Persistent, superficially polite demands for evidence used to exhaust rather than to learn.
Named from a 2014 Wondermark comic. The distinguishing feature is asymmetry of effort: each demand is cheap to make and expensive to answer, which is Brandolini's law used as a tactic.
In practice
- A reviewer puts nine courteous questions to a two-page proposal, each needing an afternoon to answer, and no answer moves the reviewer.
- A consultation respondent submitting 400 near-identical questions in courteous language has occupied a team for a month without advancing anything.
- Standing
- A rare case of a rhetorical term coined by a webcomic panel.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Communication & Media
- Essay
- What happens to a message after it is sent