A Short Reaction to Skellie’s Post: Why Great Writing Doesn’t Matter Online
By Rhett Soveran • Mar 11th, 2008 • Category: Blogging
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Today, I am breaking our regular posting schedule to react to Skellie’s post. Maybe this makes up for not posting on Friday?
Generally, I have found Skellie’s blog fairly useful. Of course, there is always room to disagree. On Sunday Skellie posted Why Great Writing Doesn’t Matter Online and I will take a few minutes to respond to this post. If you read this blog often you will likely know how I feel about this post. However, Melissa already wrote a brilliant post and so I don’t need to repeat what she said. I do want to respond to Skellie’s post though about something else—I might say something more than just why great writing is important (and it is absolutely important), but there is something more frightening in the post than a disregard for language—a disregard for people.
Let me ask you a question—when did you first realize that you had become a search bot? Furthermore, when did you first realize that everyone around you was also a bot? If you have an answer to this—other than I am not a bot, nor is anyone else—than I don’t think you had a problem with Skellie’s post. She wrote:
The words you use are just a vehicle for what’s really important: facts… People don’t read online. Nor do they scan. They extract ideas, resonating with some and disregarding others.
She also put a lot of that in bold. To help you bots take her facts easier. DOES IT HELP TO MAKE MY POINT IF I PUT THINGS IN BOLD AND CAPS? I digress.
Let me suggest to you that we are not bots. Let me also suggest that while I understand we may take information in differently online that we continue to be humans—specifically humans who continue to desire connection with other humans. The reason I don’t write top ten lists is because it says something about who I believe you, the reader, to be and who I am. I believe you are intelligent, want to make real connections in this community, and that you take the time to challenge yourself to be a better blogger and person. Because I believe that is who you are, I believe that is who I am and/or who I want to be. To say otherwise would limit myself and to limit you.
I want to push limits and not set them. Otherwise all you would ask for is a Vitamin C pill and not an orange. Are there people who just want the pill? Absolutely. They want it straight and quick. That’s fine. But that’s not who I am talking to. I am talking to you because you have an imagination, you are a visionary and you are interested in relationships. I am not here to feed the bots chicken feed. If some bots chew on what I say, that’s awesome. But I am here to talk and listen to you.
I don’t treat you like you are a bot because that’s not how I want to be treated. Blogging shouldn’t be about force feeding a pill-shaped product (unless you are a pharmaceutical rep, maybe) but offering a full delicious meal that we can sit around and discuss.
Photo by kalandrakas
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I don’t know why you’re so hard on top ten lists. While there are maybe a few too many of them, I think they’re fun and entertaining. Everyone can use a little fun entertainment now and then, don’t you agree? Plus it’s nice to alternate between long written posts and brief lists. Anyway, I like them as long as they’re occasional and not overdone.
So there.
I am not into rules. Lists aren’t always bad. The last list you did was good. It was a list, but it had some meat to it. I mean you could easily say my twitter post was very list-like. Or I often write lists within a sentence.
To summarize, the list point and even the point of the post, is that if you assume your audience can only handle ten barely interesting points than you can only handle ten points. You are the audience and the audience is you… or something wise like that. Therefore, I like to imagine a deeper, limitless audience so that I reach for that as well.
It was a good post and it deserved a link. No thanks necessary. But I will take it! I am needy like that.
I’m not subscribed to Skellie’s blog, however I was over there in search for some of her older articles as part of the research for my post, and I noticed the title of this very article that was bashing great writing. However, I didn’t read it because of two reasons - I didn’t have time, but the most important one was that I was so appalled by it that I didn’t even have a desire to actually read her arguments, because no matter what she had to say, would not have convinced me that she’s right.
Now, that I read your reaction and Melissa’s, I’m glad that I didn’t waste my time on reading her bias on great writing and what matters on the Web.
I’m not saying that those who are not good at writing shouldn’t blog. I’m no Dorothy Parker myself. But at least we should all try our best at improving our writing and aiming to be good at it, be better than just average, not pat ourselves for doing such an amazing job at running a blog without having any adept writing skills.
Great writing will always rise above the mediocre, but blogging is its own medium. Just as writing copy for a marketing company, or producing daily column inches for a newspaper and writing a novel require different styles, so too does blogging. Of course, each of these mediums has a different definition of what great writing is. So what makes great writing on a blog? I don’t think top ten lists are it. I wouldn’t be so bold as to say I know the answer, but I think blogging in itself presents one of the core rules to writing, and encourages it. a rule that I’m breaking right now. KISS- Keep it short and sweet. If you can say something in one hundred words don’t bother adding another hundred- keep it clean, fast to read and entertaining.
This is a topic worthy of further investigation….