On LinkedIn, One-Sentence Paragraphs are the New Bullet Points

Are you even aware you’re doing it?

Writing in one-sentence paragraphs?

Just because everyone else on LinkedIn is doing it, or so it seems?

Just because — if you’ve thought about it — this style seems to make content more accessible?

Or does it?

Give it a think.

Are one-sentence paragraphs the new bullet points, a lazy way to avoid the trouble of composing an argument?

Composing an argument: that’s what paragraphs do by grouping sentences that together support one another, better communicating an idea.

Just like you were taught in grammar school.

And mind, Mrs. Smith-Jones (or whoever your composition teacher was) wasn’t pushing Hegelian sentences spanning two pages.

You learned to communicate.

You wrote; you didn’t follow fads.

Two years from now, you will look back at this choppy, one-sentence-paragraph style and say… well, not a lot, because GPT-5 or 6 will be doing your writing for you, but that’s a different topic.

For today: Go back to writing in paragraphs. Write the way you learned in grammar school, the way Jane Austen and James Baldwin and Naguib Mahfouz wrote, they way they would write, were they writing on LinkedIn. Their writing employs paragraphs to weave sentences into a coherent narrative. You can do it too. You should!

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