73 Ways to Become a Better Writer

Do you want to become a better writer? Silly question, eh.

The good news is that writing makes you a better writer. Just like practicing the piano makes you a better pianist, or riding a trail bike makes you a better biker.

A few weeks ago I asked a question on Write to Done: What Helps YOU Become a Better Writer? The suggestions the readers offered were so rich and varied that I decided to gather them all together for Copyblogger readers.

I think there is one guaranteed winner among the seventy-two suggestions - blogging. Writing a blog is an amazing way to sharpen one’s skills. As bloggers we have to produce words daily - even when we don’t feel like it. And we get instant feed-back through comments. As Leo Babauta points out in his inspiring story How I got 100,000 Subscribers: Lessons from Zen Habits, it’s the readers that help us improve.
Doing these things can help you become a better writer:

1. Become a blogger.

2. Use self-imposed word limits.

3. Accept all forms of criticism and learn to grow from it.

4. Read what you’ve written over and over, until you can’t find any more problems.

5. Show what you write to a trusted friend for feedback.

6. Outline. And then write to that outline.

7. Edit, and edit again.

8. Live with passion.

9. Be open, curious, present, and engaged.

10. Take a break between writing and editing.

11. Learn a new word a day.

12. Get the pen and fingers moving.

13. Write in different genres: blog posts, poems, short stories, essays.

14. Read grammar books.

15. Write without distractions.

16. Challenge yourself: write in a crowded cafe, write on the toilet, write for 24 hours straight.

17. Take a trip. Road trips, beach trips, bus trips, plane trips.

18. Watch movies. Can you write the story better?

19. Write. And then write some more.

20. Read, think, read, write, ponder, write - and read some more.

21. Read your stuff aloud to anyone who can stand it - including the cat.

22. Go back and cut 10% from your word count.

23. Talk to people.

24. Listen to how people talk.

25. Read lots of books. Both good and bad.

26. Make notes of your (fleeting) brilliant ideas.

27. Start your writing ahead of time - not hours before a deadline.

28. Listen to podcasts on writing tips.

29. Use simple, declarative sentences.

30. Avoid passive voice.

31. Limit your use of adjectives and adverbs.

32. When in doubt, cut it out.

33. Kill clunky sentences.

34. Be inspired by other art forms - music, dance, sculpture, painting.

35. Read your old stuff and acknowledge how far you’ve come - and how far you have to go.

36. Write for publication, even if it’s only for the local newsletter or a small blog.

37. Make writing your priority in the morning.

38. Keep squeezing words out even if you feel uninspired.

39. Tell everyone: “I’m a writer.”

40. Recognize your fear and overcome it.

41. Let your articles rest and then return to them with fresh eyes.

42. Comment on your favorite blogs.

43. Keep a journal to keep the writing juices flowing.

44. Use a journal to sort out your thoughts and feelings.

45. Keep it simple.

46. Practice monotasking. Set a timer for uninterrupted writing.

47. Watch people.

48. Get to know someone different from you and reflect on the experience.

49. Try new ideas or hobbies - the more variety you have in your life, the more likely you are to keep on generating good ideas on the page.

50. Read works from different cultures. It helps keep your writing from tasting stale in the mouths of your readers.

51. Rethink what is ‘normal’.

52. Work on brilliant headlines.

53. Check if your assumptions are right.

54. Join a writing group. If you can’t find one, form one.

55. Write during your most productive hours of the day.

56. Designate time to research.

57. Take time to muse and mindmap.

58. Map out a writing schedule for your project and stick to it.

59. Ask someone else to proofread.

60. Read Zinsser’s “On Writing Well” at least once a year.

61. Break out of your comfort zone.

62. Write at the scene. If you want to write about a beach, get a picnic rug and go write by the sea.

63. Go to the supermarket, the ball game, the class room, the building site. Make notes of the sensuous details, the atmosphere, the people.

64. Start with metaphors and stories.

65. Approach writing with gratitude, not just with a ‘must do this’ attitude.

66. Deconstruct and analyze books and articles you enjoy.

67. Know about story architecture. Many writers don’t. Which is like doing heart surgery or flying an airliner by intuition. Survival rates are low.

68. Socialize with other writers.

69. Stretch or exercise in between writing.

70. Make a note of ideas for further development before you leave a piece for tomorrow.

71.Use mindmaps for inspiration.

72. Take risks - don’t be afraid to shock. You are not who you think you are.

73. [Please add your own suggestion in the comment section!]

I hope that one or more of these suggestions has inspired you. Let me know which ones resonated with you. And please add to the list. I look forward to reading your comments! Thanks to all the Write to Done readers who contributed to this list.

Article source: http://www.copyblogger.com/better-writer/

Google building 3D hardware boost into Chrome

Departing significantly from what other browsers offer, Google has begun building its O3D plug-in for hardware-accelerated 3D graphics into its Chrome browser.

"The O3D team is working on getting O3D integrated into the Chromium build, and we're close to being able to complete our first step towards integration," said programmer Greg Spencer in a mailing list announcement Wednesday about Chromium, the open-source project that underlies Chrome itself. "I'll be making the Windows build of Chromium be dependent upon building O3D as part of the build process."

By helping to pave the way for high-powered Web-based games, the move furthers Google's ambition to speed the transformation of the Web from a static medium into a foundation for applications. Another piece of the work is Google Native Client, which is designed to let Web applications take advantage of a computer's native processing power.

The overall effort has taken on new importance with the announcement of Chrome OS, Google's Chrome-based operating system set to arrive on Netbooks in the second half of 2010. Chrome OS will use Linux under the covers, but the real foundation for Chrome OS applications is the Web, Google has said.

Native Client coming, too
Google plans to build Native Client into Chrome, too.

"We recognize that there is well-justified resistance to installing browser plug-ins. For this reason, we have a strong preference for delivering Native Client pre-installed or built into the browser, and we'll be focusing on that as our main strategy for delivering Native Client to users," said Brad Chen, engineering manager of the Google Native Client effort, in June.

Just offering the technologies is only a first step. Google must convince programmers to learn to use them and convince Web developers to embrace them. That's not simple, especially when few browsers can take advantage of them.
Brad Chen, engineering manager of the Google Native Client

Brad Chen, engineering manager of the Google Native Client
(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)

Chrome won't be the only browser to feature the acceleration features, though, because Google is working on plug-in versions, too. By building the technology into Chrome, Google could exert some pressure on others to support it.

Making Native Client and O3D into some kind of standard could help convince programmers the technologies are worth supporting and win over potential rivals. "The support of ratified standards (that Web developers) can use is something that we are extremely supportive of," said Amy Barzdukas, general manager for IE, in an earlier interview.

After years of near-dormancy, development of HTML, the language used to describe Web pages, has hit a feverish pace right now as browser makers try to make the Web into more of an applications platform.

Browser wars are back
Google added new fury to the browser wars when it introduced Chrome in September 2008. Chrome has attained a small but respectable market share of nearly 2 percent, according to research from Net Applications, but it has a long way to go expanding from the technophiles to the mainstream.

Chrome doesn't have the Internet Explorer or Safari advantage of being built into an operating system--though that could change over the years if Chrome OS manages to overcome its challenges and catch on widely. And Mozilla's Firefox took years to achieve its present market share of about 20 percent, making it the top alternative to IE and in widespread enough use that Web developers often choose to make sure their Web sites work with it.

Google has been spending a lot of time reproducing what other browsers already have--plug-ins, bookmark management, print preview, and any number of mundane but useful features. But Google also has been working on innovation, including more robust security and faster performance when running applications written in the JavaScript Web programming language.

Google has high hopes that it'll be able to match the performance of desktop applications with its technology.

"With O3D, we think we'll be able to enable high-quality games, the kind you're accustomed to seeing on consoles, as well as CAD (computer-aided design) applications," Chen said in a May speech. And regarding Native Client, "We want to be within single-digit percentages of what you can do with the best desktop native code," he said.

Google also is participating in a separate 3D Web graphics effort spearheaded by Mozilla and the Khronos Group.

Article source: CNET

MySpeed: Watch video at your own pace

There are some videos that drone on--business presentations, product demos, and online driving school--and others that rush by too quickly. MySpeed is a fun, free-to-try bit of software that serves as a playback remote so you can watch Flash videos at your own pace.

The simple app consists of a sliding bar that's set to 1.0, regular time, when a video plays. Slide it to the left to slow the sound and picture, or to the right to speed both elements to two or three times the original speed. You can also use shortcut keys to quicken or slow the video. Crtl+Alt+F makes it faster; Crtl+Alt+S drags it down.

The audio and video largely remained in sync when tampered with, but original trip-ups in streaming and buffering were more noticeable with the video accelerated. If you don't set MySpeed to start on boot-up, you'll need to open it each session. After that, it'll run in the background from the system tray.

MySpeed is an amusing, sometimes time-saving utility for YouTube and sources of Flash video. However, for the $30 post-trial asking price for the Windows app, it's clearly aimed at very frequent video watchers, especially e-learners who may want to breeze by some sections of a module and stroll through other, more technical segments.

Article source: CNET

Facebook Connect Available Now in Multiple Languages

Facebook may be the biggest social network in the world and one of the most visited web sites but it doesn't stop here. The company wants to get as many people as possible using the service and while the site is already the most visited destination online it aims to connect to its users even when they are visiting other sites. This is where Facebook Connect comes in, allowing any site or service to offer Facebook integration.
And with the social network having such a big presence worldwide it was only a matter of time before Facebook Connect got internationalized.

Being the premier social network in the world, as it has officially passed 250 million registered users with only 70 million or so in the US, it’s easy to see why it would need a powerful localized experience and, in fact, Facebook is available in 64 languages already, just 18 months since the program was launched. And now Facebook Connect users can benefit from the same level of service, with all of the features currently available in their native language.

“Developers who've implemented Facebook Connect, including those who have installed social widgets like the Fan Box, now have the ability to decide in which language they want their Facebook Connect features rendered,” James Leszczenski writes on the Facebook developer blog. “When a user first connects to your site, or publishes something back to Facebook, the Facebook Connect content will appear in the language you specify. User-generated content continues to appear in the language in which it was written.”

Facebook Connect has been a resounding success for the site, having been deployed by more than 15,000 sites or services in a little over six months since its launch. The login standard has been adopted by several large companies already, allowing users to login with their Facebook credentials. The localization feature is easy to implement, with webmasters having to make just small modifications to their code.

Article source: Softpedia

Adobe Releases Beta Text Layout Framework

This week, Adobe announced the beta release of the Text Layout Framework, an extensible library, built on the new text engine in Adobe Flash Player 10. This will allow developers and designers to use more sophisticated typography layouts in Web applications. The framework is intended for use with Adobe Flash CS4 Professional or Adobe Flex, and is included in the next version of Flex, code named Gumbo.

The Text Layout Framework delivers multi-lingual, print-quality typography for the web, including support for:

* Bidirectional text, vertical text and over 30 writing systems including Arabic, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Lao, the major writing systems of India, and others
* Selection, editing and flowing text across multiple columns and linked containers, and around inline images
* Vertical text, Tate-Chu-Yoko (horizontal within vertical text) and justifier for East Asian typography
* Rich typographical controls, including kerning, ligatures, typographic case, digit case, digit width and discretionary hyphens
* Cut, copy, paste, undo and standard keyboard and mouse gestures for editing
* Rich developer APIs to manipulate text content, layout, markup and create custom text components

While this might be especially of interest to developers (because it looks like there is a bit of hard work behind the scenes to use it), for designers it means that online typography design is coming closer to what can be achieved in print. On the Adobe website you can test out eight examples of how you can manipulate and control text. Examples include working with columns, text effects, linked containers, ligatures and graphics. On first impression, the ability to work with text like this feels a little bit like InDesign “lite,” which is very exciting if you love type and are frustrated with current limitations on the web.

Do you think the Text Layout Framework sounds like something good for designers and developers to work together on?

Article source: Sitepoint

Falcon Grabs Screens with Talon

Aviary has expanded their offering of nifty AIR-powered, bird-themed graphics tools with the recent release of Falcon – a simple visual markup tool.

So what exactly *IS* a visual markup tool? Falcon is basically just a really neat tool for selecting, cropping, and marking up screen content. Bloggers, writers, and general forum junkies take note!

Like Aviary’s other tools, Falcon is free and runs live in your browser via the magic of Adobe AIR. However, the bit that makes Falcon particularly useful is its integration with Firefox via the Talon Firefox Extension.

So, here’s the 30-second tour:

1) After installing Talon, you’ll find a new button on your Firefox toolbar, and a new right-click/CTRL-click option on your mouse. Activate this control and you’ll be able choose between capturing areas, whole pages, or the entire application window.

2) Falcon resizing textOnce captured, your screen image is auto-loaded into the Falcon application inside your browser, complete with a small but useful suite of editing tools.

3) The toolbox allows you to add attractive, stretchable arrows, lines, squares, and circles with a simple drag and drop. As these are vectors, they remain fully editable at all times.

4) The Text tool lets you annotate your image. I must admit, I found the lack of text-size controls a little disconcerting at first. However, once you’ve become accustomed to the idea of using the scaling tool to control the size of ALL elements, — even the text — it’s all good.

5) When you’re happy with your image, you can then choose from two options: save to desktop or create an account with Aviary. The latter allows you to upload the image directly to their image hosting servers.

Though I confess I’m partly loath to add yet another image hosting service to my list, it’s hard to beat the sheer click-and-forget joy of the Falcon/Talon system. The transfer process is completely invisible, and it also autogenerates ready-to-eat markup for Twitter, BBcode, Facebook, and WordPress. Slick stuff. There’s something to be said for laziness.

Ready-to-eat codeI’ve been using Falcon for a couple of weeks now and it has quickly become a fave. True, the editing tools are relatively modest but are good enough to make your point in 95% of situations. In the other 5% of cases, jumping out to more sophisticated tools (including Aviary’s own Phoenix editor) is simple enough when required.

Most importantly, Falcon is superfast — even on modest systems — and clean, and positions itself exactly where you need it, when you need it.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Articles source: Sitepoint

Is GMail Finally Complete?

Google has a reputation for never completing a project. GMail has been around for five years but is yet to lose its “beta” tag. Docs, Calendar and many other Google services are still beta-products despite having evolved radically since their initial release.

The company’s reasoning for endless beta cycles has never been clearly explained and Google always insisted the tag would be removed once the product was ready. I suspect Google’s motivation for beta tagging is a combination of:

* it reminded users that the web application was experimental and undergoing development
* it lowered user expectations of early web systems and gave us a pleasant surprise to find fully-functional online products
* version numbers rarely have much meaning when applied to web applications and services. Unlike shrink-wrapped disk-distributed software, web solutions can be incrementally improved on a daily basis. Few people, other than the developers, will care if it’s version 7 or 57.

However, Google has finally recognised that the “beta” label has different connotations in the business world and it could be damaging their prospects. Many business users are put off because they associate the term with incomplete or untested software.

It is possible that other Google products will follow the example set by Chrome. The web browser had a beta period of just 100 days and is already at version 2, even though it was only released in September 2008. Could Google’s beta habit be over?

Has Google’s insistence on beta labels ever confused or put off any of your clients?

Article source: Sitepoint

Firefox 3.5 and the potential of Web typography

In addition to new features such as support for HTML 5, geo-location, and a noticeably faster engine, Firefox 3.5 added a new CSS rule that makes Web typography much more attractive.

@font-face is a CSS rule that allows Web designers to reference fonts not installed on end-user machines. Just as you would have a pointer to a server-based stylesheet or JavaScript file in your Web page code, you can now make reference to a hosted typeface.

You'll note that news sites such as CNET News and NYTimes.com are optimized to make Web type more readable and as stylish as possible, but there are many design possibilities via additional downloadable typefaces. (As with any linked asset, there is some level of security risk if a hacker gets their hands on the font file.)

Mozilla's John Daggett explains: Within a stylesheet, each @font-face rule defines a family name to be used, the font resource to be loaded, and the style characteristics of a given face such as whether it's bold or italic. Firefox 3.5 only downloads the fonts as needed, so a stylesheet can list a whole set of fonts of which only a select few will actually be used.

This function is something I would have expected to be commonplace by now (Safari began supporting it in Version 3.1 and Opera in Version 10) but neither have the market share to drive usage the way Firefox and Internet Explorer do. (Note: this function doesn't work in IE.)

Generally speaking, the Web browser has done a terrible job with type. We've been stuck with old standbys such as Helvetica or Times New Roman, and don't forget the oft-loathed Comic-Sans and other delightful Microsoft fonts that are often easy to read but lack any real style (Verdana, for example.)

As Ian Lynam and Craig Mod write: "Fine typography has always been one of the stumbling points of Web design. Limited at most to a handful of cross-platform specific fonts, Web designers have often found it necessary to hack their way into typographically nuanced territory."

New font possibilities won't necessarily make you more popular or a better designer, but @font-face does open the door to make Web pages much more attractive and readable without being forced in Flash or other plug-in based solutions.

This of course is provided that font developers figure out ways to make their typefaces available freely or in a manner that encourages developers to use them. From a technical perspective, Firefox 3.5 allows fonts only to be loaded for pages served from the same site. This prevents sites from freely using fonts found on other sites and gives a bit of protection, but not much.

Most commercial type foundries aren't prepared for this and generally don't have licenses that are conducive to this type of use. But there is a big opportunity to get stylish new typefaces onto browsers worldwide, provided font designers are ready to embrace an open mindset.

Article source: CNET

Just Do It! 5 Ways to Get Over the Fear of Working for Yourself

If you’re contemplating starting a business or beginning a freelance career, you may be scared to death. Let’s face it; there’s a lot to worry about. So many factors come into play when you work for yourself that you may not have to face when you’re externally employed. You may worry that:


* You will fail.
* You will not make enough money.
* It will have a negative impact on your family.
* You will end up hating it.
* You’re not disciplined enough.
* You don’t have drive.
* You’ll be selling something no one wants.
* You don’t know enough about marketing, networking or business management.

Looking at this list can be paralyzing, and you may even convince yourself that you’re not cut out for entrepreneurship. But is that really the case? If you’ve done the research, the work and the planning to position yourself for self-employed success, you can’t let the fear derail you.

Try these actions to help you control the fear and follow your dreams.

1. Make the Fear Work for You

Consider all of your worries and concerns, but instead of letting them eat at your resolve, use them to push and challenge you every step of the way.

2. Adopt a Positive Attitude

Not only is having a positive attitude a key factor of success, but the more you think with optimism, the more you will believe it and the more it will start to become an automatic part of your daily life.

3. Set Realistic Goals

Start off small and let your momentum build with time. When you set realistic and achievable goals, and evaluate them often, you will be more encouraged and confident in what you can accomplish.

4. Ask for Help

It’s hard to do anything in life completely on your own. Having the support and encouragement from family and friends and knowing people believe in you can do a lot to stifle the fear. You may even want to consider a mentor to keep you on track.

5. Be Patient

Make a plan, work hard and always do your best, but realize that it’s not going to happen overnight. If you accept that it’s a process filled with both successes and failures, it will be easier to live in the moment…and appreciate each step of your journey.

Article source: Sitepoint