{"id":120,"date":"2010-09-26T18:49:52","date_gmt":"2010-09-27T01:49:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/?p=120"},"modified":"2010-09-26T18:49:52","modified_gmt":"2010-09-27T01:49:52","slug":"7-reasons-why-blogs-include-numbered-lists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/?p=120","title":{"rendered":"7 Reasons Why Blogs Include Numbered Lists"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"numbered<\/a>

Numbering Like We Had in 'Nam... NOT<\/p><\/div>\n

People will read “5 Ways to Lose Abdominal Fat” or “10 Reasons\u00a0to Bring an AK-47 to Work<\/a>” while ignoring an article entitled “Reading This Could Save Your Life.” But why?<\/p>\n

1. There is an end in sight. If there\u00a010 ways to cook a skunk, you can be sure that after #10, it’s over.<\/p>\n

2. You can read the items in any order. Skip around.\u00a0The subject won’t change.\u00a0\u00a0You won’t get lost.<\/p>\n

3. White space. People love white space. It\u00a0helps them feel like\u00a0they are reading more than they are.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0You don’t feel obligated to get to the end. This isn’t great literature. It’s a list. The 7 best practical jokes may be listed, but you can stop at #3 and go buy a\u00a0whoopie cushion.<\/p>\n

5. You always know how close you are to the end. Web pages\u2014and blogs\u2014can go on forever. Numbered lists? Not so much.<\/p>\n

6. By item #6, you know if there is any point in continuing. Maybe the author provided 5 really lame reasons to sleep with pigs, but if reason #6 is lame too, you can close the window. {Wait! Don’t click on that little X up in the corner. You only have one more to go.}<\/p>\n

7. Our world is chaotic. Numbered lists give a sense of order to the universe. If there are\u00a010 ways to salvation, all is right with the world. If you have to struggle through a Bible, a Kuran, or stone tablets\u2014oh wait,\u00a0that was a\u00a0numbered list. Anyway, life is unpredictable enough. Who needs unending stress?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

People will read “5 Ways to Lose Abdominal Fat” or “10 Reasons\u00a0to Bring an AK-47 to Work” while ignoring an article entitled “Reading This Could Save Your Life.” But why? 1. There is an end in sight. If there\u00a010 ways to cook a skunk, you can be sure that after #10, it’s over. 2. You […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-great-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=120"}],"version-history":[{"count":60,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":181,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120\/revisions\/181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.luanneoleas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}