Why "Stating the Obvious" Is Often the Best Reason to Blog

Jim Nielsen picks up on a piece by John Gruber that rails against the now-ubiquitous newsletter and cookie-consent popups that bury the actual content a reader came for. Gruber’s core complaint is almost tautological — a webpage should show the webpage, an email should show the email — and that simplicity is exactly what catches Nielsen’s attention. The interesting thread isn’t the popups themselves but the meta-observation about why writing like Gruber’s works at all.

Nielsen’s argument is that effective blogging frequently amounts to saying something that feels too obvious to bother saying. Writers talk themselves out of posts because the point seems self-evident, yet real-world annoyances accumulate while everyone stays silent, leaving the writer feeling like the child in The Emperor’s New Clothes — the only one willing to name what’s plainly there. Those are often the most resonant posts to read.

The takeaway is a low-bar, high-value recipe for writing: be willing to state the obvious when no one else will, and bring concrete examples to back it up. And if someone has already said it, the move is simply to link to them and amplify. It’s a small piece, but a useful corrective for anyone who self-censors blog ideas for lack of novelty.