Quote of the Day: Wordcounts

Apr 10th, 2008

I’ve found that over the last few days, as the students work through their assignments, I’ve been fielding a lot of questions along the lines of “what should a word count be for my online articles”. Reflecting on this I understand it’s a reasonable question but I’ve found it a frustrating one.

My reply has been that word counts are for essays, dead trees and lazy people.

Now, let me just say that I don’t think that any of the students who ask that question are lazy or stupid (or a dead tree!). The thing that frustrates me is that it seems to me an old media way of quantifying the value, weight or merit of an article - 150 words = NIB. 2000 words = feature etc.

- Andy Dickinson

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