Audience and Writing Style in Technical Debate

As some of you now know the focus of my inquiry has been the preservation of an open internet through the breakup or weakening of internet service provider monopolies. Specifically I am focusing on the creation of municipal networks to create real competition, but this is not all that unrelated to the broader net neutrality battle that is currently being fought in Washington DC and abroad. While the positions and questions raised in this debate are often nuanced and steeped in both rhetoric and ideology, the whole thing can largely be simplified down into a fight between market and government forces.

The Atlantic is a well-known and respected publication in the US. When the net neutrality debate was renewed after a SCOTUS decision overturning the FCC's Open Internet Order, The Atlantic released this article providing a brief history on the debate. The language is clear and easy to understand and care is taken to explain some of the more technical aspects of the debate in order to make it more accessible to a broad audience. While a lot of sources are referenced throughout, this piece serves as more of a primer for people new to the topic than an in-depth inquiry into the net neutrality debate. It is also worth noting that while both sides of the debate are discussed, more emphasis is placed on the pro-FCC/neutrality side that appeals to the moderate to left-leaning audience.

For an alternate take on the ISP monopoly debate I came across an article in the Wall Street Journal  via the university library databases. For context the Wall Street Journal generally takes a more conservative and pro-business stance on issues and is generally written for a investors and other white collar workers. This shows in an article that relies more heavily on statistics and dollar figures than its counterpart in the Atlantic. Less time is spent explaining the more technical financial concepts it references because the intended audience is one that is already quite familiar with finance. It also takes a far more pro-market stance and engages in a lot the ideological rhetoric that has plagued the broader debate at the national level.**

I know that this particular blog post hasn't been the most exciting, but I think there is one key takeaway in all of this. Audience matters. Due to their different intended audiences both publications have adapted their writing and editing in order to maintain the wide readerships they have today.






**As an aside the WSJ article was an opinion piece written by the executive director of the Progressive Policy Institute, a progressive think-tank. I find it odd that he is so openly critical of the same municipal solutions that many other progressives so actively support.