Our editors have brought their plain language skills to many fascinating and influential projects. Here we share links to a handful that are available online, so you can see how we have transformed content across a range of genres and sectors.
Read More
2021 was another year dominated by COVID-19, and it generated a whole new list of words we didn't know we needed, including ‘centres for national resilience’.
Read More
The Financial Services Council commissioned us to overhaul the Life Insurance Code of Practice. We created a new plain English document with big improvements in readability, usability and accessibility.
Read More
2020 was the year of COVID-19, and it generated some less than welcome words. The South Australia Government eased some coronavirus restrictions and allowed people in bars to drink while standing up… But then they dubbed this ‘vertical consumption‘.
Read More
We've taken a look back at the annual Worst Words winners from 2010-2020 to select the Worst Words of the Decade, and there was a clear winner.
Read More
As the moves toward cleaner energy gained momentum in 2019, the US Department of Energy decided to ramp up the spin. It rebranded natural gas as ‘freedom gas' and trumpeted its efforts to help export ‘molecules of US freedom' to the world.
Read More
2018 was a particularly poor year for corporate doublespeak and spin. When our national public broadcaster used the phrase 'external career development opportunities' to discuss firing its staff, it joined a long list of institutions incapable of using simple English to describe something difficult.
Read More
Political doublespeak dominated our 2017 list as things became seriously Orwellian in the US. At the top of the heap was the worrying ‘alternative facts', suggesting that politicians can be right even when they're wrong.
Read More
Noxious Frankenword 'Brangelexit' topped our 2016 list. Combining Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's celebrity moniker 'Brangelina' with the recent 'Brexit' vote, this elevates a celebrity divorce to the level of a major world event.
Read More
In a particularly bad year for corporate spin doctoring, 'possible emissions non-compliance' topped our 2015 list. Volkswagen’s CEO used this phrase to describe what was actually cheating when regulators tested how much pollution its cars emit.
Read More
