My one hold back is, is it gaming the system, too much? And of course that is relative, since
SEO/SEM can be viewed as gaming, but it is done to "help" the SEs find the most relavent content (mine or my client's, of course) and there has to be a way to "grade" equal content.
Having the text at the top is one factor. The SE can easily and quickly figure out what the page is about, which is important when it is trying to index billions of pages.
The user doesn't care about the SE except they want it to help them find the most relavent content. When the user views the content, they don't necessarily want to wade through a bunch fo text, unless they were looking for a dissertation in the first place.
Quite a vicious circle.
cd :O)