November 2010
21 posts
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“That word is really important: design. At its heart, design means to make a...”
– Start searching if you want to find your writing voice | Write for Your Life
A little nudge towards an article I just wrote about finding your writing voice, complete with design-related analogy, as demonstrated here.
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The Long & Short of Writing for the Web | 52 weeks... →
I’m a big fan of 52 weeks of UX, but I’m not entirely sure about this latest article.
Here’s how it starts:
One recommendation, however, rang false to me: keep your text short. The author recommends this because “People don’t read on the Web”. Instead, the author claimed, they “scan” text instead.
There are several problems with this assumption, however. First, people do...
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Terrible, awful business buzz phrases →
I like plain English. I hate jargon.
This post is full of fantastic business speak and nonsense phrases suggested by fellow writers.
The following is a quick sample:
I like touchpoints. I like to think of them as erogenous zones. And executing instead of doing is always fun. Unless the client has actually killed someone. Then it’s quite serious.
(via @mbatey)
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“As writers, our job is to write the book, polish the book, research the right...”
– Will Literary Agents Really Read Your Query Letter?
I agree. Totally. It’s all about taking responsibility and remembering that the whole world doesn’t revolve around you and your writing.
If we complete a job application, but miss out half of what the employer is asking for in their...
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Extract: A is for Angelica / Iain Broome
Tomorrow...
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What Children’s Publishers Are Doing in the Apps... →
PW contacted a number of children’s divisions and houses and found that many publishers are experimenting with different formats—some are creating heavily educational material (which occasionally doesn’t even link to a specific title), others are investing in games, and still others are looking for more direct ways of adapting existing fiction into an app.
I’ve said before that...
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“Good fiction doesn’t just happen, it is designed.”
– How To Write A Novel Using The Snowflake Method
Working as a copywriter in a design agency that has an awesome team of developers, I know that you can switch the word fiction in this quote to pretty much any creative or technical pursuit.
Design is everything. All great work, and I mean truly...
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WatchLast week I spoke at Clear Channel’s Ideas Seminar on behalf of The Workshop. We were taking part in a Dragon’s Den style pitching session where I presented our idea to combine big screens, public spaces and Microsoft’s Kinect technology.
You can watch my pitch in the player above. It was very nerve-wracking, partly because hey, it’s not everyday you speak in front of...
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“Spend at least twice as much time editing as you do writing. Slave over every...”
– Patrick Rhone | Intrvws
This is taken from a very insightful interview with Patrick Rhone of Minimal Mac, posted at Ian Hines’ marvellous Intrvws.
I recently wrote an apparently divisive post (read the comments!) over at Write for Your Life, where I talked about my frustration at a tweet...
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“Is the iBookstore platform something Apple takes seriously, or is it happy to...”
– Is Apple Using Gift Cards to Prop Up a Sagging iBookstore? - DailyFinance
I must admit I do get a little confused when it comes to the different models for selling ebooks. It seems pretty obvious to me that part of the reason Apple’s iBookstore is lagging behind other retailers is down to...
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Looking at Different Writing Tools for Macs | The... →
minimalmac:
Mr Brooks provides a nice tidy rundown of a lot of the Writing Apps available for the Mac. Some really great choices here (TextEdit being my favorite, of course). The one he likes and uses is called Ulysses which I had never heard of before but looks interesting (hardly minimal).
Fantastic list of writing resources here, many of which I’ve given a try and enjoyed using....
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“Kindle had been introduced in 2007, the Sony Reader a year before that, and...”
– Is Publishing Doomed? JOHN B. THOMPSON with Williams Cole - The Brooklyn Rail
If you have any interest in the publishing industry, the so-called digital revolution or the changing world of media consumption, this is a must read interview.
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Extract: ‘Ignore the Real World’ from...
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Mind Over Monster →
At The Workshop, we’ve recently worked on a learning-based game called Mind Over Monster for learndirect. It was originally called Mental Monsters, which we preferred, but it was considered a little to risque.
Anyway, I wrote the initial pitch that won the job and it’s great to see it come to fruition. There are two games, actually. One for Maths and one for English. They’re...
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“When digesting a technology press release the first thing you do is strip out...”
– How to write for the web: 23 useful rules | Econsultancy
I’d say that this applies to most copywriting jobs. One of the most common and frustrating misconceptions is that copywriters are all about the sell, sell, sell.
Truth is, the opposite is usually the case. We’re the folks who...
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Why NaNoWriMo Naysayers Should Please Shut Up →
The bar for good writing isn’t any different for November novel writers. The definition of a “novel” (which my previous post quoted) also applies to November novels. Just because a participant wrote 50,000 words does not mean that those words constitute a novel.
NaNoWriMo produces drafts. It’s a fantastic opportunity for people who believed only a few people could...
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“At the moment I am almost two years into writing my second novel. I have been...”
– The Woman Who Talked Too Much: Music Monday: NaNoWriMoSpecial
The excellent Marie Phillips on National Novel Writing Month (she’ll be speaking at LMTYAM tonight, coincidentally).
(via jeanhannah)
All in, including stops and starts for work and family illnesses, that kind of thing, I’m...
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750 Words →
I recently published what turned out to be a pretty popular guest post by Helia Phoenix over at Write for Your Life. It was about Morning Papers, a writing technique or process developed by Julia Cameron in her book, The Artist’s Way.
If you’re not familiar with Morning Papers, although it seems there are lots of you who are, the idea is to sit down and write approximately three...