The super coy, slow-reveal style of article writing and why it fails.

[Superhal]

@Airman_Doors_USAF

Nah. News consists of the usual “who, what, where, why and how?”. Features do the same, but with background and color. People want to know more, and features provide that.

How many times do you read something on the Internet, for example, and find that you want to know more? It’s the difference between reading a blurb from the AP wire and getting the details at Slate.com.

Wow thanks for straightening me out. I knew that the two years of journalism classes I took in college were pure BS.

[Marley23]

I’d like to thank the OP for “disproving” long form magazine writing. How foolish journalists have been to think that, just because people have been reading this kind of thing for a few hundred years, there might be some people who like it.

It takes a long time to put together a story like the one in the OP. It’s not intended to be a news article. Feature stories like this are usually about a slowly developing trend that doesn’t make for immediate news, or they’re a deeper examination of something that was news recently. Hard news is intended to get the basics to you immediately. This was a very long piece in the Times magazine that you can read over the weekend. They’re not intended to be the same thing and it’s somewhat pointless to criticize one for not being the other.

That said, I found the start of the Jung book story painfully bad. Dan Brown-on-an-off-day bad. “Some people feel that nobody should read the book, and some feel that everybody should read it. The truth is, nobody really knows?” Oof.

Then she must have been surprised to see her masterpiece tale in print. Because the NYT page editors have splashed their front page with this sub-headline:
“The Holy Grail of the Unconscious
What the unearthing of Carl Jung’s Red book is doing to the Jungs.”
And when we get to the page we see two pictures of Jung, with captions, and links to"Times Topics: Carl Gustav Jung"

So the long long long would-be secret was all for naught.

And I have to wonder why the editors let this happen.

Is this a serious question? They do this on purpose. They tease the topic on the front page to get you to read the article.

[Brainiac]

@Marley23

I’d like to thank the OP for “disproving” long form magazine writing. How foolish journalists have been to think that, just because people have been reading this kind of thing for a few hundred years, there might be some people who like it.

Nope you missed the point entirely. Long windup may be a valid style, but long windup with a spoiler headline and photo captions is not hundreds of years old. Lazy editing and writers who don’t look at the finished piece. Yes, they “tease” on purpose, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t making the writer a chump at the same time. It’s the identical thing we all hate on TV and movie ads that give away too much. Do the famous directors want their clever endings and cherished oneliners revealed out of order? Of course not. Bu they are at the mercy of the studios and distributors.

[Marley23]

@Brainiac

Nope you missed the point entirely. Long windup may be a valid style, but long windup with a spoiler headline and photo captions is not hundreds of years old. Lazy editing and writers who don’t look at the finished piece.

I’m saying it’s done that way on purpose. (And it’s not the writer’s department.) They are giving you some information about the mystery book to get you to read it in the first place, and withholding the rest.