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In industry, a white paper is a piece of marketing writing that,
in tone and formatting, attempts to sound neutral and objective.
Its purpose, however, is to promote the company's point of view.
Neutral, conservative formatting, a complete lack of hype and
slickness in production, and a convincingly objective tone
are all critical to the white paper. Also, the trade press finds
it easier to simply cut out and paste down such copy, avoiding the
annoyance of actual writing.
The more obnoxious, unpalatable, and self-serving your position is,
the more toned-down your White Paper should be. I would recommend
12-point Courier for heavy-duty industrial-strength white papers,
such as Microsoft claiming to be non-monopolistic, or Intel trying
to put the floating-point bug behind them.
(I love writing white papers. They're a gas.)
-- Robert
--
Robert Plamondon * Writer * robert -at- plamondon -dot- com * (408) 321-8771
4271 North First Street, #106 * San Jose * California * 95134-1215
"Writing is like plumbing -- even people who know how to do it will
pay top dollar to keep their hands clean."
