The other day I had a short twitter exchange with Chris Brogan regarding the new book by Michael Pollan called Food Rules. In the book, Pollen offers simple techniques for eating right with the overall aim of curtailing America’s health care crises.

Here’s the verbatim twitter exchange:

chrisbrogan: Wow. Want some simple rules for eating? – http://bit.ly/5bqjYe
salmajafri: a little too simplistic, no? like the ones abt kids eating their vegs if in front of TV-my 2yr-old doesnt fall into that trap!
chrisbrogan: I love simplistic. Complex is where I fall off.
salmajafri: true but simple to a point is good. gross over-generalizations tend to become inaccurate.

Although I’m sure Chris meant to imply “simple” instead of “simplistic”, I’m amazed how many people actually deliberately use the word simplistic.

So what’s the difference? Aren’t they just one and the same thing? Well, no! And this might come as a surprise to some people.

Here’s a definition of “simple” from the Merrium-Webster dictionary:
“readily understood or performed[simple directions][the adjustment was simple to make]“

And now here’s a definition of “simplistic” from the same dictionary:
“of, relating to, or characterized by simplism” where a search for simplisim reveals “the act or an instance of oversimplifying; especially : the reduction of a problem to a false simplicity by ignoring complicating factors”

Often people seem to think the term “simplistic” is good! I’ve seen variations from an email received for a job stating “Hi, I’m a simplistic writer” to a newspaper reviewer positively commenting on a book by saying “the author has a very simplistic style”. Gosh, simplistic has negative connotations people!

Now don’t get me wrong; I’m all for simple. After all I love speed-reading, I love relevant lists, I love getting to the bottom line quickly and I love writing targeted web content and focused SEO articles that get to the point succinctly. But turns out, you can sometimes go overboard on the simplicity wagon and be simple to the point of being ridiculous and inaccurate.

After all, wasn’t it Einstein who said “Make things as simple as you can, but no simpler”?

What does that mean exactly? How can you go beyond simple into simplistic and inaccurate? And what is simplicity?

A web quote I found (I’ve adapted it a bit) phrases it perfectly by saying: “Simplicity is knowing when one more word would be too many, and one less word would be too few. But it’s not just knowing the right number of words, it’s also knowing which words are right, and how to arrange them.”

Therefore, simplicity implies the right combinations presented in an easy to understand, yet factual manner.

When you write for the web, your aim should be to present information in as simple a manner as possible without losing meaning and context. When writing web content, for example, being simple means getting the point across with compelling, thought-provoking words which are also a true reflection of the fact. Over-simplifying means that you’re just deleting important and relevant facts.

The beauty of simplicity is that it’s so intrinsically complex, yet so easy to understand. Want an example? You! That’s right; human beings are the most complex organisms, yet we have the simplest desires: a parent’s need to protect their child, a person’s will to survive, our collective need to evolve. These things are practically hard-wired into our system. And that’s the beauty of simplicity