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Posted by andsoitis 1/25/2026

First, make me care(gwern.net)
813 points | 249 commentspage 4
MarkusWandel 1/26/2026|
So LLMs can't do that? Every LLM-written historical or pseoudo-historical (i.e. made up) thing that comes up in my Facebook feed does start with a "hook" like that. Doesn't make them great articles but obviously you can prompt them to do it.
treelover 1/25/2026||
"When writing, your first job is this: First, make me care."

It really depends on who the audience is...

bravura 1/25/2026|
Understanding your audience is your first job as a writer or communicator.

Speaking to them and making them care is job two.

wtetzner 1/26/2026||
Ideally you wouldn't need to make them care. Just give them enough information up front for them to determine if they care.
kazinator 1/25/2026||
Video edition:

1. First, make me care.

2. Then provide an indication (e.g. in the video description) giving the time in the video where the question starts to be answered.

If you make me somewhat care, but I have to binary search through your video to skip the rambling, I'm likely to back button out.

NegativeK 1/26/2026|
First, make me care and tell me the answer. In 30 seconds.

Then expand on it in increasingly advanced levels of detail.

If your knowledge is high, I won't care about the video production. If you're not getting to the point quickly, you're manipulating the audience into getting views; education and sharing knowledge isn't the main driver of your video.

But what I want is idealistic.

orleyhuxwell 1/26/2026||
For the last 30 years I've decided that the best stuff (most engaging books, stories, experiences in life) require investment. It gets worse (you go through some pain while exercising) before it gets better. That's essentially a definition of a good life to me - finding the things worth sacrificing resources and getting the payoff.

So 'first make me care' to me is a manifest of Gen Z - tiktok - brainrot approach. From my perspective you miss most of the really good stuff by cultivating this approach. I.e. my favorite books - Tai Pan, Noble House; tv series - Better Call Saul! - require you to go through so much of initial boredom. It's also the same discussion as 'learn to code vs only do AI Slop' or 'learn math and algos vs only import functions from libs and never check what's inside'.

*Exceptions apply, ofc. There are things that hook you and progressively ad depth, but it's really rare. I.e. Arcane tv show is both easy to access and quite deep.

Edit: ...so I can imagine math teacher that first tell you what are some amazing uses of derivatives and integrals - PIDs, SGD, better estimation, wave functions, generalized description of problems, accessing interesting physics etc. And after that they make you grind. I think it would be quite great. But it is so rare, that you have to make a leap of faith and assume most of the good stuff is boring initially.

aucisson_masque 1/26/2026||
That’s basically what tv shows do every time. The pilot is great/awesome then the 10 episodes are boring and the very last one get exciting enough for you to wait the second season.

Best example: the walking dead season tv shows.

deadbabe 1/25/2026||
I hate this. Basically it’s saying use constant clickbait to keep your reader reading.

Increasingly, readers don’t have time for this shit. Be direct, and if the reader doesn’t care, they were never meant to be your reader anyway. Someone will care, write for them.

oncallthrow 1/25/2026||
This didn’t make me care
jfengel 1/25/2026|
Agreed, because it's not very actionable advice. At best it provides some examples of what not to do.

The example leads to one classic bit of writing advice: tell only the very most important things and omit everything else. Start the story as late as you can and end it as early as possible. This applies to nonfiction just as much as to fiction.

ziofill 1/26/2026||
I’m from Venice and it’s heartwarming to see someone from a different country/culture so into the history of Venice <3
greenie_beans 1/26/2026||
read about what gordon lish has to say about opening a story: https://www.tetmancallis.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/The-...
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