David Strahan | Articles

A small British startup has withdrawn from the market for measuring heat loss from new homes after legal threats from a subsidiary of one of the world’s biggest insulation manufacturers. In Nov...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/legal-threat-forces-startup-out-of-heat-loss-measurement-market/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=legal-threat-forces-startup-out-of-heat-loss-measurement-market

This article was first published in the Telegraph, 14 January 2024. Heat pumps have copped some bad press recently and it’s time to redress the balance. I installed one in early 2022 and I love...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/im-a-happy-heat-pumper/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=im-a-happy-heat-pumper

What is it with ‘multiple’ these days?  I can scarcely open my eyes without being assaulted by this ugly and unnecessary coinage: “…parts of these wings move between the UK and the EU m...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/the-mystery-of-the-multiplying-multiple/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-mystery-of-the-multiplying-multiple

Centrica, which owns British Gas, reports “high levels of competitive intensity” in a trading statement published today. Say what? Why not “intense competition”, which is immediately unde...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/smoke-signals/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=smoke-signals

Why does the #BBC keep describing Stormy Daniels coyly as an “adult film star”? Strictly speaking, that description also covers any famous film actress who also happens to be a grown-up. So D...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/adult-film-star-grow-up/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=adult-film-star-grow-up

As the fictitious government spin doctor in The Thick of It, Malcolm Tucker was gloriously foul-mouthed. But I have quite often been pleasantly surprised by the quality of the language on the rea...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/mind-your-language-like-malcolms-mates/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=mind-your-language-like-malcolms-mates

I always thought the term grocer’s apostrophe a little unfair. Many are innocent, after all. In Eats Shoots & Leaves Lynne Truss records that one apparent infraction – a stall with a sign bea...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/carrotts-is-innocent/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=carrotts-is-innocent

What is it with business writing and “utilise”? It means exactly the same as “use” but adds two syllables to inflate its importance.  And it’s ugly. Really, I can’t think of a single...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/114/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=114

I saw this recently in a report published by UKERC on local authorities’ involvement in clean energy projects. It’s classic academic sentence, by which I mean back-to-front. “Existing work ...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/how-not-to-start-a-list/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-not-to-start-a-list

Turning verbs into nouns into verbs and vice versa has been going on since cavemen learned to grunt. Nothing wrong with that in principle. But what I call ‘verb nounification’  – replacing...

http://www.writefirstdraft.co.uk/verb-nounification-strikes-again/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=verb-nounification-strikes-again