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10 August 2010
Starting Strong & Lasting Long — Vol. 2
California Supreme Court To Decide Interplay Between Severability-of-Interests Clause And Intentional Acts Exclusion
by Patrick McKinney
Can an insurance company deny coverage to a homeowner who did nothing intentional because another insured under the policy committed a crime or intentional tort?
The first line of this article suffers from a problem that plagues us all — putting things out of place.
No doubt, the author didn’t intend because another insured . . . . to modify a homeowner.
I’m sure the author meant this:
Can an insurance company deny coverage to a homeowner because another insured committed a crime or intentional tort?
By inserting another phrase (who did nothing intentional) between the modifier and what it’s meant to modify (homeowner), it seems as if the author is asking about coverage for a homeowner who did nothing intentional because another insured committed a crime.
That’s how we first read it, and that’s because of its syntax.
Now . . . it takes a reader just an instant to realize what modifies what, but the reader shouldn’t have to go through that effort. The writer (or his editor) should make sure the readers’ job is as easy as can be, especially so in the intro.
If the reader gets the sense that an article is going to be a chore to read, he might not go past the intro. And that means the article is ineffective (i.e., you can’t influence people with what they won’t read).
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* This is one in a series of posts on how to gain and maintain a reader’s attention. In other words, how to get a return on your investment in SEO.
