I’m not sure what you’re on about…

Nice rant in the newspaper recently about the art world’s inability to discuss its works in a way that normal people can understand. But as one poster so accurately put it:

It’s not just the art field; it’s most fields. People should be able to express complex ideas plainly, but they confuse complexity of language with complexity of thought. Or maybe they just aren’t saying anything real or don’t know what they’re trying to say. As Mr. Canter says, abstract nouns are one hallmark of empty writing.

Lots of companies are guilty of doing this with their web copy, for example. They think that by using longer words where simpler ones would do, they make their offering sound superior.

It doesn’t though. It alienates a lot of people and confuses them…

I can certainly remember reading descriptions about art shows and not really understanding what was being said. It went over my head, I assumed the show wasn’t for me and so I didn’t go. Imagine if that’s what your web copy’s doing to people who visit your site.

Writer? Then you’ll know Muphry’s Law

Nope, it’s not a typo. But if you’re somebody who writes for a living you’ll more than likely be well acquainted with Muphry’s Law. Earlier this week was the first time I’d heard about it, but I found myself chuckling inwardly and nodding my head sagely.

Muphry’s Law as defined by Wikipedia is:

…an adage that states that ‘if you write anything criticising editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written’. The name is a deliberate misspelling of ‘Murphy’s law’

The law states that:

(a) if you write anything criticising editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written;
(b) if an author thanks you in a book for your editing or proofreading, there will be mistakes in the book;
(c) the stronger the sentiment expressed in (a) and (b), the greater the fault;
(d) any book devoted to editing or style will be internally inconsistent.

I know I’ve been there: that sinking feeling as you read the introduction email you sent out last week, only to notice a typo in the text. Or the copy on your website, with an obvious (well, to everybody else but you) mistake in the title. Seeing, wood, trees, anyone?

We’re only human, of course, but for some reason that’s an excuse copywriters and editors can rarely use without meeting a snort of derision… Would love to read about any of your wordy foul (maybe ‘fowl’?) ups!

Learning languages online

As if I needed another distraction, this week I discovered Busuu.com. It calls itself a ‘language learning community’ and is basically another social network with a twist: you create a profile for yourself and add details of the languages you’re learning.

Busuu.com offers courses in English, Spanish, French, German and Italian at the moment. As well as providing units in vocabulary and grammar, it also prompts you to submit a short writing exercise that other members can then check and correct.

Improved site tools and features

This is a great little tool for language learners and much better than anything else I’ve found online so far. I’m not sure how old the website is, but I’m guessing it will of course be further developed.

A few things that I’d like to see are:

• an improved search tool that lets users search using a keyword — I’d like to make ‘friends’ with people in my locality, not just my country
• downloads (PDFs and podcasts) with more detail and exercises than just those found in that unit — these are ‘premium’ content that do not offer anything additional at the moment
• the different languages to have different scripts — at the moment, the script is exactly the same in each unit for different languages, so if you complete ‘weather’ in German and then do it in Spanish too, the information isn’t new
• recognition on your profile that you’re a premium member — I keep needing to remind myself that I’ve upgraded because I’m still being urged to do so!

Grow your ‘language tree’!

However, it’s an excellent start and I’m currently hooked! It’s great to chat to native speakers and the features that Busuu.com has introduced to keep you working are simple but inspired: your ‘language garden’ grows for every unit you progress and you collect ‘Busuu berries’ for every activity you perform.

There’s also a fabulous mix of fellow learners of all ages, and you can chat to people from Mongolia to Chile.

(Wondering what Busuu means? ‘Busuu is a language spoken in Cameroon — based on an ethnological study conducted in the 80s, apparently only eight people are able to speak this language’.)

Online PR guidelines for ‘print’ people

If you’re interested in content and you’re not a member already, I’d recommend joining the Content Strategy Google group. Many well-known (in content terms, at least!) names pop up regularly on there, contributing to a range of interesting discussions.

One such person is Ginny Redish, who recently responded to a query on online media centres or press offices with some best practice guidelines for press officers ‘who come from print’. I thought this was worth sharing.

Seven guidelines for online press releases

1. Make the headline a statement that gives the key message. Think ‘bite, snack, meal’ — a concept from Marilynne Rudick and Leslie O’Flahavan. The headline is the bite.

2. Make the first few sentences the snack — just a bit of elaboration of the key message.

3. Break up the piece with informative headings. Think of headings as key message bites to the next bit of information.

4. Keep paragraphs very short. What looks fine in print is often too long for online. A one sentence paragraph is fine.

5. Add links — to whatever else on the site are good follow-up places. You want to keep people on the site.

6. Name a contact person — and include that person’s title. Many people will get to the press release who do not know the way press releases work. They may think the person who is named is the researcher and not realise it is a press office person.

7. Date the press release — and remember that whatever you put online lives forever on the site (unless your content strategy includes a plan for taking these down).

Ginny’s the author of Letting go of the words — Writing web content that works (now added to my Amazon wish list!), which contains a section with more guidance on this topic. Do you have any other tips for online media centres?

Just say what you mean

Why faff around with pompous-sounding words that don’t help the reader and probably aren’t even used correctly? The use of ‘seeking’ has popped (maybe ‘pooped’ would be more appropriate!) up again today and it seems to be a bit of a trend in business writing.

On this occasion, it’s the Guardian’s new Sustainable Business section (a fantastic idea). It describes itself like this:

Guardian Sustainable Business is a new source of news, data and intelligence for professionals seeking to make their organisation sustainable. Powering the service is the Guardian’s leading team of editors and business analysts seeking to give you the best platform to make your business sustainable.

(Have just noticed they’ve even used it twice within this short description. Gah.)

Technically, it can be used in this way; my dictionary defines ‘to seek’ as ’5. to make an effort (to do something); to try or aim (to do it)’. So why not just say ‘trying’ or ‘aiming’? Keep it simple; don’t fall into the trap of trying to be too sophisticated.

And the use of ‘seeking’ in the second sentence doesn’t seem positive enough to me. They’re only ‘trying’ to provide the best platform. How about a bit of confidence, guys? You will give the best platform.

May I humbly suggest:

Guardian Sustainable Business is a new source of news, data and intelligence for professionals working to make their organisation sustainable. The Guardian’s leading team of editors and business analysts power the service, giving you the best platform possible to make your business sustainable.

What do you think? Should we all be seeking to use ‘seeking’ in our writing? Or do you think it’s a bit too weak sounding?

Picture it: Flukle

An email popped into my inbox this morning about another social media tool, Flukle. I don’t remember signing up to receive information but that doesn’t mean a thing – there seems to be something new every week. But I digress…

With Flukle, you can ‘share where you are, and what you’re doing, in real-time, through photos’. I’m not sure if I’m missing something but this sounds a lot like Twitter with pictures to me. Hang on; that is Twitter, isn’t it?

However, I guess you don’t need to trawl through the reams of text to get to the images. This could potentially be a great tool for furthering photo journalism. Caption the photos so that people can search by a keyword and instant images of anything that’s happening in the world.

As long as, of course, someone’s added it.

I’m not going to register for this for now (after all, there are only so many photos of my home office that are worth looking at), but it’ll be interesting to see how Flukle takes off. Have you signed up? How do you use it? Let me know!

(By the way, what is it with these social media names? ‘Flukle’? Sounds like a contender to replace a certain two-word obscenity: “There’s flukle to watch on TV tonight”…)

Why hello, 2010

Happy New Year everyone! Another year done and dusted, another Christmas been and gone. I can hardly believe I’ll have been freelancing for two years in April.

So, what do you hope this year holds for you?

I’m planning to focus my efforts more on issues that matter to me – they all pretty much fall under the topic of ‘environment’. I’m on the hunt for new clients in that broad sector, building on my current experience in engineering and construction. Anything, from sustainable housing to renewable energy. If that’s you, get in touch.

And to bolster my knowledge in that area, I’m excited to be starting an MSc Architecture in Advanced Environmental and Energy Studies in March (to complement my BEng in Mechanical Engineering). It’s a distance course from the Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) (Europe’s leader) and the University of East London (UEL).

The on-site course would be even better, but that would be a bit tricky seeing as I live in Mallorca. On the plus side, Spain is an exciting area for renewable energies, so I’ll get the best of both worlds. I’m also taking the part-time option, which means I can continue to work at the same time.

What else?

I’m going to keep improving my Spanish and work on my German. I’m also going to get more involved with my local Friends of the Earth group (for which I currently volunteer) and finally buy the camera I’ve been thinking of throughout 2009.

Oh, and so many other things but the above are all I’m going to commit to on (virtual) paper for now. What about you?

Social media: not so shiny anymore

Because I’m a web copywriter, it’s almost an obligation to be involved with social media. It’s one of those things that we should understand and ‘get’. I have profiles on the standard hat trick of networks: Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. And I’m starting to get a bit, well, bored. Of (gasp) Twitter in particular.

It’s a bit like a relationship that seems great at first, then gets a bit dull, until finally you realise you’re putting a lot in, but not getting much back. You really thought you would, of course, and you’ve ‘met’ (hey, let’s not forget this is virtual) some really nice people…

But I only use it for business; unless the person’s an extraordinary writer, I really don’t want to know what people are doing right now. I’ve made some interesting contacts, but now I read their blogs, not their Tweets.

I’ve tried to provide useful links for my ‘followers’, which has worked as their number has grown organically and they say nice things to me (yes, that’s certainly one of the good points). But while this helps me to keep up to date with my industry, I spend more time than I’d like searching out these links.

On the plus side (as well as the nice things they say), as a work-from-home freelancer it’s kind of comforting to have this online network available for those little chats you might have over a cuppa in the office.

So, should I stay or should I go? I’m been mulling over this for a little while but am worried that if I call it a day, I’m going to miss out on something. Y’know, something HUGE. But then, nothing very exciting’s happened while I’ve been using Twitter, so why should that change? Oh, what to do.

Is bad English better than no English at all?

I’m really not sure. I wouldn’t be surprised if the end result is the same: nobody finds your website.

I’m talking about the English content offered by many websites that have a different primary language. The internet’s great because it opens up your business to many more people, who speak many different languages. But it really doesn’t matter if all the other languages on your site are written beautifully if the one they’re reading is just not very, well, good.

Of course, this is great news for me because this is something I can help with – ironing out those grammatical lumps and bumps. But perhaps you need a bit of convincing as to why it’s so important, so here are three reasons (and for argument’s sake, I’m going to refer to English) for starters…

Help people to find you

If you want English speakers to find you, you need to provide words they’ll use in the search engines. It’s no good having an English version if everything’s spelt wrongly or grammatically incorrect. If you’re offering something that ‘is respectful with the medioambiente’* and your English speaker searches for ‘respects the environment’, your website isn’t going to come up in the search results.

Make them think you’re really very good…

Well-written copy makes a company look professional, credible and genuine, and builds trust with a site’s readers. Text littered with errors and spelling mistakes makes it look as if you can’t really be bothered to get it done properly. And if you have that attitude towards your own business, then perhaps you’ll act the same towards their project. That’s what they’ll be thinking.

…and make sure they keep reading about you!

Complicated English copy with lots of long words does NOT equal good copy. Saying ‘we are in compromise with the sustainable development from the deepest convinction’* will not make your visitor think, ‘Hey! This guy knows what he’s talking about’. It’s hard work to read that sentence; it needs reading and rereading to work out what’s actually being said (which, I think, is  ‘sustainable development is really important to us’).

There are probably lots more reasons (add them in the comments!) but I think these are more than good enough to start with. Y si necesitas ayuda con tu página en inglés, contáctame!

*Both from a real website. Really.

Choosing a ‘green’ laptop

We all need to play our part in moving towards a ‘greener’, more sustainable lifestyle. This covers every part of our daily lives, including work. I’m in the market for a new laptop, so I’ve decided to try to go green and I’ve been researching my options.

I’m not a computer expert but I am technically minded, so I’ve been hunting down information that strikes a balance between the two. I thought I’d share these with you, in case they can help you too.

What I’m looking for

Firstly, my considerations:

• I have a limited budget (as far as laptops go) but realise I might have to pay a bit more to meet the environmental standards I’d like (which, by the way, I’ve only identified by reading the following articles – my initial standard was, well, ‘better’).
• The majority of my clients are corporate and are therefore using Windows. My new laptop needs to be compatible with the technology my clients use.
• I don’t just want the ‘green’ offering from a company that’s targeting that area of the customer market. It’s no good if it otherwise falls down on its other products, or fails to be a ‘good corporate citizen’.
• (Yes, it falls in with ‘corporate social responsibility’, which I know lots of people are sceptical about. But customer demand drives business strategy, and if this is towards a more community-focused one, then that’s a good thing in my mind.)

Sources of information

I don’t think these are too much to ask of a modern organisation. So, on to the sources I’ve been using to help me make my choice:

• The Greenpeace Green Electronics Survey, December 2008 (PDF) (this was my starting point, which suggests Apple and Toshiba should be considered)
• ‘Does Apple really have the greenest notebooks?‘, InfoWorld
• ‘Are green IT premiums worth the cost?‘, InfoWorld
• The Green Electronics Council’s EPEAT website, which provides searchable criteria to help businesses choose electronic products ‘based on their environmental attributes’.

Trusting what I read

I’m not going to pretend that this is a particularly scientific piece of research, but I’m simply doing my best to make a decision based on the information available to me. I think this is how many members of the public would try to make their choice, and they’re the ones who will be buying much of the technology.

Do you know of any good articles or have any words of wisdom to share that will help me to make the right choice (for now)? If so, please share them below. Otherwise, stay posted – I’ll let you know which I decide on and my reasons why.