itcs-writing-style
Use when drafting or revising an ITCS paper's abstract, introduction, and technical presentation so the conceptual innovation lands before any theorem, the model is motivated as a lens rather than a tweak, scope and limitations are owned up front, and complete proofs are deferred cleanly — matching the ITCS emphasis on new ideas over technical depth.
Profile →npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill itcs-writing-style --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# ITCS Writing Style At ITCS the reader must feel the **innovation before the theorem**. Reviewers are briefed to reward a new model, question, or connection over a deeper result on an old one, so a paper that opens like a STOC depth paper — leading with a bound and a technique — reads as if it mistook the venue. The whole job of the first pages is to make a skeptical expert think *"I hadn't thought to ask that, and I want to"* before they reach a single lemma. Because ITCS has **no rebuttal** (see [`itcs-review-process`](../itcs-review-process/SKILL.md)), the writing must also *pre-empt* objections there is no later chance to answer. ## The ITCS first-page arc Structure the abstract and introduction as: 1. **The new question or model** — the first breath. Name the object or ask the question the standard setting cannot phrase. Not "we study X with parameter Y," but "here is a thing worth thinking about that we did not have a way to talk about." 2. **Why the field lacked it** — isolate the silent assumption or missing seam that hid the question. This is the honest delta (see [`itcs-related-work`](../itcs-related-work/SKILL.md)). 3. **The conceptual payoff** — what the new lens *lets
- The ITCS first-page arc
- Lead with the idea, not the machinery
- The first-10-pages merits window
- Pre-empting objections (because there is no rebuttal)
- Technical presentation
- Common failure modes at ITCS
- Output format
What does the itcs-writing-style skill do?
Use when drafting or revising an ITCS paper's abstract, introduction, and technical presentation so the conceptual innovation lands before any theorem, the model is motivated as a lens rather than a tweak, scope and limitations are owned up front, and complete proofs are deferred cleanly — matching the ITCS emphasis on new ideas over technical depth.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill itcs-writing-style --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills, a repository with 909 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.