Continued Lessonsdisseminating seeds: The Series - INSTL 021The challenge of doing this writing thing is...that I’m going to ask you to turn off that part of your brain that automatically goes,
“Yeah, well, but that doesn't apply to me.” Actually, you don’t have to turn that part of your brain off. Just put it on vibrate. Let your objections go to voicemail.
Writing MattersWhat I know is that writing matters. In spite of the buzz surrounding disruptive technologies, such as
+David Amerland discusses in his newest book, “Google+ Hangouts™ For Business”, and the glut of people rushing to make use of interactive communication, writing — of any type,
is more important now than ever before. *ALL OF IT* — I’m talking about email, memos, and blogs. I’m also talking about what you wrote on your friend’s Facebook wall, a tweet, or a share in Google+.
Whether you want to or not,
you and I are being judged on it. And we’re being judged differently because of the era we live in.
AuthorityIn terms of writing, what really changed wasn't the computer, but what it was connected to. The Internet as we understand it now didn't exist when I graduated college. There weren't Wordpress blogs, or interactive websites like today, or Wikipedia. “Google” was still one followed by 100 zeroes. And if you knew that, you were probably one of the nerds I hung around with.
I’m referring to “authority” as sort of the confluence of expertise and reputation. Reputation only comes with time. It’s basically the degree to which people feel they can
#trust you to be giving your honest opinion, and to
be consistent from one day to the next. There have always been experts. But writing now allows for extremely specialized authorities. Realistically,
everyone is a potential authority on some subject.But why would you want to be an authority? Because unlike expertise,
#authority is transferable.
It’s a commodity. And I’d argue that today, it’s one of the
most valuable commodities out there. Authority is about a kind of emotional, qualitative process. You strive in writing to have credibility, but
only others can give it to you. So it had better be damn good or you will forever just be chasing a white whale.
ImmediacyI grew up assuming that news was something that happened once a day, which is
incredibly naive now. I am quite used to the idea that news is happening continuously: it’s a stream which You and I can jump into and out of. Life now resembles the annoying ticker that’s scrolling along the bottom.
But what happens is thirty minutes later, a day later — it is gone. It’s transient. It’s only important while it’s happening: which begs the question,
was it ever really important and worth attention at all?And I should stress, by immediacy, I’m not just talking about what I define as important, or a sense of timeliness. There’s also immediacy in the emotional sense. A sense of intimacy.
A false intimacy, an informality. If you look at writing over the last decade, it’s become much more casual. Not just grammatically, with its sloppy punctuation and really badly thought out emoticons, but tonally. I, like most, write everything as if we’re writing to our very best friends,
whether it’s appropriate or not.PermanenceWriting and publishing used to be something akin to
Schrödinger’s cat, existing in a state of quantum uncertainty. And that’s the quality that I’m trying to describe: Permanence. Or more approriately, impermanence. Transience.
This never used to be the case. Only a few short years back you could shout “Stop the presses!” But there were huge costs to doing that. Now,
those costs are essentially zero. Particularly in a culture that values immediacy, it changes the dynamic between I as a writer and you, the reader. If I’m sharing something online,
I can’t even be certain you’ll read the same thing I read.This is a concern for all of us. Imagine if corporate annual reports could be revised that transparently.
That’s dangerous. Illegal.
And inevitable.ResponsivenessWriting used to flow in one direction. I wrote, you read. Sometimes, if you were incredibly motivated, you might respond: a letter to an editor, or a letter directly to the author. But the initial writing and the response
weren't linked together.Now they are. At the bottom of an entry, you can add comments, and they may travel with the original story forever. Newspapers and Magazines are adding comment sections directly to their articles online.
If you’re an author, ordinary readers will review your books on Amazon or Goodreads.
Isn’t this good? Isn't this freedom of speech—the ability to comment and disagree.
Yes, certainly.But this culture of being able to respond to anything is a bit dangerous too. These responses are writing, and they’re subject to the same new challenges as the original writing:
Authority — How do you know if this responder knows what he’s talking about?
What if he’s anonymous?Immediacy — You’re more rewarded for being the first person to respond to something, rather than the most eloquent or thoughtful.
Permanence — These comments You or I can be typing at 3 a.m. are forever linked to the original article. They become part of the original article. We may have no little or no control over them.
Response to the response — I’ve been in enough forums and threads where the original topic is long gone. It’s now just disembodied voices bantering at each other. If you’re the author of the original piece, how do you get control back? Are you even allowed to? Who owns the discussion?
A Call To ActionAuthority I have had to move beyond simply Questioning Authority in every attempt at writing and set a more ambitious goals:
Become an Authority. I’m not exaggerating to say that, everyone is a potential authority on some topic, no matter how esoteric. You become an expert by researching. You become an authority by writing. Writing consistently; writing fairly; and
writing for an audience that is eager to hear about it. It is a challenge to do this each day or even once a week. But one thing is certain,
today’s society NEEDS writers who can actually write with authority.Dealing with immediacy I had to accept never going to slow down culture. The cyclic motion seen today is only going to continue to accelerate.
I could not stop the madness, but I could step out of it. You and I could and can refuse to participate. I stop trying to “keep up with
#caturday shares,” because I find that they’re irrelevant. I am not saying I or you should be less informed, as that is heresy. I’m saying I had to dig deeper.
I found the only things I should follow closely are those things
I actually find fascinating. In them, I might just be an authority. That’s what offered me the only way out of
the trap of immediacy. I stopped reading populist crap, and start writing more. Endeavoring to provide context, criticism, and reflection. Organize my own thoughts, and
if possible encourage the same in others.Permanence The challenge today is that the things you or I wish would go away seem to linger like a cold sore — forever. What I discovered is what I write about doesn't have be acceptable to my mum, but
it should accurately reflect how I would like the world to see me.Response The Achilles Heal of today is offering both the best, and one of the worst in that everyone’s welcome to comment.
I could choose not to participate, being a passive consumer. I could close comments, so that what I write is simply my article, and not the launch pad for a protracted discussion.
But in order to become an authority,
I knew I had to participate. I have to offer thoughtful opinion when appropriate, and invite others’ responses. I had to remember: an expert is someone who knows something. *An authority is someone with the
#reputation to back it up. I had get that reputation from my peers, and
it will take time.Final Thoughts [?]Crappy writing is ugly, and bad writing is outright dangerous. And what I do not want is a digital historian reading my stuff and wondering,
“WTF!? Didn’t he have spell check?”I realized that whatever path is chosen for me by fate, I will be a writer for the rest of my life. As this age continues its acceleration, I’m convinced that writing is more important each day. It’s not a noun anymore. Writing is a verb. It’s an action.
It’s a crucial way in which I and you process the world around us.My Best Advice (
and something I have to remind myself of each day ) is to do it well. Do it carefully. And do it like my life depends on it, because I’m convinced it does.
~ owen
*Question: Are you haphazardly sharing your thoughts on Google+, or are you taking into consideration Authority, Immediacy, Permanence, and Response to be a better writer?
Personal Note: I wanted to acknowledge the handful of people, who - over the last six months have been major contributory influence to my own development to return to writing in a pubic community;
+David Amerland and
+Mark Traphagen for showing me by example and patiently providing the education I need (daily) to understand subtleties and engage in a social network. Your lessons provide the foundation in most everything I now do.
+Grizwald Grim,
+John Kellden, and
+Alexandra Riecke-Gonzales for being my passionately patient teachers, over and over again. I will never forget that imprint on my psyche.
And finally,
+Lance Fields and
+Gina Fiedel. Your eloquent words are inspiring. You offer a gift of inclusion to your world, and with it - I feel like a member of a close knit family, through moments of inner turmoil as well as enlightening and joyous self-discovery.
Thank You
#disseminatingseeds #essaybyowen
