(Poem) Sun Structures

(source: trekearth.com)

 

Deserts form where seas once reached

Where water carved and sunlight bleached

On seas of stone and painted sand

The sentinels of Shadowland.

 

Rocky sinew landscape formed

The tower guards with caps adorned

They ring of time and streams run dry

Telltale tattoos of time gone by.

 

Like pillars to the sun they stand

Since Old Man Napi walked this land

Through canyon folds and sanded curves

Primeval language to the nerves.

 

The threshing storms and solar flairs

And endless pounding windy wear

Do none but deepen old resolve

As countless starry nights dissolve.

 

A sunburned splendour comes to life

As dawnlight trickles through the blight

The somber guardsmen rouse anew

As Napi’s dream is once more true.

 

Deserts form where seas once reached

Where water carved and sunlight bleached

On seas of stone and painted sand

The sentinels of Shadowland.

6 PR Copywriting Lessons From Religious Pamphlets

Source: www.jesusisyhwh.blogspot.com

I have a confession to make: I quite enjoy receiving leaflets from religious organizations. As a child growing up in an essentially secular family, I devoured faith-based pamphlets anytime they were dropped off at our house by the Watchtower Society or on the rare occasion I went to church, not really believing in it but bewitched by the clarity and audacity of the claims made therein. My fascination with sectarian propaganda turned into a master's thesis on religious racketeering in 1930s Japan, and my time as a researcher in Japan included zealous collecting of handouts from every two-bit religious sect I could find.

Today as a PR professional, my fascination with religious pamphlets still abides, and while I no longer physically collect them, I always read them from beginning to end when they arrive in the mailbox. Furthermore, in my new professional capacity I have a new-found respect for the people who write these things. Love them or hate them, we could all learn a thing or two about content creation and key messages from the Watchtower people and other religious pamphleteers, and they serve as a great model for students of public relations.

Religion is without a doubt humankind's first attempt at public relations, and all of history's prophetic figures have been PR people of one sort or another. What were Moses' tablets but a Bronze-Age PowerPoint presentation of ten key messages? The Prophet Muhammad, prior to his revelations, was well known for his negotiation and peace-making skills between warring tribes, leading one Muslim PR blogger to describe him as the best PR man who ever lived. And Jesus of Nazareth, if you look past the conjuring tricks and questionable claims, was no less than the greatest ever spokesman for not being a dick.

I don't intend on getting into a Christopher Hitchens-type debate over whether religion is a force of good or evil in the world. Compelling arguments could (and regularly are) made for both, and in any case I don't know how useful a debate this is anyway. But what I think can't be argued is that the communications model that the forces of organized religion have developed and fine-tuned over the course of 5,000 years is nothing short of brilliant, and that anybody planning on a career in communications would be well recommended to take a serious look at the world's religious sects, and specifically their messaging.

And as for those Jehovah's Witnesses pamphlets that occasionally appear at your door, at times presented to you in person, don't turn them down and don't put them straight into the recycling bin. Read them. In addition to being remarkably well written much of the time, they embody many important lessons for today's PR professional. Here are a few takeaways from Watchtower Society collateral.

1. State their mission clearly right off the bat.

As I type I'm staring at a JW brochure that was dropped off at our house the other day. The opening salvo: "Would you like to know the truth?" OK, we're talking about deep, universal truths, and even if the truth they propose turns out to be outlandish and doesn't ring true, it's still an appealing sales pitch. I mean, who doesn't want to know the truth? Granted, we all blanket ourselves in convenient self-deceptive untruths now and then, but at our more calm and meditative moments, we all want to know the truth. And with this as a lead, you're immediately drawn in with the anticipation of some sort of 'eureka' moment.

2. Use clear, simple language.

It goes without saying that religious copywriters write with one purpose in mind: to be understood by as wide a range of people as possible. Mind you, religious leaders can be terribly ambiguous and confusing much of the time, but on a basic level religious propagandists want to convince you that their worldview is the best one out there and you should join them. The pamphlet in front of me moves on to a series of bullets which succinctly capture the big questions that every human being at one point or another has contemplated.

• Does God really care about us?
• Will war and suffering ever end?
• What happens to us when we die?
• Is there any hope for the dead?
• How can I pray and be heard by God?
• How can I find happiness in life?

Writing doesn't get much more crystal-clear than this. It's virtually perfect, and any corporate copywriter producing materials for their employer would be well off taking a page out of the Jehovah's Witnesses' book of message crafting.

3. Know your audience.

When I pick up a religious pamphlet, it's generally not because I'm looking for deep truths about life, the universe and everything. (I'm much more likely to pick up Douglas Adams for this.) However, it's probably safe to say that people like me aren't the intended reader of religious leaflets. The successful public relations campaign attempts to sway the targeted public in one direction or another by appealing to that group's specific needs and circumstances, like promising "more flights to more places" or to "support the growth of open shop construction." Or the promise of eternal life in the presence of a loving God for those who embrace His message.

4. It's all about those key messages.

In a recent TED lecture entitled 'Atheism 2.0' philosopher Alain de Botton noted that while in the secular world we tend to assume people need to hear something once and we've got it, whereas religious leaders recognize that message need to be repeated in order for them to sink in. In public relations we call the former school of thought the "Magic Bullet Theory" and everybody with any experience in the industry knows this never works. The central tenant of the Christian faith, namely that all can be saved through Jesus Christ, punctuates every single piece of literature the church has ever produced, from the New Testament onward, hence why the message has stuck.

5. Provide ample supportive 'evidence'.

I know I'm going to get crucified (put intended) by the Nu-Atheists out there for characterizing scriptural passages as 'evidence', but if your conversational context is indeed religion, then your storehouse of facts and figures is by definition going to be religious scripture. And religious pamphlets always provide an ample volume of this, with every supposition backed up by Biblical, Qur'anic or Sutric passages. Ask a rhetorical question, give the reader and answer and back it up with a quote from the Holy Book. It's the same formula one uses in a business case, except substitute the New Testament for the latest data from Abacus or Statistics Canada.

6. Always end with a call to action... and contact info.

In the end, the purpose of public relations is to persuade people to do something, be that buy a product, use a service, vote for a candidate or protest against something. And for this reason, a PR campaign is useless unless it contains a clearly stated call to action, a "Here's what you can do" section. And on this too, PR pros would be well-advised to look at religious leaflets. Ultimately the purpose of these brochures is to put butts in pews or on prayer mats by giving people a compelling reason to attend church/mosque/whatever, and then giving them info on how to find one near them.

These days, religious pamphlets invariably direct the reader to online resources. The Watchtower Society has - it should be noted - a truly amazing website, one of the best I've ever seen. It's available in virtually every language in existence, from Acholi to Zapoteca, and will locate the nearest JW congregation to you wherever you live (unless you live somewhere like North Korea where their church is banned). I still have no intention of joining their ranks, but I have to hand it to the JW's for being extremely skilled PR people. Their teachings on the cosmos and on blood transfusions may be wacky as hell, but they could all teach us a thing or two about effective communication.

Social Media and Profanity - Does anyone give a f*ck anymore?

Warning: This post contains language that some readers may find offensive. Reader discretion is advised.

Source: www.tisdelstirades.blogspot.ca

I've been meaning to write a post about social media and profanity for quite some time? Why has it taken me this long? To be honest, it's taken me a while to figure out what my views on the topic actually are. Even as I type here I'm not quite sure, but hopefully by the end I will have it figured out.

When it comes to dropping f-bombs and uttering other expletives online, I'm of two very different minds. On the one hand I'm very much a product of my generation in my views on freedom of speech. As a nineties kid who came of age on a diet of expletive-laden grunge rock, punk poets like Henry Rollins and potty-mouthed shock-masters like Marilyn Manson, Trent Reznor and Ministry's Al Jourgensen, swearing is in my DNA and I still find myself swerving into sailor talk when I'm either angry or past the three-pint mark at the pub. I can't help it. Nor do I particularly want to. It's in my bones, and when interjected at the right time, a well-placed "fuck" or even a "What the fucking fuck?" does wonders for getting a point across.

On the other hand, I still contend that there's a place for f-bombs and a place for cleaner, classier language and I tend to think that the 21st century commons that is social media is the latter. But even as I type these words I can easily recount expletive-laden Facebook posts with my name next to them. That said, I've always been discriminating in my use of profanity online. I will occasionally drop a four-letter word on Facebook, but I have never once done so on Twitter, and suffice it to say never on LinkedIn. For me it's a matter of business versus private life, and as Twitter very much overlaps the two worlds, I err on the side of business.

But what about this blog? Those of you inclined to comb through my back posts for colourful language (i.e. those with a lot more time on their hands than I have) will find the odd one here and there, but they're certainly the exception rather than the rule. But I don't eschew this vocabulary completely, and unlike in the title of this post, I don't asterisk it. If you're going to use the word "fuck" in a post, there's no point in pretending you're not using it. Moreover, the word "shit" has become so mainstream anymore that using an asterisk in the place of the 'i' just looks silly. Most other profanity I could use in this blog is either directly pertinent to sex (which isn't really the focus of this blog), or misogynistic (which I hope never to be), or within the context of a quote, which should be self-evident - and therefore totally inocuous.

Like an animal? Really, Trent? Ahhh... the nineties!

Then there's the issue of abbreviated profanity. While it's safe to say that most of us would refrain from responding to an amusing cat video posted on Facebook with "I laughed my fucking ass off watching that!" but wouldn't think twice about tapping out the abbreviation LMFAO, which means exactly the same thing. Likewise, most of us avoid telling people to "Shut the fuck up" in any sort of public domain, but still wield the STFU abbreviation with reckless abandon. And while I find myself employing an at-the-ready arsenal of WTFs and LMFAOs on Facebook, part of me can't help but feel that this drains the colour from our more colourful epithets. Would the likes of George Carlin or Margaret Cho stoop so low as to reduce their colourful language to cute little abbreviations? I cheapens it for the real artists, IMHO.

In a recent article in the Huffington Post, columnist Ann Brenoff laments the mainstreaming of the f-word. As she eloquently puts it, "Saying "fuck" used to be like eating caviar -- a rare experience indulged in so infrequently that the occasion itself became memorable. Instead, "fuck" has become just another word, as in "Can you please change the fucking lightbulb?"" I couldn't agree more. I like my profanity, but I also like it to have an impact, and if you're wielding it all the fucking time, these wonderful words lose any sting they ever had. Furthermore, I would like to see an overall reduction in the faux-fanity represented by the aforementioned popular SM abbreviations. If you're going to swear, just swear. If not, you have access to a rich and wonderful language full of great words that can get the point across just as well as an WTF.

As for whether or not to use expletives in a public forum like a blog, it's entirely a matter of personal taste. It's about knowing yourself and your own comfort zone, with the knowledge that whatever you put out there becomes part of your brand persona. As Randy Brososky, Edmonton-based marketing a communications guru and founder of the Group of Rogues put it when I asked him, "If you want the world to know you're willing to swear in totally mixed company, then it can definitely work, but it will become a very noticeable, indelible part of your personal brand. Make the choice and be okay with it, 'cus it sticks. If you're not okay with that, or people you are aiming to connect with won't be okay with it, then steer the *%#¥ clear."

We live in a complicated era, where boundaries between business and personal lives have become more blurred than ever, and where any and all content we create and commit to the public sphere contributes to shaping our personal brands. This means we need to draw our own lines. For me that line exists somewhere between Facebook and Twitter, with my airport and freelance work (i.e. anything I get paid to do) unquestionably on the 'business' side, and Brush Talk straddling somewhere in between. This is where I get to test the water, give the gods of communication a little jostle, and drop the occasional f-bomb - but only occasionally enough for it to retain its sting. That aside, I prefer to stick to classy language.

Where is your line in the sand vis-à-vis profanity and social media? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Writing Tips for Musicians - 11 Bio-Writing Sins To Avoid

Rule 1: Don't follow this guy's example.

I wear many hats as a writer and communications professional. One of those hats is as the unofficial 'manager' of my wife Allison's band, The Last Calls. The Last Calls are an up-and-coming six-piece cover pop-rock band from Edmonton who made a fabulous debut last summer by way of a six-stop tour of southern Alberta - taking in Coleman, Medicine Hat, Nanton, Pincher Creek, Twin Butte and Waterton Park. (Yes, all the great capitals of southern Wild Rose country!) I've also done a great deal of promo material for Allison in her capacity as a solo artist and occasionally sat down at the piano stool myself as accompanist, although far less often than I would like!

As such, I've written a hell of a lot of band and soloist bios. And not just for my better half's work. The trouble with being a professional writer is that, once people find out you're a professional writer (or that your spouse is), you tend to get innundated with requests for bios, social media posts, proofreading etc. Being a writer and editor is rather like being a massage therapist. Show up at a party and tell people what you do for a living and before long you have people asking if you'd "just check this for spelling and punctuation" and "could you just write me a 100-word bio for my program?"

Not that I mind. I'm more often than not very happy to indulge my musician friends with wordsmithing. It's what I do and it comes easy to me. Moreover, many musicians - and I say this with the deepest respect - write terrible bios! Anyone who's ever been to a classical music recital or a jazz festival has had the experience of opening a program and confronting overwrought, cliché-riddled disasters of bios that inadvertently make the performer sound like the biggest prick that ever enrolled in music school. How many of us have read dreadful musician bios that read something like this?

"Violet Wienerbunker was born into a musical family of esteemed, supremely talented and musical musicians and was singing Verdi arias while still in her mother's uterus. Violet literally lives and breaths music, catching the attention of musicians and human beings alike with her dulcet tones and 13-octave collaratura range that some have compared to Maria Callas, Michael Bolton, Freddie Mercury and an ascending 737. Violet studied at the esteemed Kenny Loggins School of Music at the Unversity of Eastern West Virginia, where she was told that she had a "glowing future" but then artist-in-residence Kid Rock - a phrase he claims he only ever used once in his life, whereupon she set off for the Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachussetts, the alma mater of such famous musicians as Keith Jarrett, Joe Lovano, John Mayer, Esperanza Spalding and Judas Priest alumnus Tim "Ripper" Owens, among many, many other great musicians. While at Berklee she also studied under the tutelage of legendary almost-Grammy-nominated Tuvan throat-singing virtuoso Sainkho Namtchylak and was shortlisted for a UNESCO tour of the Tuvan Autonomous Republic, although she was unable to participate due to a competing recording project with Boston-based early music-inspired heavy metal group Flagellatorium, which launched her career on the world stage and beyond. Today she is an early-to-advanced childhood musical educator for the Mercedes Woodcock-Nimrod School of Performing Arts in Lansing, Wyoming, where she imparts her lifelong love of music from Tallis to Tool and beyond to young children of all races, genders and nationality all across the fine state of Wyoming while continuing to excel in all facets as a professional performing musician, and today brings you a wide array of works by 19th century Paraguayan composers......"

If you actually read through to the end of that bio, you're a freak. Even I stopped paying attention to what I was typing about half way through. But this is not to be harsh on musicians. Musicians, after all, are trained to sing, play instruments and write music at a high level - not crank out accessible, reader-friendly prose for audience members. That's what people like me are trained to do. However, many musicians are indeed fantastic writers who do amazing things with words as song lyrics - but still manage to write terrible bios.

Writing a good bio is a tricky undertaking, requiring exactly the right balance between self-deprecation and self-confidence. However, by avoiding the following common bio-writing pratfalls and clichés, you can at least assure that your bio won't make your audience hate you before you even start to perform.

1) Don't tell us that you "could sing before you could crawl" or any other such nonsense.

Unless you're Groucho Marx, who famously began his autobiography with the words "I was born at a very young age," intros like this just sound silly. Nobody comes out of the womb wielding a Stradivarius or knowing all the words to 'Bohemian Rhapsody'. You may have a natural inclination towards music, but you still got to where you are today by studying and practicing. And that's just fine.

2) Nobody cares if you were "born into a musical family."

We're here to hear you, not your family. Unless your great-uncle is Mick Jagger or your brothers' names are Jackie, Jermaine, Marlon and Tito, you're better off leaving your family out of it.

3) Don't make vague claims with no substance.

Specifically, don't refer to yourself as a "gifted artist" or a "musician destined for stardom." Tell as who you are and what you do and let your music speak for itself.

4) Don't boast about your youth - and how young you were when you accomplished X, Y and Z.

There's no more surefire way of alienating your reader than rubbing it in their face that you had a record contract at 16 or that you were the youngest person ever accepted to the Eastman School of Music in the woodwinds department. All of us worry, on one level or another, that we haven't achieved as much as we should have achieved by whatever age we're at. And we don't fork out for concert tickets for the purpose of being reminded of that fact. And don't describe yourself as a "young, up-and-coming talent." If being young were a musical achievement in and of itself, we would all have Grammys sitting on our Ikea bookshelves.

5) Self-deprecation is good - but only to a point.

Just as nobody wants to hear you boast about how much better than everyone else you are, nobody wants to read a bio that will leave them questioning what they're doing listening to you. If your bio reads something like "We started a band 'cause we were stoned on Tyler's couch and listening to Radiohead one night and figured 'Well, we could never be as good as these guys but we don't completely suck, so why not?'" Because nobody wants to see a band that fits that description - unless they're giving out free weed at the intermission.

6) Don't make unsourced comparisons between yourself and other artists.

If a reviewer in a newspaper or magazine likened your voice to Amy Winehouse or your piano technique to Oscar Peterson, then you can include it in your bio. (In fact you'd be an idiot if you didn't.) If some drunk guy at a bar once said you reminded him of Rihanna, don't think that gives you licence to claim you've been "likened to artists such as Rihanna, among others." Furthermore, don't use the words "among others." That's just a cheap aggrandizing bio trick that won't fool anyone who's actually reading your words.

7) Keep the list of performance credits, diplomas and awards to a minimum.

It's a bio, not a CV. Provide perhaps three career highlights and leave it at that. Nobody wants to wade through a Tolstoy-esque biography covering every single place you've played. Your audience is there to hear music, not read a novel. Moreover, if they're sitting in the audience, having already paid the ticket price, you've already sold them on the idea of coming to hear your perform; you don't need to further impart them with the merits of coming to see your gig. Any excess information is just going to get on people's nerves and lessen their likelihood of coming to see you again.

8) If you're performing alongside other musicians, don't write a bio that's way longer than those of your fellow performers.

In an ideal situation, a bio that's three times as long as all the others in a program will get nipped and tucked into line with the others. But realistically most music festivals are strapped for money and people and the person putting the program together doesn't have time to edit the bios because they're too busy filling in grants and learning the viola part to the Benjamin Britten ensemble piece that follows your solo number. Ask whoever is putting together the program what an appropriate word limit it. Otherwise you might just look like a pompous jerk - or an insecure person.

9) Don't include complicated URLs in a print bio.

This rule is only applicable to print bios. If you have a band website with a simple, easily typed URL like www.flamingtostitos.net or a Facebook page like www.facebook.com/flamingtostitos, you can include it. However, if your sound clips are buried someplace and accessible only by way of a long URL like http://www.bandfart.com/weenieroast/fullofcrap&35308221597351?4/meeeee!2, you're wasting time and space by including this because nobody is ever going to manually type it out. If you do have a page like this, provide the root URL together with instructions on how to access the specific page.

10) For the love of God, proofread!

This should go without saying, but I've seen enough bios with glaring errors in them that it seems to bear mentioning. Check your work before you submit it. And if possible, reread the program in hardcopy form before it gets printed and distributed. Keep in mind that, as in Rule 5, the person doing the programs probably doesn't have enough time to proofread everything. Nor are they likely to be trained copy editor. Proofing is your job.

11) If you're writing a bio for a website or social media page, don't forget to include contact information.

The old Field of Dreams adage of "If you build it, they will come" notably does not apply to digital media. Particularly if you omit the crucial part where you let visitors to your site know how to reach you. You could be the most amazing band on the face of the earth, with a beautiful web presence and a superbly crafted band bio, but unless you provide people with easy-to-find phone and email contact info, you're not going to get any work. Trust me, I've seen numerous band websites and Facebook pages with no contact information.

In sum, keep it short and pleasant, injecting some humour wherever possible, and remember the purpose of what you're doing. For more on how to write a great musical bio, here is an excellent article on the site MusicianCoaching.com by musician and Bitch magazine contributor Julia Rogers. It covers some of the same tips outlined here along with some more in-depth advice on marketing yourself as a musician.

In the meantime, to my musician friends, I hope you find this post entertaining and helpful. And if you do have any questions on bio-writing matters, feel free to give me a shout.

21 Arcane Words Worth Reviving As Modern Business Lingo

Every time the new year rolls around, just about every PR, communications and business management-related blog or forum comes out with its own list of annoying corporate neologisms and political buzzwords that deserve to bite the proverbial dust as expeditiously as possible.

I too have found myself writing light-heartedly acerbic posts about words and expressions that ought to be banned. Not surprisingly, this year's worst offenders' list includes 'fiscal cliff', 'job creators' and 'yolo' as well as stubborn hangers-on like 'guru', 'double down', 'the new normal' and 'a-ha factor'. As for me, the sooner that irritating expressions like 'lots of moving parts', 'synergy' and anything with the word 'robust' in it disappears from our business speak, the happier our workplaces will be.

But rather than focus on the words and expressions we love to hate, I would instead like to propose an infusion of new words into our daily parlance. Or, more to be more precise, I propose we revive some wonderful old words that have long fallen into disuse and breathe new life into them. Many of our extinct words are in fact delightfully punchy and compact words that strike me as very well-suited to our modern-day places of business.

What would we have to gain from reviving long-dead words and expressions? Firstly, a richer vocabulary means richer communication. What bothers me about much of our modern-day corporate lexicon is that it's frankly lazy English. Why can't we use real words instead of cheap constructs like 'core competency' or cartoon words like 'incentivize'? Secondly, the 140-character confines of the Tweet have made greater virtues than ever out of terseness. And thirdly - and this is the most important reason - it would be fun. And we all want to have fun in our work, don't we?

In selecting my top 20 candidates for vocab revival, I did my best to select words that a) would actually be useful, b) are short and concise enough for today's social media world, and c) sound cool. Some of these are fairly recent (i.e. 19th century) losses from the language, whereas others haven't been in popular parlance for over 500 years. Most of them are either verbs or nouns, although I've included a few choice adjectives as well. And as always, I'm open to other suggestions. Here we go.

1. Acrasial

 Meaning: Ill-mannered or ill-tempered.

Example: Jill may be acrasial but she gets the job done.

2. Bajulate 

Meaning: To carry a burden.

Example: Geez, I didn't realize you wanted me to bajulate this event as well as plan it!

3. Buncombe

Meaning: Unacceptable behaviour, rubbish, bullshit.

Example: I don't care if it's in your holy book! This misogynistic buncombe stops now!

4. Darkle

Meaning: To obscure something, to make dark or indistinct.

Example: As Fukushima Daiichi was in full meltdown, TEPCO darkled the issue by making vague statements and shuffling officials from post to post.

5. Dragoon

Meaning: To compel or coerce, usually by force.

Example: If you think you can dragoon me into this joke of a settlement, you're very much mistaken!

6. Drollic

Meaning: Pertaining to puppet shows (seriously).

Example: Danielle Smith assembled a drollic assortment of big oil advocates and formed the Wildrose Party.

7. Fantods

Meaning: A state of nervous irritability.

Example: John Turner's fantods got the better of him as he lashed out at Brian Mulroney over patronage appointments and lost the debate.

8. Icasm 

Meaning: A figurative expression.

Example: Just tell it to me straight; don't hide behind icasms and innuendo.

9. Jobler

Meaning: Someone who does various odd jobs.

Example: She built a reputation as a jobler within the company and eventually rose to CEO.

10. Krioboly

Meaning: A ritual involving the sacrifice of many rams (or possibly any complicated and messy ordeal).

Example: If I had known this task would turn out to be such a krioboly I would have contracted it out.

11. Mochlic

Meaning: A drastic purgative medicine.

Example: Paul Ryan's proposed economic mochlic will plunge half the country into poverty.

12. Naumachia

Meaning: A type of gladiatorial combat in Ancient Rome involving staged naval battles (or possibly any over-the-top and ghastly spectacle with an invariably messy outcome).

Example: I think we should all be patient with Obama, especially considering the naumachia that preceded him under the Bush administration.

13. Obrumpent

Meaning: The state of breaking or bursting things.

Example: Larry's obrumpent performance as CEO left the company with a tattered reputation.

14. Omniregency

Meaning: Maintaining total control over every facet of something.

Example: Seriously, your omniregency over these proceedings is starting to piss us all off!

15. Persiflage

Meaning: Lighthearted banter, friendly chitchat.

Example: A bit of persiflage with employees can help soothe nerves during performance reviews.

16. Scaevity

Meaning: Unluckiness.

Example: Hard work and good planning are no substitute for a competitor's scaevity.

17. Speustic

Meaning: Half-baked, hastily slapped together.

Example: John's speustic communications plan was full of typos and poorly articulated key messages.

18. Supererogation

Meaning: The performance of more work than duty requires.

Example: Jenny, it's great that you have such a strong work ethic, but you should know that supererogation will just make everyone else resent you. Just nod, smile and do the minimum - that's how we roll.

19. Tantuple 

Meaning: Multiplied by the same number; so many times a given quantity .

Example: China's tantuple economic growth began to peter out in the late 2000s.

20. Venialia

Meaning: An assortment of minor sins or indiscretions.

Example: Look Fred, an early departure here and there and the occasional use of company property for personal use is one thing, but your venialia is starting to attract negative attention. 

21. Wittol

Meaning: A man who is aware and tolerant of his wife's infidelity; an acquiescent cuckold (or possibly someone who is aware and tolerant of corporate misdeeds).

Example: The Watergate scandal exposed Nixon for the political wittol he was.

For those interested in these and other arcane expressions, The Phrontistery's Compendium of Lost Words is a great online resource.

Shit History Undergrads Say - Woodrow Wilson's 'Fourteen Pants'

Anybody who has ever worked as a teacher knows how mind numbing the marking process can be. Just about every teacher has his or her own strategies for plowing through a mountain of exam papers or essays without completely losing their mind. As a former TA in 20th Century World History at the University of British Columbia, I've had to endure many an evening slogging my way through booklet after booklet of verbose regurgitations of in-class notes on Vimy Ridge and the sinking of the Lusitania or, even worse, intensely morbid essays on war atrocities that relished in every gory detail like a Saw movie.

What was my coping strategy? Generally a combination of beer and derision, specifically combing through exam papers and essays for the egregious and comical abuses of the English language. We've all been guilty of this, of course. We've all been in the position where we're frantically scribbling away in an exam booklet in the hope of half-blindly stumbling on enough correct points to get a decent mark. The result is generally a cornuccopia of wounded sentences, awkward constructions, breathtaking run-on-sentences (runs-on-sentence?), tautological assertions, and just flat out bizarre factual statements.

Here are some particularly good ones that I've been hanging onto some over the years for my own amusement. This is what you get when you're grasping at straws or trying to fill an exam booklet as quickly as possible.

Syntaxed To Death



Diplomacy, apparently

Hitler achieved economic, military and physical growth.

Mao was married at the age of 14 but his wife died three years later. Then Mao had countless relationships with many children.

The Soviet Union used diplomacy to invade Poland.

Suspekt Speling

The Colombian Navel fleet was busy stropping American ships.

Wilson is most famous for his “fourteen pants” which outlined the steps he felt needed to be taken.

Pubic opinion on the subject has varied over the course of history.

Mathematical Genius

Mao Zedong and Adolf Hitler were considered one of the few greatest leaders that transformed their own countries in the early 20th Century.

In this way, both of them were one of the strongest countries in the Second World War.

Geography Fail

Japan resumed its expansionist policies, especially in the Middle East.

 
Going for Broke (a.k.a. Trying To Fill An Entire Exam Booklet)

More different than similar

Mao Zedong and Okonkwo [the main protagonist in Chinua Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart] were more different than similar in many aspects. Being from different cultures, this is to be expected. They share some similarities, but it is evident that these two leaders did things and thought things differently from each other.

Throughout history, there have been many great people, and many more unknown people. There have been many who have done wonderful things, and many who have done nothing at all. And every person has different attitudes towards everything around him or her, and it is these attitudes that shape actions.

You Don't Say!

Perception is crucial in understanding history.

Educated guessing is a large component of media writing as the future is still open to any number of possibilities.

Throughout history, many events have occurred which have greatly impacted the world. Such events are also bound to keep happening.

Hyperbolic Overdrive

In Japan’s case, the “two-two-six” rebellion is one such crisis that led to Japan’s involvement in WWII, and the subsequent history of the world.

Say That Again??

These comparisons of documents and accounts provide a number of questions about the reliability and reasoning behind such discrepancies in the comparisons, establishing an understanding of the lengths the Great Leader would go in order to attain freedom for his people.

The means Hitler and Mao used to achieve leadership roles were similar and different in different ways. Hitler used threat, secret police and democracy.


Similar....yet different

When juxtaposed on a comparative perspective, the methods Hitler and Stalin, of Germany and the Soviet Union respectively, implemented on their rise and solidification in power are very similar.

These two situations are similar in that they are opposite.

Stalin didn’t want to get his country involved with silly things such as world conquest.

As we live, we make history. The present is the history of the future, and the past is the future of our contemporary time.

Meanwhile, the Russia country was governed by the communist party under the Stalin Regime.

His views, albeit firmly believed, are often objective in regards to the external concerns, and only become prejudiced when the conflict strikes and internal locus.

When Nwoye [the protagonist's son in Things Fall Apart] becomes a Christian, he and his father fall apart.

This forced a period of hardship on the people triggering the despair of poverty, the anguish of war and the tragedies of death.

Just as in human nature, agreements on major events in history are fraught with inconsistencies, untruths and confusion.

[The soldiers in WWI] didn’t need or want absolutely anything else other than some food, rest, shelter, and most importantly, of course, not to end up dead.

Win!

The author writes his memoirs of his visits to the Front because the worm (or curiosity) of context got into his ahistorical apple.

Neologism of the Week - Hyphoon

What's with the random comma in there? Unless you're going for Shatnerian inflection.



Back in January of this year I wrote a post on portmanteaus in which I highlighted ten of my favourite compound neologisms. These included such gems as 'momniscience', 'floordrobe' and 'botax', as well as my personal favourite - 'pornado' (the frenzied whirlwind of activity of a person desperately trying to cover up their Internet porn use upon being walked in on). Occasionally, however, I come up with my own gem, one of which I would like to share with you today.

One of my biggest pet peeves as a writer and editor is the misuse of hyphens. Hyphens are a useful form of punctuation, and indeed one that I employ fairly liberally in my own writing. However, they often employed wrongly and excessively, such as in the phrase 'thank-you', 'South-American' and 'badly-punctuated'. I personally think Marvel Comics is at least in part to blame for hyphen overuse. Why exactly does Spider-Man have a hyphen in it when Batman, Superman, Aquaman and Iron Man don't? Never made any sense to me.

Sometimes, however, hyphen misuse goes beyond an inappropriate one here and there are goes to crazytown. Case in point the photo hereabove, taken at one of the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York. There is so much wrong with the punctuation on this sign that it's hard to know where to begin, but certainly the most striking feature of it is the crazed explosion of unnecessary hyphens. Granted American liberalism has a prediliction for hyphen-based inclusivity (i.e. _______-American), but at leasy 'Arab-American' and 'Chinese-American' are correct usages. This, however, is bizarre and perplexing.

Which brings me to my neologism of the week, which is hyphoon. I think this requires little explanation. Moreover, as my good friend Yair Linn pointed out, this also works in French as tirade d'union, which, for the benefit of non-French speakers, is an amalgam of tirade (same as in English) and trait d'union, which means hyphen. Perfect!

I'm always on the lookout for new and interesting phraseologies and neologisms, and cool portmanteaus in particular. Please let me know if you come across any - or come up with a gem of your own.

6 Reasons Why Everybody Thinks They're A Writer

Writers are an oft-depressed lot. Not only do they tend to spend a lot of time in isolation staring at a screen (and getting little physical activity), but they also have to contend with a world that by and large considers 'writing talent' to be about as rare and prized as right-handedness or an extensive knowledge of Internet porn. Writing, we are told, is not like, say, proficiency in graphic design, cardiology or jazz piano. In other words, it's something that given a high school education we can all do reasonably well.

As a professional writer and editor who has worked as a wordsmith of one sort or another for nearly a decade,I have always resented the notion that writing is somehow less skill-bound than other creative domains. While it is rarely spelled out to me so matter-of-factly as "Oh, anybody can write!" and indeed the praises of 'good writers' are often extolled, when it comes down to meeting production deadlines and cranking out copy, I have more than occasionally found my services bypassed on the pretext that "Well, we needed it done so we got Bob to do it, and you seemed busy. And Bob can do it just fine."

The problem with this rationale, of course, is that often Bob can't do it 'just fine'. Not that Bob is an idiot, or even a bad writer per se, but after eight years of wordcrafting and word-nerdery I am exactly the person you want to get those critical messages fine-tuned and positioned in exactly the right spots in the text, while ensuring that there are no awkward sentences, misplaced commas or references to 'pubic service'. (Trust me - I've seen it happen more than once.) Moreover, as a staff 'writer', it's my job to do this sort of thing, and the fact that I am appearing busy is not a reason to bypass me. After eight years as a professional writer, I work fast - and can get assignments done very quickly.

This is not to say that I'm the king of the written word, nor that I don't make mistakes. I've made more than my fair share in my writing career. I've committed egregious typos and acts of grammatical terrorism that have made it to print and still make me cringe today. (I won't give you specific examples because I hope to continue getting work with the publications in question, who I think haven't noticed yet.) I do go back and correct my blog posts, sometimes on numerous occasions. And even beyond this, I frequently think of better ways I could have phrased something after it's too late. (When it's too late? After it's too late sounds redundant doesn't it?) But I continue to get better with every year I spend doing this. As it is with brain surgery or plumbing, the more mistakes I make, the better I get at avoiding them.

But to return to the original topic, it is true that 'good' writing is often seen as something of a extra - not a frivolity exactly but a bonus that, while desirable, isn't of life-or-death importance. Which, to be fair, I suppose it is. After all, having a burst water main or a listeria outbreak at your airport is significantly worse than having a misplaced semicolon or a dangling modifier on the airport's web copy on shopping and dining offerings. And even if you're sticking to the creative professions, hideous graphic design on a pamphlet is invariably worse than convoluted syntax within the copy, as the graphic design in question will likely prevent readers from picking it up in the first place.

Nevertheless, poorly constructed writing will derail your communications, make your social media communication less effective and generally make your brand less good. And while I'm not saying that writing 'talent' is the exclusive purview of a certain noble breed of elected ones, it is the purview of people who have spent many years playing with words, sweating over syntax and generally fretting over crap that most people rarely think about. Us word people are not normal. Take one of us to a rock concert and our first reaction to the exultation "Rock on!" is to ask "On what?" Yep, we're freaks, but we're the freaks who keep your web and brochure content from going south,

Still, though, everybody on one level or another thinks they're a writer. Here is my personal theory on why that is.

1) We all do it in one form or another.

We write every day. We write grocery lists. We write angry letters to our neighbours for blasting Lynyrd Skynyrd out the window at 11:00 pm on a Tuesday. We help our children with their writing homework. And some of us write obnoxious blog posts purporting to explain why everybody thinks they're a writer. Not everybody fixes their car transmission on their own or designs a book cover. But everyone with a baseline level of literacy writes - and all the more so in the era of social media.

2) It's not generally taught on an extracurricular basis.

Writing isn't seen in the same light as, say, playing the violin or slam-dunking a basketball. And one important reason for this, I believe, is that with the exception of certain really nerdy kids, hardly anybody studies writing as an extracurricular activity - it's seen much more as a core subject that everybody learns. And the kids in writing clubs are probably mostly there to escape bullies; the writing is just a pretext.

3) Bad writing is often less immediately apparent than, say, bad music or bad drawing.

When a singer is hideously off-key or mangling the lyrics to the national anthem or something to that effect, it's generally quite apparent, as is egregiously bad visual design. Bad writing doesn't generally have the same effect. I suspect the reason for this is that at first glance writing on a page simply looks like writing on a page, and any badness therein does not become immediately apparent until you really, really read it. Which brings me to my fourth point, which is....

4) Most people don't really do that much reading.

Now before you protest, let me ask you this question. When was the last time you picked up a travel brochure at a tourist infocentre or on the brochure rack on a ferryboat and actually read the thing from start to finish - or even the lion's share of it? Unless we're actually sitting down to read a novel, most of us (and I don't necessarily exclude myself from this) are terribly lazy when it comes to actually reading and digesting the vast amount of content out there. This, I believe, leads to a devaluing - on some level - of the skills of the people who produce such content. But the fact of the matter is that without good copywriters, the key messages in boldface that you do actually pay attention to won't pop up, much to the detriment of the company in question.

5) Schools reinforce bad writing habits.

 PR Daily ran a great article recently on how schools inculcate really terrible writing habits among pupils. Such habits include shooting for length rather than conciseness, adherence to arcane grammatical rules like not starting sentences with the word 'and' (something I do all the time), and an unhealthy fixation on the introduction-thesis statement-body-conclusion structure. While these quirks in writing education don't necessarily undermine professional writers' respect out in the world, it does contribute to a general overconfidence in regards to writing know-how. "Oh, I know what the rules are." No, you probably don't.

6) Nowadays, everybody truly can be a writer - with a readership.

Thanks to Blogspost and other free blogging programs, anybody can start a blog. And many, many people do - including many who really shouldn't. No....I don't really mean that. In fact I think everybody should blog, because blogging on a regular basis is a great way to build up your writing chops and become the writer you know in your heart you could be. Because anyone can be a good writer. You just have to start out as a mediocre one and plod ahead.

Yes We Can ≠ We Built It - Two Slogans Poles Apart

The terms 'liberal' and 'conservative' are bandied about with such gleeful abandon in US political life that they've largely been gutted of meaning. On the political right, the term 'liberal' has since the Clinton administration been employed as a slur, often prefaced by adjectives ranging from 'godless' to 'tax-and-spent' to 'freedom-hating'. Meanwhile, on the leftward end of the spectrum, many erstwhile 'liberals' now eschew the term in favour of 'progressive', while deploying the term 'conservative' in adjectival form accompanied by nouns such as 'theocrat', 'windbag', 'nutjob' and so on.

Given the ubiquitous nature of these terms (and their seemingly arbitrary use), it's worth consulting a dictionary. The term 'conservative' derives from the Latin conservare, which means 'to retain'. Wikipedia defines conservatism as "a political and social philosophy that promotes retaining traditional social institutions" whose advocates tend  to either emphasize stability and continuity or oppose modernism and seek a return to 'the way things were'. Liberalism, on the other hand, is defined as "a political ideology or worldview founded on the ideas of liberty and equality" while progressivism is defined as "a political philosophy advocating or favouring social, political and economic reform."

This guy would have loved the
Romney/Ryan slogan.

While it's debatable how accurately these views characterize the leaders of the US Republican and Democratic Parties respectively, there's no denying than from a branding perspective, these characterizations are bang on. At last week's Republican National Convention in Tampa, the Romney/Ryan team unveiled its official campaign slogan, 'We Built It'. The open-endedness and punchy trisyllabic format of this now-viral catchphrase invariably draws comparisons to Obama's 2008 campaign slogan, 'Yes We Can'. While on the surface these catchphrases are essentially meaningless, these superficially similar campaign slogans both speak volumes to promises espoused by their respective candidates - and the political ideologies they represent.

While the Obama presidency's 'liberalism' or 'progressivism' remains a matter for debate, there's no denying that his 2008 election campaign was rooted in the dictionary definition of progressivism. Not liberalism, but progressivism. (Obama's stance on social issues, particularly LGBT rights, does however fit perfectly with the aforementioned definition of 'liberalism'.) The Obama campaign was all about change, and the catchphrase 'Yes We Can' is perhaps the perfect linguistic distillation of the progressive ethos. It's positive (yes); it's inclusive (we) and it highlights potential (can). It's a slogan that appealed to a belief in a positive future, a future alive with possibility. Nothing short of a call-to-arms for progressives.

The Romney/Ryan slogan, by contrast, is tautologically, even classically conservative. Not conservative in the modern-day neo-conservative sense or even really in a socially conservative or Tea Party sense. Conservative in the original sense as espoused by the likes of Edmund Burke in the aftermath of the French Revolution. Like the Obama slogan, it the inclusive 'We'. But thereon in it immediately hearkens to the past with the past-tense 'Built'. The nebulous 'It' is the word that has caused much consternation in cyberspace. While Romney and Ryan's business-fixated rhetoric makes the slogan's intended meaning clear (Yes, you the average American voter built this country, not that nasty narcissistic big government that wants to steal your lunch money and take credit for your homework!), some have also suggested that 'it' could refer to a national debt that looks to hit the $16.4 trillion borrowing limit by the end of this year.

Is that the Nike swoosh under the 'did'?

Ambiguity notwithstanding, though, the 'We Built It' slogan is arguably the most perfect conservative slogan ever devised. It's a slogan that says, "We've built these institutions, and we should keep them in place." Whether true-blue Burkean conservatism will register with the American voting public remains to be seen, but if nothing else it makes for a refreshing departure from the amphetamine-crazed neo-Conservatism of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld or the cartoonish Tea Party conservatism espoused by the likes of Donald Trump and Sarah Palin - neither of which fit with the encyclopedic definition of the term. As for the Obama team, progressivism continues to define Democratic sloganeering with the party adopting one-word catchphrase 'Forward' for 2012. 'Forward' is a tad more muscular and perhaps even militant sounding than 'Yes We Can', but it's still textbook progressivism.

Which ideology will win the day? While it's still too early to say, the recent appearance of a campaign banner with the curiously overemphatic 'We Did Build It' (with the 'did' underlined no less) suggests that the Romney team is feeling a tad desperate. "No really, we DID build it!! Honest!" I guess we'll see on November 6.

And then there's the issue of the band Jefferson Starship. While the veteran San Francisco psychedelic rock group has yet to weigh in on the issue of the Romney/Ryan campaign slogan, one can't help but wonder if they lifted it from the group's iconic 1985 hit. Then again, at the time when We Built This City hit the airwaves, the group existed only in the form of the Mickey Thomas-led spinoff simply called 'Starship'. Which is fitting given that the current crop of Republicans are not particularly, er, Jeffersonian (sorry).

How To Write Gooder - 3 Pages of Longhand At An Ungodly Hour

A number of years ago, my wife introduced me to The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron - the mother of all creative self-help books. To this day it remains the only self-help book I routinely recommend to others and continue to employ myself.

Those of you who read my blog know how much of a fierce skeptic I am, be it about religion, new age trends, politics, marketing or anything else that has yet to prove its mettle in the face of cold, hard investigation. I also tend to be a knee-jerk skeptic when it comes to self-help manuals. I try to keep an open mind about them but I invariably end up getting irritated and putting them back on the shelf, opting instead for one of my usual nerdy history books, an angry screed by Christopher Hitchens or some ridiculous mashup of Jane Austen and zombie apocalyptica.

But not The Artist's Way. This is a book I routinely go back to for inspiration when my creative ideas dry up or I'm otherwise feeling stuck. When I first picked up the book I had just left graduate school with a vague notion of pursuing a career in writing/communications but no real clue what I was doing. Julia Cameron's elegant stepladder-type creative exercises coupled with down-to-earth creative advice not only expanded my notions of what was possible but sharpening my writing skills like nothing else. It got me writing in a far more focused and serious manner, which in turn led to a career as a freelance writer, a sharpshooter editor and a professional communicator. I give Cameron a lot of credit for this.

While this and her follow-up books (which I confess I have yet to work my way through) are replete with excellent advice, her one main tool has done more to hone my writing skills than any other - the 'Morning Pages'. It's very simple really. You get up, you make a pot of tea or coffee or whatever, you sit down and you crank out three pages of longhand. And then you carry on with your day. Not enough time in the morning? Set your alarm 30 minutes earlier than you otherwise would. Distracted by the computer? Turn it off. No distractions. Just you, a caffeinated beverages, a pen and a notebook.

Granted, I would be lying if I said I'd been completely consistent with the Morning Pages over the years. In fact I really fell out of the habit upon moving back to Canada. Since then it's been hit and miss, but in recent months I've put forth a major effort to make sure those pages get done in the morning. And if I don't manage them in the morning, I do three pages in the evening - although 'Evening Pages' really don't pack the same processing punch.

So what, exactly, do the Morning Pages do for you? I can only tell you what they do for me, and why I currently feel compelled to get up at 5:30 in morning to do them.

1) My writing chops improve markedly when I do them.

Not that my mornings scribblings are ever poetic. Far from it - it's pure brain-dump, and brain-dump while my brain is still waking up and often mad at being up at all. I rarely read my old Morning Page notebooks after the fact, and when I do the content is often embarrassing. But being a writer is like being a musician. If you want to get good at it, you have to practice every day.

2) I feel much more organized when I do them.

For me, Morning Pages are more than a writing tool. They're an organizational tool. I have a pretty good memory when it comes to things I have to get done on any given day, but rehashing them in prose form while I'm still waking up tends to make for much more efficient, smoothly flowing workdays. And when you're trying to juggle a full-time job, a part-time study program and other extra-curriculars, this really helps.

3) Writing longhand is a refreshing departure from my usual activities.

Like most 21st-century workers, I spend most of my working life glued to a PC, and the vast majority of the writing I do is on a computer. Putting pen to paper is not only a refreshing departure from having my retinas abused by a flickering monitor but also gives me a fresh perspective on words, how they look, which ones might fit interestingly together and so on.

4) It's a great place to brainstorm.

Remember when your junior high English teacher asked you to write quietly on your own in a notebook for maybe five minutes at the beginning of class as a brainstorming exercise? I always enjoyed that. As a blogger, my best ideas for topics have generally come from three sources: sitting on the toilet, running and doing Morning Pages. And as I'm generally not on the toilet for long enough to fully flesh out an idea, it's mostly the latter two - and more Morning Pages than anywhere else.

5) It helps me wake up.

I've never been a morning person. My Morning Pages sort of act as an extra spike of caffeine in my, er, caffeine. Like a shot of whisky dropped in a pint of beer - except with the reverse effect.

6) It's a very appealing ritual.

If there's one thing I envy about people with religious faith, it's the comfort to be found in ritual - be it the flicking of rosary beads, the unrolling of the prayer mat, the donning of the turban and kirpan at the gurdwara or the waft of incense that greets you at a Buddhist temple. These days the closest I get to religious practice is writing, but I find the same kind of comfort in the laying out of my favourite rollerball pens, my notebook and a piping hot pot of Japanese tea. Granted, there's usually nothing saintly about the contents of my Morning Pages, which are often rife with expletives, but it's a daily ritual that invariably sets me off on the right foot - even when I'm dealing with all kinds of crap in my life.

For more on Julia Cameron and the power of Morning Pages, visit this site.

10 Ways Not To Be A Pompous Jerk (A Response to Jerry Agar of the Toronto Sun)

Yesterday I came across an article in the Toronto Sun that made my blood boil. The article, which was entitled '10 Ways Not To Be Poor', began with the opening salvo "The perpetually poor are not blameless." (Right off the bat you know where this train is going.) Sun columnist and 'conservative radio personality' Jerry Agar then proceeds to offer ten pearls of wisdom as to how to avoid being chronically destitute, such as don't see life is a lottery, don't set low goals and learn how to "manage your emotions." Thanks Mr. Spock. That's really useful!

Of course, Mr. Agar makes no mention of extenuating factors such as mental illness, physical ailments, domestic violence, inadequate public transportation, public safety concerns (in many cities) and other problems that contribute to trapping people in poverty. Nor does he acknowledge the importance of community organizations, educational programs and cultural institutions (all of which depend on government support for their existence) in helping people break free of the poverty trap. Moreover, he derides "pop culture and self-help programs" for instilling a culture of "wishing and hoping" while simultaneously spewing out a parade of platitudes taken straight from a third-rate self help book. Sometimes the irony truly writes itself.

What really gets me about this article, though, is what its actual intended purpose is. Imagine, for a moment, that you are a poverty-stricken person with two jobs, three kids to feed, a Mount Kilimanjaro-sized pile of bills on the kitchen table, disconnected power and an impacted molar that you can't afford to get fixed. You pick up the Sun at your bus stop at 11:00 pm on your way home and you read Jerry Agar's column, which its sage advice such as "God helps those who help themselves" and "Some low-income people find a way to save for the future, but they do so by foregoing $300 Nike shoes." Is there a single low-income person thus far who has read that article and thought to themselves, "Wow, I hadn't thought of that! I see the error in my ways!" I doubt even Jerry Agar can imagine such an occurrence.

Why, then, did he choose to inflict this article on the public? On this blog I make a conscious effort to write things that are either a) entertaining, b) enlightening, or c) a bit of both. Agar's column is none of the above, which to my mind leaves only two options. One - he could be deliberately trying to piss off his readers for pure shock value. Two - he's engaging in classic right-wing journalistic masturbation aimed at readers who enjoy nothing more than stewing in their own smug sense of superiority over those 'silly' poor people are 'silly', while simultaneously giving them an outlet for their righteous indignation over tax dollars going to social programs designed to help people who don't ever 'help themselves'. The first I can respect, although he's a far cry from a Christopher Hitchens in the wit department. The second I just can't get behind.

With that in mind, here is a Top Ten of my own dedicated to Jerry Agar and others like him. Call it 10 Ways Not To Be An Asshole Columnist, or something like that.

1) Ask yourself what the point of your article is. And unless it actually enlightens, entertains or shocks (in an entertaining or clever manner), think perhaps about writing something else.

2) Back up your facts when you make accusations. For example, if you're going to accuse poor people of mismanaging their finances (or buying athletic footwear that they can't afford), have at least some anecdotal evidence.

3) Try not to make the same point again and again while pretending they're different points. For example, "believing in the quick fix," "believing life itself is a lottery" and "believing in wishing and hoping" are, if I'm not mistaken, the same point worded in three different ways. That's annoying, and not to mention a transparently cheap way of padding your points to reach the number ten.

4) Don't make crass assumptions about people you don't know. When you say things like "Stay off illegal drugs and off alcohol if it causes problems in your life" you're essentially insinuating that everyone who is poor is an addict, which results in deepening existing stigmas against marginalized groups, thereby lessening people's likelihood of breaking out of poverty. (OK, this is kind of the same point as number two, but so important that I think it's worth mentioning twice.)

5) Don't insult your reader by stating the obvious. When you spout crap like "Drunks are bad at self-analysis," not only do you sound like an idiot but you're most likely to alienate your readership - unless your reader is of exactly the same mind as yourself, in which case they have no need for this article.

6) Don't foist advice on people that isn't really advice. If, for example, you say "Don’t have children until you are able to financially care for them" and your reader is an 18-year-old single mom struggling to get by, what do you expect her to do? Un-birth her child? Oh, and accusing her of being a 'child abuser' doesn't help.

7) If you're going to invoke scripture, do it properly. As my old pal Tyler Gingrich (aka The Political Pastor) pointed out to me, the line "God helps those who help themselves" is nowhere to be found in the Bible. In fact, many if not most Christians consider these words to be contrary to the Biblical message of God's grace. If nothing else, it's a tired cliche that doesn't really mean anything but is so prevalent that most people assume it's in the Good Book. It isn't.

8) If you're going to criticize government policy, offer some potential alternatives. As opposed to simply saying "We’ve spent billions on a “war on poverty” to negligible effect as there are still huge numbers of poor people" and "Perhaps we should demand more from people who stay on public support for decades and for successive generations," it would perhaps be more beneficial to offer some alternative strategies. To not do so suggests that you have no more idea than anyone else what to do to resolve the problem of inequality in our society.

9) Offering links to useful sources would be nice. The great thing about the Internet is that you can create links to other useful sources of information. And when it comes to a hugely consequential issue like poverty, you would think that the author would provide some 'further information'. Nobody's asking you to be an expert on everything. But it would be nice if you'd give credit to people who know more than you do on the subject, and have more to offer readers who are struggling to improve their lot in life.

10) Please stop repeating the line "It is not too much to ask." That's just annoying.

I should probably qualify all this by saying that I don't disagree with the assertion that individual bad decisions are a factor that contributes to the cycle of poverty. Nor am I some loony leftist whose response to everything is throwing more money at the problem. In fact, I do believe that we are a culture with a huge sense of entitlement much of the time, a characteristic that both the ideological left and the ideological right display in abundance - albeit of a different plumage. The ideological left expects government to coddle society. The ideological right gets incensed when asked to fork out for anything that doesn't directly apply to the individual taxpayer's narrow set of circumstances, such as alleviating poverty, solving the climate crisis or keeping ballet companies from going bankrupt.

Poverty is a colossally complex problem with innumerable factors, some of which are derived by personal behaviour and others that are tied to institutionalized inequality of one sort or another. My fundamental problem with the article in question is that it insinuates that all of us are born into this world with equal opportunities and that 'privilege' - be it of the racial, gender or socioeconomic variety - does not exist. I most strongly disagree and I would love to hear Jerry Agar's argument to the contrary.

Incidentally, your comments - bouquets and brickbats alike - are more than welcome. And Jerry, if you're reading this, I invite you with open arms to respond. And please be nice. It's not too much to ask.

8 Reasons Why People Love Numbered Blog Posts

There's something about Top 10 Lists or Top Insert-Your-Own-Number Lists that seem to never fail to captivate. We all love lists, and from David Letterman's Top Tens to the never-ending music-related top tens in the famous 2000 music-geek dramatic comedy High Fidelity, Top-Whatever lists seem to be hardwired into our DNA.

In the blogging world, numbered posts are known as 'link bait' as they seem to unerringly draw traffic. It has become a universal format across the blogosphere, employed by blogs ranging from Foreign Policy Magazine online to Cracked.com. Unlike Letterman and John Cusack's melancholy vinyl peddler, numbered blogs more often than not don't stick to the Top Ten format (to me ten seems a bit contrived and inherently less credible), but any number in the Top X format seems to do the trick just fine. In my own experience, these posts always draw the most traffic.

Why is this? Here is my own highly speculative and unscientific explanation.

1) People like small tidbits of information.

The average netizen has the attention span of a goldfish. Moreover, as people read twice as slow on a screen as they do on a printed page, this small chunk-like paragraph format works very well. Dive into the page, gobble up a few tidbits, and then head off somewhere else - that's how the Internet rolls.

2) People don't like to commit to reading an entire article.

Did I mention that people on the Internet are decidedly lacking in attention span? Reading an article with a daunting title like 'After The Wave - The Communications Lessons of 3.11' seems like a tall order after a long day at the office, and with an essayistic piece like that you feel committed to reading it in its entirety. With a list, you feel free to read a few and then leave - or keep reading if you're feeling sufficiently intrigued.

3) Lists are inherently suspenseful.

While the opt-out option of a Top-Whatever list is a definitely psychological draw, human beings tend to want to know how things end. If it's a well-written list, chances are your reader is in fact going to stick around to the end - unless they have to run off somewhere.

4) The list format is hardwired into our culture.

Thanks to Letterman, Cracked, High Fidelity and pop culture in general, lists are an integral part of how we interpret the world. And this is not new - this format dates back at least as far as Moses, who really owned the Top Ten format like nobody else in history, and the US Constitution, which modernized the format in the Enlightenment era.

5) It's appealingly irreverent.

Taking a serious topic and distilling it through the Top-Whatever format is appealingly disarming. Former Discovery magazine editor Stephen Petranek exemplifies this in his 2002 TED talk on 'the 10 most likely ways that life on the Earth could end'. It's a disarming way of tackling a serious topic that grabs your attention - and then holds on to it.

6) It's a natural lightning rod for debate.

If it's an interesting topic, people are bound to have their own opinions on what should be on said list, and people are going to want to compare and contrast with their own Top-Whatever. And people love to fill you in on all your egregious omissions.

7) It's a friendly and approachable format.

We all make lists. We've been making lists since the dawn of time. And blog posts in the form of a list feel real, genuine, not-at-all haughty. Had Fyodor Dostoyevsky rewritten Crime and Punishment as 'Top 20 Occasions When Cold-Blooded Murder Is Probably Beneficial to Society', he invariably would have had a far greater readership.

8) I guess people just like to count.

And we can all thank own favourite arithmomaniacal ex-pat Transylvanian muppet for that.