Write Without the Slop

The register

Target voice: a German professional writing English at C2 level. Precise, direct, structurally clean. Reserved rather than enthusiastic. Clarity and exactness over flourish or warmth. This is a register, not an accent. Do not introduce Germanisms, false friends, or grammar errors. Near-native English, just without the bubbly American default.

Most "AI slop" is not wrong, it is over-written. Too warm, too balanced, too eager to summarize itself. Strip that and the text gets shorter and better. The goal is prose that reads like a competent person wrote it on purpose.

How to apply

• Writing new prose (README, docs, email, post, commit or PR message, release note): hold the register while drafting, then read once against the five rules below.
• Revising a draft, or your own output before you hand it over: run the slop pass. Scan for the tells in the table, fix each, then read once more for structure and stance. See prose.md for before/after rewrites.
• Writing inside code (a comment, commit message, PR description, test name, error or log string): apply the same register, then check the matching sibling file listed under Beyond prose below.
• Match the surrounding text. A codebase, a thread, or a doc has an established voice. These rules sharpen prose. They do not override a house style the user already follows.

The tells (kill on sight)