Under Ten Hundred Words

Randall Munroe writes a geek web-comic called XKCD.com, and one of his comics describes a Saturn V rocket in technical detail, but only uses the one thousand (ten hundred) most frequently used words in the English language.


"US Space Team's Up-Goer Five, the only flying space car that's taken anyone to another world..."

Link:  Saturn V Comic


Then he wrote a book explaining a lot of things that same way.  It's actually one of Bill Gates's recommended books for 2015.

Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words



I tried describing football using his text editor, and it was tough, but here it is:


One team starts the game by kicking a ball, that isn't round, to another team. They have a person catch the ball and run back the other way until they get knocked down. Sometimes there are a lot of angry people lying on top of, and yelling at, the person with the ball. Small people in black and white shirts tell the teams to stop yelling, and to go talk in their groups again. 

The team with the ball then throws or gives the ball to someone else who runs until they get knocked down. Sometimes a person runs with the ball all the way into a box made of lines on the field and everyone on that team jumps around. Sometimes one person holds the ball until another person, who few people know, kicks the ball over a bar and between two other bars and some people smile.

Eventually the team kicks the ball to the other team, who try to run with the ball back to the other box made of lines at the other end. 

Sometimes both teams are told, by the people in black and white shirts, to run the other way. Eventually the men in the black and white shirts tell everyone to stop knocking each other down for good.

A quiet person with a writing stick and paper sees how many times each team gets the ball into the box of lines, and how many times each team kicked the ball over the bar and between the two other bars, and tells one team to jump around a lot. The other team yells at the people in the black and white shirts. 

Everyone likes the team who jumps around a lot, gives them lots of stuff, pretty girls smile at them, and they get to talk out of a box while everyone at home listens.

After the game, loud people in the box talk a lot about the game, and when more people are going to get knocked down again, to people at home who wear shirts that match the shirts that the teams wear.

Other people, who kick a round ball, or hit a round ball with their heads a lot, say that their game is the real foot-ball. Then they fall to the ground for no reason and roll around on the ground holding one of their legs or their head.


Link that you can play with:  Text Editor