The Art of Plain Text

Resist the temptation to use images. If you are unable to distill the concepts or thoughts into language, then you have likely not fully understood the problem. Use illustrations as supplementary, not instead of information.

That's it. You should find that you soon will spend a lot more time on defining your thoughts and putting the important information forward rather than fiddling with font faces, sizes and colors.

I like this idea of trying to make images supportive not essential, like a progressive enhancement of narrative: if the images aren’t there, you can still understand what’s being explained in the words.

I’m not saying get rid of images, but there’s an art to this kind of communication. As an example, I like what Gruber does on Daring Fireball where images are often supplementary and therefore hyperlinked via the text that describes them (rather than displayed directly inline).

I’m not sure I’m ready to go all in on that, but there’s something appealing about it to me personally.