Google's reading age tool - comparing journalism blogs

Since Google just brought out its new reading age analysis tool, I've used it to compare a pretty arbitrary selection of news and journalism blogs I happen to follow for a view as to the different reading ages of sources going into the site. I've included aggregator Mediagazer as a baseline (although like Techmeme it seems to have a higher reading age than its constituents, oddly). 

Patrick Smith's site doesn't show up properly on Google's reading age tool so the dignified prose of Alan Mutter's Newsosaur seems to come out with the highest reading age, followed by Jay Rosen and then Paidcontent UK (amusingly coming out very slightly ahead of the main US site). My own modest efforts bobble around the middle of the pile. 

Not that writing for a high reading age is necessarily anything to shout about of course - there is a great deal to be said for plain English. But since the tool is now lying around I've been using it to compare newspapers, social networks and other sources so I wanted to see how the news and journalism commentators came out. 

You can see the results for UK newspapers here, social networks here and a Techmeme-derived sample of tech blogs here. 

Notes on methodology: the URL in the left-hand column typed into Google Advance Search with the "annotate results with reading levels" option turned on. Different results seem to be generated by icluding the www, in some cases. Results are ordered by % of pages classed "intermediate". HT to Searchengineland for the original pointer that the tool exists.

 

Journalism site	Basic	Intermediate	Advanced
Patrick Smith	0	100	0
Mediagazer	2	97	0
Newsosaur	3	95	1
Pressthink	5	94	0
Paidcontent UK	5	93	1
Greenslade	6	92	1
Journalism.co.uk	7	91	1
Charlie Beckett	6	91	1
Paidcontent	6	90	2
Onlinejournalismblog	11	87	1
Sarah Hartley	13	86	0
Jon Slattery	14	85	0
Publishing2.0	15	84	0
Martin Belam	15	84	0
Poynter	16	82	1
virtualeconomics.co.uk	25	75	0
The Media Blog	26	72	1
Lostremote	32	67	1
Buzzmachine	33	66	1
Hannah Waldram	33	66	0
Mindy McAdams	14	65	20
10,000 Words	38	61	0
Malcolm Coles	46	53	0
Out With a Bang	47	52	0
Newsnow	46	52	1
Invisible Inkling	48	50	1
Adam Tinworth	50	49	0
Alison Gow	52	47	0
Adam Westbrook	53	46	0