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RE: Are you smart in English enough to understand Steem White Paper? No? I will tell you why! Warning - graphs and statistics inside!
Nice work! I've just encountered Steem and have finished reading the white paper before signing up and finding this post.
My immediate thought while reading the white paper was "This thing needs a `Dummies' Guide'. A funny one; with pictures; and a car chase.
I'm a first-language English speaker with (more than one) college degree and I can tell you that unless you have a background in crypto-currencies and economics it will take several readings to absorb all the ideas in the white paper.
If you have neither of those things and understood everything on your first reading, you're either
i) kidding yourself
ii) confusing the Steem white paper with an actual blank piece of white paper
So don't feel too bad.
So in your experience those numbers from tests are just an optimistic version?
The reading tests typically gauge quantitative metrics like word and sentence length. They say nothing of the complexity of the ideas contained within. Dr Seuss could have written the white paper and it would still take several readings to grasp the content. That's not to say articles shouldn't aim for clarity of expression; I think they should. I also tend to favour simple writing than "high-brow" academic tomes.
BUT
Using everyday language tends to require more words from the author to get the same idea across (because phrases replace jargon and lots of metaphors, visual imagery and the like are used to explain ideas). In academic circles, this type of writing is often dismissed as "unscientific" or "too informal" (I have had papers rejected citing this very thing).
SO
On the one hand, I can fully appreciate why the white paper is written the way it was and I can also appreciate OPs frustration as a 2nd-language English speaker. That's why I think a simplified companion piece would be very helpful.
The thing is I'm hearing all around me it's better than Facebook...
