bad in any form.

Start with a short summary of your answer - bring the main point across in the first paragraph. Then use subsequent paragraphs to elaborate on that. Finish with a conclusion that brings you back to the start.  
Use formatting _where appropriate_. Do not **overuse bolding**. Split your text in paragraphs. Use headlines or taglines where appropriate.

If you do all of the above, your answer will not be a wall of text. It will be easy to follow. People will be able to read your introduction and can then decide wether they will embark on reading further (through the parts of your answer where you elaborate) or if your answer doesn't apply / doesn't interest them.

For comparsion, this is my own answer as Wall of text:

> Harry Potter is not a wall of text. It uses line breaks, paragraphs, headings and chapters. thats the opposite of a "wall of text", which simply means "a lot of text without formatting, line breaks, paragraphs or any typesetting whatsoever". As long as you properly format your answers, long answers are not bad in any form. Start with a short summary of your answer - bring the main point across in the first paragraph. Then use subsequent paragraphs to elaborate on that. Finish with a conclusion that brings you back to the start. Use formatting where appropriate. Do not overuse bolding. Split your text in paragraphs. Use headlines or taglines where appropriate.If you do all of the above, your answer will not be a wall of text. It will be easy to follow. People will be able to read your introduction and can then decide wether they will embark on reading further (through the parts of your answer where you elaborate) or if your answer doesn't apply / doesn't interest them.

As you can see, its much harder to read when not properly formatted. Thats what people critizise when they complain about "wall of texts" (at least in the context of internet platforms).

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-02-24T11:55:25Z (over 7 years ago)
Original score: 37