It used to be if you needed to review an article to learn something, such as how to unclog a sink, how to photograph a hummingbird or whatever, the articles got right into it. Today there seems to be a trend to write articles longer than encyclopedias on the history of mankind itself. Or personkind if you prefer. Years ago to read an article on tips to photograph a hummingbird the author would make rational assumptions, such as you know what birds are, you actually own a camera, know where hummingbirds might live, etc. They would start with the type of lens, the shutter speed, ISO speed, focusing mode and so forth.
Today? I was just reading an article about photographing hummingbirds and they started with making sure you are on the planet Earth, as they cannot swear there are hummingbirds on other planets. What, is someone going to sue them if they are on Mars and can’t photograph hummingbirds?
Then, understand what a hummingbird is, as opposed to a Blue Jay or someone’s baseball glove. Next up, consider obtaining a camera. Oh, don’t forget to go outside your house, as hummingbirds rarely buzz between your milk and eggs inside your refrigerator. What the hell???
Then they discuss the ethics of the task. Ethics? What? Of photographing birds? They have to go into massive details about the ethics of feeding birds, of capturing their image without their consent and not to reveal the exact location to prevent bird kidnappers. I guess there might be a grain of reality to these statements, like feeding protected birds junk food, but since the title of the article is how to photograph hummingbirds one might think that ship has sailed, right?
OK, I am five thousand words into this article and still haven’t gotten to anything about actually photographing the damn birds! Maybe these web authors get paid by the word?
Beats me.
It is the same thing even if it is unclogging a kitchen sink. It takes them five thousand words to get to the kitchen itself, much less the actual sink!
Maybe this is a sign of our times. Are people today so freaking stupid that they might actually try to unclog their kitchen sink even if they don’t live in a house or apartment with a sink? Do they have to be told to not try to unclog a sink where the water is flowing just fine, without any signs of a clog?
I have a headache. I’m going to check out an article about how to relieve a pain in the head. It will probably start with making sure you actually have a head.
This planet is really getting stupid.