For years, spending time on social media was an investment that paid dividends. One of my UN jobs was connected directly with responding to a tweet about them looking for an archivisit. Within a day I had an interview and within a few days I was working. That was back in 2014 or so, when social media was more convivial....
Posts tagged “writing”
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On Investing Time Writing a Daily Blog Post daily — Apr 17, 2026 -
On the Blank Page and Time Spent Thinking — Apr 1, 2026The more I read about AI generating blog posts and other content, the more I feel that we should write for ourselves, rather than our readers. I noticed, recently, that no one is reading my posts. There could be three reasons for that. The first is that what I’m writing interests no one. The second is that when I disconnected Jetpack I broke integration. The third possibility is that posts are being read, but because they are federated I get no feedback on audience....
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Twitter Threads and Blogging — Sep 16, 2019Twitter threads and blogging are both free but whereas with one you need to click to read the continuation and it’s hard to print the other is self contained and easily shareable.... -
Time For The Dissertation Re-write — Apr 19, 2007Now that I’ve achieved my goal of getting most of my dissertation written I’m going to take a day’s break and work on another of my assignments to clear my head and also to make sure I complete all assignments by the required date. It’s been a long effort but last night I spent several hours working on my dissertation, getting it up to 8800 words. The word limit is from 10-12000 words and having almost 8.8K means I’m 1200 words away. With re-writing and clarification of certain points I should easily get up to the word limit that was set out initially. I’m happy about the state of affairs. Over two weeks for editing and cleaning up of the text. There’s another assignment that I will work on the 22nd of this month and another which I will start working on later today. With the way things are going, I should quite easily be able to meet all the deadlines and have time to be human by the same opportunity. It’s a great feeling. Finally, the glacier that was pressing down on me is starting to melt and I’ll begin to rise up as the pressure is released, much as England is doing since the last glacial age hundreds of thousands of years ago....
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One Hundred And One Blog Posts in One Hundred and One Days — Feb 24, 2023I have written at least one hundred and one blog posts in one hundred and one days. During this time most blogs have gone by unread. Blogging could be seen as futile but it isn’t. Having the discipline to write every single day, despite having no inspiration is good. It forces us to stop, think, and develop inexistent ideas.... -
Of Twitter Threads (mice) and Blog Posts (Humans). — Feb 20, 2020With the sentence “Of Twitter threads (Mice) and Blog Posts (Humans)” you’ll see that I’ve done two things. The first is that I’ve modernised a well-known book title to draw parallels with the practices of writing Twitter threads and blog posts....
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Ninety Five Days of Blogging In A Row — Sep 20, 2021I have managed to neutralise the inner censors. I have accomplished ninety five days of blogging in a row, once again. During the first 100+ days of the pandemic I did the same. At the time I thought that this would provide a document of how life was for the pandemic. The pandemic has lasted over 540 days and I eventually lost inspiration, and inspiration for new things to write.... -
Learning By Writing despite GPT — Jan 30, 2023I am old enough to remember a teacher writing on a board or piece of plastic for an overhead projector. "Why don’t you just give us photocopies of what you’re writing instead of asking us to copy down what you’re writing. “Because you will remember it better if you write it down.”... -
Finding time for Long-Form Writing and Other Pursuits. — Jan 6, 2018Finding time for Long Form Writing... -
Finding time for Long-Form Writing and Other Pursuits. — Jan 6, 2018Chloe Gilbert - 7 Jan, 2018...
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chatGPT, GPT3 and Reading Time — Jan 20, 2023Time for a new discussion to take place. Reading time. Do you read through articles or do you skim them. Is reading the headline enough or do you read every word of the article? I ask because in the age of chatGPT and GPT3 I would ask the same question as I asked about social media.... -
Blogging And Digital Minimalism — Mar 6, 2020Blogging and Digital Minimalism are related. Blogging is about finding a topic and focusing on it for an extended period of time. Social media has shifted from being a conversation between individuals to one where personalities broadcast, and their audience is ignored....
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A Writer Can Expect To Revise His Work Over A Hundred Times — May 7, 2007Those words were magic, a writer can expect to review his work over a hundred times. That so many times. Can you imagine going through something one hundred times? By the end, you’re going to go mad. Actually, when I’m working on video it’s not unusual for me to watch the same five minutes 20-30 times till I’m satisfied it’s perfect. I’ve been applying that procedure to my dissertation which is why I still haven’t completed it. I was feeling discouraged this morning but this afternoon when I heard the sentence I’m now using as a title for this I felt encouraged. Of course, it’s hard, of course, it’s repetitive but if you want to write well you’ve got to give it the time it requires. What’s the point in having a dissertation to write if you’re going to do it within two days. What about all the thought process. What about all the conversations you’re missing out on. I joked with someone who was still taking notes today, “45 credits… ah that’s worth at least 45 minutes of work”. She probably hates me for saying that but come on, it’s your dissertation. It’s the first time that people want you to blab for so long about a topic of your choosing. No one else tells you what to write, only how you should write it. Some friends are smart, they chose the subjects they love. So did I, means you’re studying even when you’re not. Add to this the process of writing. It’s enjoyable. Put some music on, zone out for an hour or two and just write, research, and learn more about what you love, then write more. Write to learn rather than the other way around. I love the thought of writing to learn. It’s a book I read several years ago, when still at La Chat in Geneva. I think I’d like to be a writer. I don’t mind academic writing as long as I have as much time as I want, or else organise my time so that I fool myself into believing I have as much time as I want. There’s one paragraph that’s taunting me at the moment, I’m going to trick it though, and it will be tamed into a relevant bit of text....
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2018 Nanowrimo attempt — Nov 1, 2018As an introvert, I have a tendency to listen and daydream rather than talk. It is for this reason that the Nanowrimo challenge is an interesting one. It encourages me to be verbose, to use more words than I would usually use. It also forces me to find 1667 words of inspiration on a daily basis. This is a challenge. When you’re inspired it can take about an hour and a half to two hours depending on typing speed or it can be split into chunks.... -
A Break from Blogging — Jan 12, 2026I was in Spain for three weeks. I had planned to blog while I was there. I didn’t because my mac book pro was misbehaving when I tried to connect to three or for Wifi networks. Last night I tested it with another wifi network and I had similar issues. I think that there is an issue with the wifi device n the machine.... -
The Absurdity of AI in Creative Writing — Mar 13, 2025The Absurdity of AI in Creative Writing... -
NaNoWriMo and Typed Wordiness — Nov 1, 2024November has Arrived. With November so does NaNoWriMo. NaNoWriMo is the US National Novel Writing Month. This is the month where people spend every day writing 1,667 words per day, so that by the end of the month they have a draft of a novel. I have tried the challenge several times and completed it just once....
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Blogging for Three Hundred and Sixty Six Days in a Row — Nov 16, 2023For three hundred and sixty six days I have written a blog post daily. In some cases I wrote two posts, and scheduled the post to appear the next day. This is when I was driving for thirteen hours, or if I knew that my morning was busy. In the process I have definitely given myself a writing habit. The question I ask myself now is whether to continue, or whether to change the posting frequency.... -
The Daily Struggle to Find Something to Write About — Nov 13, 2023For three hundred and sixty two days I have struggled to find a topic to write about. In that time I have, more than once, felt, during my walk, that I had a great idea for the next day, only to deflate the next morning....
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NaNoWriMo and Blogging — Nov 10, 2023November is the month when a group of people try to write 1667 words per day for a month. they have write-in events, word sprints and many other gimmicks to encourage them to break the challenge into less daunting challenges. I didn’t even consider participating this year for a simple reason. This is my 360th day in a row of writing a daily blog post....
