Month: April 2006

I have always been drawn toward poetry. It interested me at school, and captivated me during my university studies. You have probably even read some of my own buried here on the blog.
But the thing that continues to draw me into poetry is the ambiguity that it offers. You can use words powerfully and playfully to create many meanings, some which you may intend, and others that appear between the words (and only in the minds of some readers).
So it was an unexpected joy today to find this small piece of poetic writing that eloquently captures the challenges that marketers face every day. If only we all had such noble causes and clear results!
With thanks to Seth Godin for pointing it out.
S.

There is always something new to learn on the web. The challenge of course is to have enough time to read/learn all there is to offer (never going to happen), and after failing/accepting this, learn to quickly select useful content. Most people have the same problem … but it is comforting to hear that others with more experience find the same thing.

There is a great article on Rebecca Blood over at the C for Chaos. Rebecca is famous for having a great blog and writing the Weblog Handbook. I was interested to read about her take on storytelling, and that she views this as a form of sharing. I also liked the way that she keeps notes during the day and sits down later to write her posts.

There are as many different approaches to blogs as there are bloggers. What are your tips? How do you work it all out? Or haven’t you tried yet?

S.

I was reading this great post from Nat over at Decisive Flow and it reminded me of working as a technical writer and dealing with a particularly verbose computer analyst (let’s call him "George").

Now George was an intense young man and was having some difficulty in working with a writer. It was nothing personal … it was simply that we were working through some procedural documentation and it was very important that the document was correct. It was, after all, a "mission critical app, man" (who says that anyway?).

We had almost completed the document when George came to my office and explained that there was a new function that we had to urgently incorporate into the document. So I pulled up the document, ascertained the best place for the material and turned to George who began dictating some text. As I typed it became obvious that the text was becoming, with every word, a veritable hodge podge of jargon, keywords and acronyms that made no sense had no punctuation and was becomingvirtuallymeaningless. (Sorry couldn’t resist.)

So I stopped.

George kept going. Then stopped.

I looked him in the eye and asked him to describe the task. He looked at the screen and began reading what I had written. "NO", I said, "what is the task?". After a deep breath, George was able to explain the task that needed to be performed. I was then able to write it in a procedural format.

It made me realise that many people don’t write for clarity, they write in a way that is "designed to be clear". Unfortunately, this often means that extra words and jargon creep into your writing. It is only by listening first that you can write clearly … so when you are writing, try to listen to the sounds that are made in your own head. Don’t write for clarity … write for understanding.

S.

To tell a story you have to be able to spell. If you have errors in your text then it becomes easy for readers to not engage with your content. It can appear sloppy or careless. Even I am guilty of this … a former editor and writer — someone who cares about writing and language — can also fall into the trap of laziness.

And while I know that Typepad comes with a built-in spell checker, I very rarely use it … and the result can sometimes mean that I find errors in my own writing. These errors rarely change the meaning of what I am saying, but it does effect the way that I read my own text.

I was reminded of this after reading SplaTT’s weblog and trying out this cool Flickr spelling tool. Another one for the Web 2.0 junkies … but it appeals to my interest in technology and words. So, what does your name spell in pictures?

S.