Twitter Effect (one of many)

March 9, 2008 by Annie

I’ve recently begun to use the offline blogging tool MarsEdit. Hopefully the ability to compose & store my posts offline will encourage me to blog more often, and maybe improve the quality a bit :) .

Earlier today I sat down to try to flesh out a few of the stubs I’ve started into post-worthy writings, but I’ve run into a bit of a road bump.

I’ve always been a ruthless self-editor. In the past typically I’d write a long and rambly post but then go back and edit the crap out of it until I reach a point where I feel like the interesting has overtaken the snore-worthy.

But today I found myself editing as I wrote. I don’t think I made it through a single sentence without going back through and rearranging, changing, shortening…

Aha. Shortening. Obviously the devil behind this annoying new habit is Twitter. I’ve become skilled in saying what I want to say in 140 characters or less, and it’s bleeding into my other writing.

This is not good. So starting with this post right here- I write then edit!

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  • It's funny how different people are from one another. I've never written anything in my life that I've edited after the fact. I made it through 6 years of college and numerous papers that I edited as I went along. In fact, I have "writers block" unless I just sit and write right at the computer. (I used to have to make a "fake rough draft" complete with errors to hand in with my papers in high school as the rough draft was required...hehe!)

    This is not to say that my writing couldn't stand some improvement and I probably *should* edit but it's just not something that I've ever done. The backspace is my friend ;-)!
  • Writely concisely from the get-go can save a lot of editing later. 140 characters may be a bit extreme as a starting point, though.
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