[Wikipedia-l] A Three Way Split

[Jim McKeeth]

At 09:30 AM 9/18/2002 -0700, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>Asking that the lead paragraph of an article reasonably and succinctly 
>defines the subject matter may be as much as we can hope for.

I think this is the key.  If we can give them the basics in the first 
paragraph then if it is something they are interested in they will stretch 
their reading skills (use dictionaries, etc.) to finish the rest of the 
article.  For some people that first paragraph may be all they are 
interested in.

I know a lot people who probably fall in that 40% who have computers, and 
are on the Internet, but none of them would have any interest in visiting 
an encyclopedia.  In fact, I would wager the very act of looking up a word 
in an encyclopedia would start to elevate their reading level to 5th grade 
or beyond.  If we aim the encyclopedia to the 5th grade level then we will 
never help to elevate our readers.

-Jim