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This is an essay.

It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

Shortcuts

This page in a nutshell: Be concise.

"Too long; didn't read" (abbreviated "TLDR", "tl;dr") is used as a reply to an excessively long written statement. The term indicates that the reader did not actually read the statement due to its undue length.^[1] This essay especially considers the term as used in Wikipedia discussions, and examines methods of fixing the problem when found in article content.

As a label, it is also effective as a tactic which thwarts the kinds of discussion which are essential in collaborative editing. TL;DR is a shorthand observation very much like the complaint that Mozart's music has too many notes.^[2] The label is used to end discussion rather than engaging it.

TLDR means that you really liked someones work and want them to write more. Its no an insult in any way.

Trolls often compliment exceptional posters that overcame there trollishness by being so wonderfully eloquent.

While the literal meaning of TLDR is highly offensive acronym related to Dogs, Gays, Aliens and 15inch dildos, its a real term of honor from the Trollish perspective. REMEMBER THE TROLL IS IN NO WAY INSULTING YOU ITS HIS WAY OF SAYING THAT YOU WUN THE WAR BY BEING SO SMART AND TAKING SO MUCH EFFORT TO FABRICATE THE ULTIMATE RESPONSE. YOU SHOULD CONTINUE POSTING WELL THOUGHT OUT TEXT WALLS. YOU ARE IN NO WAY WASTING YOUR TIME. EVERYBODY ON THE INTERNET CARES ABOUT YOUR OPINION.

ALSO I LOST THE GAME''''Bold text''''Bold text''''Bold text''''Bold text'Bold text''''''''''

PS PLZ BANZOR THIS IP ADDRESS ITS A FOCKIN UNIVERSITY AND THEIRS A BUNCH OF WANKERS WHO WRITE REAL INCITEFULL STUFF ABOUT MY PAST. i DONT WUNT IT REVEALED WOO SHAGGED WHO MAN, i GOT A FOGGIN ELLLRECTION CAMPAIGN TO RUN.

What you can do to improve wordiness

Trimming or splitting

If you encounter excessively long text in a Wikipedia article, consider trimming it down (if it is truly redundant) or splitting it into another article to fit our summary style (which helps provide drill-down ability for the readers). (More info at WP:SPINOFF.)

Caveat on hastiness

Make some effort to understand whatever valid ideas the previous author may have been trying (but failing) to communicate, so that you don't just hastily and inadvertently delete valid rough draft material instead of refining it to a better draft. Remember that your own credibility is at stake as well as that of the loquacious writer, because if you're hasty and harsh enough, you could end up earning a reputation for yourself as someone with incompetent reading comprehension, which you may know is an unfair reputation, but which your actions will speciously make seem like the truth. One of the reasons that some linguists (most famously Geoffrey K. Pullum) have a dim view of Strunk & White's advice "omit needless words" is that in the hands of amateur editors (as opposed to writers—that is, content critics as opposed to content creators), it mistakes all loquaciousness for nonsense and valueless redundancy in one overly hasty, facile stroke of the pen; and it fails to recognize that not all redundancy is cognitively or communicatively valueless. The upshot is simply to consider things circumspectly before deleting content. Deleting is not always equivalent to improving, and intelligently differentiating the cases is seldom a facile affair.

Maintain civility

Sometimes a person might feel that a reader's decision to pointedly mention this essay during a discussion is dismissive and rude. Therefore, courteous editors might, as an alternative to citing WP:TLDR, create a section on the longwinded editor's talk page and politely ask them to write more concisely.

References

^ "Too long didn't read". Urban Dictionary. Retrieved 2008-05-13.
^ Swaford, Jan. "Too bizarre, Mozart!" The Guardian (UK). 4 June 2004.

External links

Tim Dowling, "Wikipedia too long-winded for you? Try the simple version," The Guardian,14 January 2008.

[1] "Too long didn't read". Urban Dictionary. Retrieved 2008-05-13.

[2] Swaford, Jan. "Too bizarre, Mozart!" The Guardian (UK). 4 June 2004.

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 As a label, it is also effective as a tactic which thwarts the kinds of discussion which are essential in collaborative editing. TL;DR is a shorthand observation very much like the complaint that Mozart's music has too many notes.<ref>Swaford, Jan. [http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2004/jun/04/classicalmusicandopera  "Too bizarre, Mozart!"] ''The Guardian'' (UK). 4 June 2004.</ref>  The label is used to end discussion rather than engaging it.
+TLDR means that you really liked someones work and want them to write more.
-== Reasons for length, good or bad ==
+Its no an insult in any way.
+Trolls often compliment exceptional posters that overcame there trollishness by being so wonderfully eloquent.
-People who edit Wikipedia probably do so because they enjoy writing.  However, that passion for writing often means that what they write is longer than necessary. Sometimes this is because the writer incorrectly believes that long sentences and big words will make them appear learned.<ref>[http://www.livescience.com/448-study-simple-writing-smart.html Study: Simple Writing Makes You Look Smart]</ref>  In other cases misplaced pride prevents the author from seeing that not every word in their golden prose is necessary.  Sometimes the author may be too hurried (or lazy) to write clearly and concisely; recall [[Blaise Pascal|Pascal's]] famous quote, "I made this so long because I did not have time to make it shorter."
+While the literal meaning of TLDR is highly offensive acronym related to Dogs, Gays, Aliens and 15inch dildos, its a real term of honor from the Trollish perspective.   '''REMEMBER THE TROLL IS IN NO WAY INSULTING YOU''' ITS HIS WAY OF SAYING THAT YOU WUN THE WAR BY BEING SO SMART AND TAKING SO MUCH EFFORT TO FABRICATE THE ULTIMATE RESPONSE.   YOU SHOULD CONTINUE POSTING WELL THOUGHT OUT TEXT WALLS.   YOU ARE IN NO WAY WASTING YOUR TIME.   EVERYBODY ON THE INTERNET CARES ABOUT YOUR OPINION.
-In a related vein, [[WP:RFA|administrator candidates]] may be judged by how much they have written.  Due to these factors, many articles, instructions and especially comments on Wikipedia are longer than necessary.  Some of Wikipedia's core policies are considered by some to be too long (e.g. [[Wikipedia:Text of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License|Creative Commons license]]).  This may be considered to put too much burden on the readers to understand.  Such a problem can be seen in other applications as well.<ref>McCullagh, Declan. [http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20008422-38.html  "FTC says current privacy laws aren't working,"] CNET News. June 22, 2010.</ref>
-According to a famous English playwright, William Shakespeare, "Brevity is the soul of wit."<ref> {{Cite book| last = Shakespeare| first = William| authorlink = | coauthors = | title = [[Hamlet]] | publisher = Washington Square Press| date = 1992| location = New York| page = 89| Act 2 Sc 2: Therefore (since) brevity is the soul of wit...}}</ref>  In our modern English, a similar statement would be: "Omit needless words."<ref>{{cite book|last=Strunk|first=William|title=The Elements of Style|publisher=Bartleby.com|date=1918|chapter=Elementary Principles of Composition|chapterurl=http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html|accessdate=2008-05-13}}</ref>  Editors are encouraged to write concisely, and [[Wikipedia:Explain jargon|avoid undue technical jargon]].  If it becomes necessary to write lengthy text in an article, editors may wish to include a short summary.  Additionally, it may be appropriate to use simple vocabulary to aid the readers in comprehension.  Many readers may not use English as a primary language, or may have other "unarticulated needs."<ref>Chen, Brian X. [http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/06/30/microsoft.2010.wired/  "How Microsoft crowdsourced Office 2010,"] ''Wired.'' June 30, 2010; excerpt, "''when users struggle to finish a task, ... researchers can examine why they are becoming confused or taking too long and work to resolve the problem. This is what usability researchers call "unarticulated needs" ... [and] any unaddressed shortcomings are "part of [an] engineering road map."''</ref>
+ALSO
-In fairness to writers, it is also true that not all [[wikt:loquacious#Adjective|loquaciousness]] is due to pretense of learnedness; often it is just a rough-draft attempt to elucidate the ways that previous arguments or content were (usually unintentionally) [[wikt:specious#Adjective|specious]] in their reasoning due to exhibiting a lack of adequate [[wikt:circumspection#Noun|circumspection]]. The latter is a common cognitive problem for all human minds, which are faced with the task of sensing the many facets of a complex reality and modeling it in a way simple enough for the [[consciousness]] to understand and easily manipulate in interrelation with yet other topics. This leads humans toward certain analytical weaknesses that have been explored through observations both ancient (the "[[blind men and an elephant]]" problem) and modern (the "[[map–territory relation]]" problem; the [[emic and etic|emic-versus-etic]] problem). [[Natural language]] is inherently well suited to oversimplifying multifaceted topics and poorly suited to circumspect communication without resorting to loquaciousness. The [[ideal]] of being able to have adequately circumspect analysis together with ease and brevity of communication—sacrificing neither to the other—is difficult to achieve; it usually requires mental effort, time investment, and multiple [[draft document|drafts]] (iterations). Thus some instances of loquaciousness are not pure redundancy or nonsense (as they may speciously appear) but rather are simply a rough or intermediate draft that hasn't yet had the benefit of subsequent refinement. Fortunately, [[information technology]] (e.g., memory, networking, linking, [[transclusion]]) is helping to achieve it by providing a practical ability to allow readers to "drill down" through successive layers of complexity or detail, as selectively as each one may wish.
+'''
+I LOST THE GAME'''''''''Bold text'''''''''Bold text'''''''''Bold text'''''''''Bold text''''''Bold text'''''''''''''''
+PS PLZ BANZOR THIS IP ADDRESS ITS A FOCKIN UNIVERSITY AND THEIRS A BUNCH OF WANKERS WHO WRITE REAL INCITEFULL STUFF ABOUT MY PAST.   i DONT WUNT IT REVEALED  WOO SHAGGED WHO MAN,     i GOT A FOGGIN ELLLRECTION CAMPAIGN TO RUN.
 == What you can do to improve wordiness ==