All Entries Tagged With: "Writing"
Say What?
The core of freelance writing is communication. It’s a simple brief. We take facts, thoughts, opinions, and we convey them to our readership as effectively as possible. Depending on our task, we use a variety of skills to accomplish our goal, but the through line is always communication. A piece of freelance writing fails the [...]
Technical Writing and The Big Ba-
The idea of technical writing may put some freelance writers off. It sounds too much like you need to know what you’re writing about. Obviously that helps, but, depending on the specific technical area, you may be able to blag your way in with just good writing skills and a healthy dollop of common sense. [...]
The Random Insanity of America
I read a funny story a few days ago involving a guy who ended up getting shot. Okay, that doesn’t sound terribly funny. Perhaps it was just the irony of the situation. Baldrick, have you no idea what “irony” is? Yes, it’s like “goldy” and “bronzy” only it’s made out of iron. Classic Blackadder. Anyway, [...]
Grow Up
I was amused the other day to read that JK Rowling is writing her first adult fiction novel. Did you hear that, all you post-pubescent Potter fans? Her FIRST adult fiction novel. Well, doesn’t that just pee all over your fiery protestations that the Harry Potter books are not children’s books? Straight from the horse’s [...]
Bucked Off The Hobby Horse
Are you feeling a little bucked off? Did you enter freelance writing to become a famous novelist only to wind up writing thousands of SEO articles on subjects that now haunt your dreams because of their overwhelming presence in your waking day? I expect the career of many a freelance writer has started out this [...]
Fly Me To The Moon
A story on Forbes online just over a month ago was entitled “So You Want To Be A Writer? Here’s How To Make The Transition From Your Day Job”. Straight away, I felt a little irritated. I know it was intended as an attention-grabber, designed to pull readers in, because – let’s face it – [...]
Does Anyone On Board Know How to Fly a Plane?
Me want repli too coment what man writ at botum ov old post. Well, according to Bob, that should suffice. Bob has just commented on a post by Monika from September 2008 entitled “Anal Reader Behaviour” (you have a lot of catching up to do, Bob, me ol’ mucker). The comment has not been approved [...]
Freelance My Ass
I don’t have much time for euphemisms. I’m fairly straight-talking and thus like to speak and hear things as they are meant to be spoken and heard. Your writing style may be different to mine, and certain projects will not allow for on-the-nail writing no matter who you are, but my favourite newspaper articles can [...]
Amoebas
Who out there is ambitious about their writing? Who wants to write a blockbuster novel or pen a Hollywood screenplay? I don’t expect anyone will admit to it. That’s okay, I get it. No one really wants to engage when the topic of ambition rears its ugly head. It all seems a bit seedy and [...]
You Could Be A Contender
I’ve been blogging here for nearly 2 years now and for the past 18 months I’ve been pleasantly surprised, if not downright shocked, that I’ve found anything to write about. Writing about freelance writing is really a finite proposition. You can keep tweaking earlier articles, adding new slants and what you believe are fresh gems [...]
I Don’t Tolerate Much
I must be getting old. I’ve turned into a ind of curmudgeon. I’m finding that as I go along, I’m a lot less tolerant of stuff. Aren’t we supposed to mellow with age? Seems to be going the opposite direction for me. In my younger days, I think I was pretty happy-go-lucky overall. I think [...]
The Politics of Writing
We’ve all heard the admonishment to be careful what you post on Facebook and Twitter. We are reminded that employers frequently check these sites to find out about a prospective employee. Okay. I’m down with that. If all of someone’s posts indicate they are a knucklehead then as an employer I would probably have second [...]
Preparing To Write
I was having an extended Twitter session last night when one of my followers asked what I do to get focused. This got me thinking about what I do to get prepared to write. My rock-solid answer is… It depends. Sometimes I’ve got a clear vision of an inspired writing session and I just sit [...]
A Time to Write
I had a blog all ready to go until I read the latest offering from Tumblemoose. I now feel compelled to say something more than just a comment at the foot of his post. First of all, I don’t think for one second that writing skills are a “use it or lose it” affair. The [...]
Enough is Enough
In the acting profession, the old adage is that you need to be in work to get work. In other words, people will give you more work when they see what you can do. There’s also a large element of bandwagon-jumping involved; people scrambling to employ you before someone else does. That’s why certain faces [...]
Internet Killed the Writing Star
The Buggles wrote a little ditty back in 1979 called “Video Killed the Radio Star”. It bemoaned the coming age of music videos, portending a career death to all those singers and groups who had once made their living from the radio. Stupid song, really. The singers and groups all inevitably ended up making music [...]
The Ratatouille Writer
One of my daughter’s favorite movies is Ratatouille. Hence, it is one we watch often. In case you are not familiar, it is an animated story about a special rat who finds himself cooking in a famous restaurant in Paris. The name of the restaurant is Gusteau’s and the owner of the restaurant had a [...]
I Need a Vocation
What? Did I say vocation? Please, no, I have two already. God, or whoever’s in charge up there, please do not land me with another. I meant to say I need a vacation. I felt my first stirrings of a vocation shortly after arriving at London University in 1984 to supposedly read History. I say [...]
