Take a look at the Source on Github which has been updated from the original I wrote for the NYT. It also now uses jQuery (NYT was dependent on PrototypeJS)
The pilcrow is too small. It's a small target, and I barely noticed them - I stood here tapping shift repeatedly until I quit and came to the comments to see what it was about... the grey background is also almost invisible.
It enables paragraph based linking and paragraph (or sentence) based highlighting. With error correction in case the article has changed. Don't guess, read the release notes (http://open.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/11/emphasis-update-and... as noted many times in the comments here).
It looks like it's pulling characters from the paragraph to generate the "unique" paragraph ID. ID = First letter from the first 3 words in the first sentence in the paragraph + First letter from the first 3 words in the last sentence in the paragraph.
I wonder... for all the different articles on NYTimes, and the different configurations of words across paragraphs, is this unique enough such that you won't get duplicate paragraph IDs in any given article?
It only has to be unique within the article, since it's added to the article path, and there would likely be some kind of provision to add or swap out for a unique character in case of conflict. It's also case-preserving, so that implies likely case-sensitivity as well. I guess we'll have to find an instance of two - probably single-sentence - paragraphs with the same characters and same capitalization in the same story to be certain.
Seriously. It's honestly one of the primary reasons I can't stand reading his stuff; each little hashmark is a reminder that the writer thinks his thoughts are so important you will want to quote them by chapter and verse, like a holy text.
Or an easy way to reference readers of your own material to any quotes you may use from him. This makes it a lot less time-consuming to link to his articles. Does this actually bring him more traffic? I don't know, but it's interesting to know that it's actually hurting his traffic from what you're saying.
Personally, I'd be more inclined to link to his article in my own because it's that much easier.
I believe the original name for them is Purple Numbers[1], though as Dave Winer mentions, the NYTs implementation doesn't appear to create the links properly.
Whoever wired this up forgot that "p[MpaBtc]" needs to actually appear in the name of an anchor for the URL to reliably point to that paragraph. Clever idea but bad authoring that just fails without javascript.
I just noticed this when I tried invoke Instant Send[0] with a modifier tap[1] in LaunchBar. A bit annoying that it blocks the LaunchBar functionality.
Ooh, I wish Readable would add this. I typically only use Readable for long articles. When reading part-way through, leaving, and coming back, it's a pain to locate the paragraph where you left off.
It does seem a bizarre key choice, 5 hits of the shift key will prompt the sticky keys dialog to appear on most of the worlds computers that have a shift key.
Quite easy to do as a 'tic' when you notice this undiscoverable 'feature'.
Nope - it allows you to link to individual Paragraphs as well as Highlighting sentences (just click them to toggle the Highlight).
As you do this it updates the URL so you can share it.
They Keys to identify the text are generated dynamically and tolerant to change (so if a Paragraph is modified or moved later on - rare) it will still link tot he correct one within a given tolerance.
I didn't down vote. I guess someone thought your comment was content free. It is frustrating when you have low karma for people to down vote but not explain why. Usually they balance out.
I'm not even sure I know what "content free" means. So complimenting the post as being nice and stating that I plan to make use of the information in the future is worthy of a down vote? I wasn't expecting an up vote but I didn't think anyone would dislike my comment so much to take that 1 sec to click it down. Whatever.
Imagine your comment was at the top. The linked article doesn't say how to get the effect. Your comment doesn't say how to get the effect. So it would all be a bit mystifying.
Imagine your comment was in the middle of the page. There would be other comments below yours that would be more worthy of people's time to read than yours. So your comment should appear below those comments. Thus it should attract a few downvotes.
Upvoting the link would be more appropriate than posting a generic compliment.
If you had said "This is an excellent idea and I will steal it because (a) it will make it easier for people to link to and quote me (b) it will make it easier for me to link to my earlier articles (c) ..." then that would be different: you would be providing reasons, and that might provoke further useful discussion. It might not attract upvotes, but unless you were just repeating what someone else had said it shouldn't attract downvotes.
That one second to vote something down is not a serious barrier to downvoting. (Neither is the one second to vote something up a serious barrier to upvoting.)
Thank you for that. Now I understand sort of. I didn't think my comment was any less than a few others. But the way you put it makes me figure that several of the other comments that didn't add any thing were also voted down. But anyway... thanks for not just being a... oh wait... I've said too much already... I should just up vote your comment in silence. :)
awesome... 3 more down votes. At this rate I should be back down to 0 Karma by morning. If I am doing something wrong here wouldn't it be better to tell me what it is rather than just down vote in silence?
People interpret it as whining, and feel whining is deserving of downvotes.
It's not a community norm I agree with --- I feel that if you want to know what you've done wrong and you're not acting all entitled about it (oh, but some people might interpret your reactions as acting entitled) then someone should tell you.
I don't think my "why the down vote" was any type of "entitlement". It was a just a question. Could easily ahve been answered. and it was. but then it was also down voted.. which in itself is not helpful at all. The answer given was some what helpful but I had follow up to it. and that too was down voted.. still with no real helpful answer. So at that point I was more frustrated than anything. Now I understand.
I wasn't ranting at all. And certainly not the first time. I asked a simple question. Then a follow up question for clarity. And rather than help me to understand... people just kept down voting in silence. But now I know. Be brilliant or be silent. Got it. And I do care about Karma a little because that is the only way I will be able to go around down voting in silence like a coward. ;) j/k
(oh, and tap Shift key 2 times, not 4)
Take a look at the Source on Github which has been updated from the original I wrote for the NYT. It also now uses jQuery (NYT was dependent on PrototypeJS)
https://github.com/NYTimes/Emphasis
Its a nifty project to contribute to and I welcome updates and discussion.