Monday, June 23, 2008

Additional word/s required for clarity




Car care or car repair? Proper text required if either.....




Contrary to the previous post of "Fewer words are sometimes better", the following sentence requires the addition of one or more words to make it clearer:-

He wins RM8,000 motorcycle using his hand to play ping pong.

It is a sub headline for an item of news in a newspaper.

To anyone, the sub headline suggests that the 'he' wins in a normal table tennis competition.

However, the news write-up says that the participants were playing with their bare hands (that is, without any bats).

To create a clearer impression, the sub headline should have been "He wins RM8,000 motorcycle using his bare hand to play ping pong" or "He wins RM8,000 motorcycle using his hand to play ping pong without any bat".

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