Is it Web site, website, or web site? What’s the best on-screen placement for a lead story? How can you better know your site’s audience? Why should you?

The rapid growth of the Web has left writers and editors relying on editorial style guides that are intended for print publishing. But these guides do not focus on writing for the Internet. “The Yahoo! Style Guide” does. It is a must-have book that will help everyone who writes, edits, or creates content for the Internet accomplish their work with clarity and precision.

The seeds of “The Yahoo! Style Guide” were planted fifteen years ago, when writers and programmers at Yahoo!, faced with a lack of industry guidance, began assembling a set of guidelines for Web writing. Their first in-house reference grew in size and company importance as content creators added to it through the years.

Polished and expanded for its public debut, “The Yahoo! Style Guide” covers the basics of grammar and punctuation plus a multitude of topics with a Web-specific focus, such as how to write and edit for an online audience, streamlining copy, basic Web codes, Internet law, and search engine optimization. Before-and-after examples of how to clean up problem copy abound.

The companion website not only features content excerpted from the book but also offers more help and resources from Yahoo! editors.

“The Yahoo! Style Guide” is available in print and digital versions, such as iPad and Kindle. It will be available wherever books are sold beginning July 6, 2010.Read reviews, comments, and endorsements from academic and industry experts. And send us feedback about the Guide.

-Chris Barr, senior editorial director