And with all that back story, they didn't even answer the most important question: WHERE DID THE IDEA COME FROM? How did the engineer know to she had to build a vibrating wristband?

Probably from that vibrating spoon idea.

https://www.liftware.com

I was always under the impression that the spoon did not vibrate but instead moved opposite of the direction of the tremors. Kinda like a steadycam for a camera.

The prototype actually was just the mechanism for a camera stablizer, just with spoon attached. Not actually a steady cam though, as those are just passive inertia-based gimbals on springs.

This is classic longform journalism writing, and it's the reason why I don't like longform journalism. I wish they'd give me an abstract -- not having article summaries is the reason I never found any "good" magazine worth the money. Imagine so

No. This is a bait-and-switch masquerading as good long form journalism. The bait in this case was the technology. The switch was the backstory. Proper long form journalism does not engage in this sort of dishonest writing. The story you came to read is introduced at the beginning and every paragraph afterward serves to build up what you want to know. Kinda like a novel!

It's really not. Longform journalism can be readable and not irritating, but you have to be a talented writer to pull it off. In addition the subject of the story has to be suitable. Here the talent is lacking and the subject doesnt fit the long-story treatmnent.

This is not a problem with "longform" writing, it's just a problem of poor writing.

I read a long winded essay on the filming of Blues Brothers. It was a perfect writing style because the message was found in the layers of anecdotes and details.

When I want to learn facts, I want to read something structured like a 9th grade essay.

Link?

You got that far? Congrats.

I couldn't stand it. After the introduction, I started scrolling, saw the general structure and just closed it.

It was the most unpleasant text I looked at in a very long time.

There's a video embedded which does a decent job: https://youtu.be/k9Rm-U9havE

Surely you could have read the whole thing in the time it took for you to write this? Why even bother?

Feedback is a gift.

Couldn't you just search for "Microsoft"+"watch"+"Parkinson's" and spend, let's say, two minutes selecting a "just the facts" article?

You probably spent those two minutes writing your post.

I spent about 10 minutes writing my post and it was very cathartic.

The article is teasing the reader. It could have easily explained the basics of the device in one or two sentences at the top. The two main questions the reader has are "Does this work?" and "How does this work?" The writer is just being cute by not getting those answers out of the way.

Different journalistic styles appeal to different people. If this one didn't appeal to you, that's perfectly fine. To figure out why it didn't appeal to you, and why you personally find it frustrating, that's great, and a good exercise in critical thinking, literary analysis, and self examination.

That said, there's a key difference between "This style of writing is very frustrating." and "I find this style of writing very frustrating." From reading other comments in this thread, the story appealed to them. What comes across to you as "the writer … just being cute" is engaging writing to others. As currently written, your critical analysis of why you find the journalistic style frustrating comes off as a rant, which doesn't contribute constructively to discussion on HN.

I agree with the gist of your reply. Different strokes, and so on. But I also found khazhoux's comment quite useful.

Also, your comment seems to try to differentiate as to whether an opinion should begin with "I think" (specifically, "I find"), which is a suggestion of poor writing form.

Had you followed your own advice, your last sentence might read "As currently written, your critical analysis of why you find the journalistic style frustrating comes off as a rant, which ^I don't feel contributes^ constructively to discussion on HN." I think you'll agree that those words are as wasteful here as they would have been in khazhoux's comment.

No, my post wasn't self-examination. I stated my opinion about the very low signal-to-noise ratio in this article. It's so uninformative, the article itself barely contributes to discussion on HN.

The article was tech-bait.

> From reading other comments in this thread, the story appealed to them.

The story, or the writing style? I also upvoted the story, because I'm not going to punish it for the shit writing. And I actually dislike that the topmost comment, which I agree to from the bottom of my heart, is about the style; but the very fact that it's at the top means that maybe even more people find it just as annoying.

As for the style, I couldn't find it here. Is there a name for it?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_style

I always wish these blog posts were written like this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_pyramid_(journalism)

Maybe it is about how "engagement" gets measured, and having people jump through hoops is more profitable than valuing their time and their own decisions about how deep they want to delve?

This is not news, therefore it doesn't have to be written in the style you linked.

If it was, people would read the first paragraph, move on, and then complain that they wasted their money in buying whatever newspaper/magazine they're reading.

I'm still asking what style it's supposed to be. If it doesn't have a name, it could use one.

> If it was, people would read the first paragraph, move on, and then complain that they wasted their money in buying whatever newspaper/magazine they're reading.

If this blog post was written in a way that isn't scatterbrained, people would complain about the money they wasted on "whatever newspaper/magazine they're reading"? I think the word I'm looking for here is "no".

The fact that people enjoy different things does not mean they are all as intellectually valuable. Children like stories with talking animals, but that doesn't mean all talking animals are appropriate for all venues. Likewise, we can reasonably (even if contentiously) make value judgements about some format that people really enjoy, like pulpy romance novels, clickbait teasers, or outrage porn.

HN is supposed to be about gratifying intellectual curiosity (explicitly in the guidelines). Romance novels, talking animals, and run-of-mill human interest pieces don't belong.

Indeed, HN is a place for gratifying intellectual curiosity. If you feel a submission (or comment, for that matter) is inappropriate for HN, please flag or down-vote it and move on. We all play a role in curating HN. Writing excessively negative comments (or comments written in an excessively negative way) lead to a worsening of discussion.

"Excessively negative comments"? I don't know what you mean by that. Content-wise, criticism is just as valid as agreement. Tone-wise, yes everything should be civil and friendly, but khazhoux's tone was fine.

You can't downvote submissions, and the post wasn't flag worthy (i.e., spam or off-topic).

Because I felt the same and wound up looking up another article here's one that does precisely that:

https://www.fastcompany.com/3066610/how-a-vibrating-watch-he...

> A new watch-like device has changed that: Strapped on Lawton’s wrist, it counteracts the tremors through vibration.

I'm glad they took the time to write down what I was thinking while reading the article.

> You probably spent those two minutes writing your post.

Let's spent two years linking to that comment under every article it applies to.

Why not give us what we were baited with, and then put more backstory below for those interested? Instead it's just a jumbled mess, paragraphs just jumping all over the place.