This is nothing new though. I remember being in middle school and teachers saying that the most sophisticated newspapers at the time were written at an eighth grade level. Basically, it’s the level where you’re not alienating potential customers, I guess. And I suppose there’s some benefit to dumbing down things like news. Maybe. I dunno.

As a lawyer, I have to take MASSIVE amounts of time to write and rewrite emails and letters to account for the fact that (1) no matter how important the matter, 80% of folks WILL NOT read the whole thing, (2) of the 20% that do read the whole thing, 50% will accidentally skip over key points. I’ve learned to use bullet lists, and as much as possible, to err on the side of plain language—even when doing so leads to an underinformed person, because the alternative is an entirely uninformed person. It’s brutal.

How do you even measure that? Is there a guidebook?