The Proper Care and Maintenance of Twitter Hashtags for Writers

For writers, a Twitter account can provide a sense of community to what is, for much of the time, a very solitary activity. But Twitter is more than that. It enables writers to reach out, to share writing techniques, discuss trends, offer support, announce launches, reach readers…. Phew! In other words, it’s a great tool for connecting, learning and sharing.

But Twitter can quickly become overwhelming, even for the most experienced user. For the Noob (or newbie), Twitter can be frightening.

What Readers Really Want (that Publishers Fail to Understand)

Today's post comes from an old acquaintance of mine, author of speculative fiction, Saul Tanpepper.

There’s a conversation going on right now—yes, right now—between Readers and Writers:

Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want,
So tell me what you want, what you really really want,
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna really
really really wanna zigazig ha.*
Sound familiar?

What Writers Really Want (Versus What We're Often Told We Should Want)

When you start off writing, as I did, coming from a completely different field, you’re pretty susceptible to what other writers tell you. And so you should be. Who better to guide you along the long and tortuous journey to Authordom than other published writers, right? So I did my due diligence, read every writing, reading and publishing book I could get my grubby little hands on. I honed my skills, joined crit groups, solicited feedback, wrote and revised, and wrote and revised some more. And it’s all been great because I've learned a great deal about craft and people and life and myself along the way.

But there’s one thing that has always bothered the heck out of me.

Vanity Google+ URLs: A Word of Warning

I've been noticing a proliferation of vanity URLs in place of the awkward polynumeric and totally anonymous URLs G+ is assigning to its users. The vanity URLs look like

http://gplus.to/yourname
or
http://plusya/yourname
or
http://gplus.name/yourname
etc.

I personally would love to see G+ allow vanity URLs, but in the meantime, going with a third party shortening service may cause you problems down the road, and may in fact hinder search results for your profile (it's an SEO thing). There's also the potential for a vanity URL company to stop supporting the link. And I've heard of some shortened URLs leading to the wrong profiles.

If you just want shorten your G+ URL, then Google owns its own URL shortener (http://goo.gl/). What you get is no less anonymous than the polynumeric one, but it's definitely less cumbersome. For example, my assigned G+ URL is:

https://plus.google.com/104693795958410368655

but goo.gl shortened it to:

http://goo.gl/lVqoI

For a more technical explanation,check out this post from Cirruslabs.

I hate when this happens

OK, not a post about writing or even remotely related to writing (although I suppose I could always think of using it as a metaphor of writing someday). I just really liked this sign, which we found in New Zealand on our drive to Franz Josef Glacier.

The Guilt (and Freedom) of Uncircling

I just had to uncircle someone over on Google+. I feel really bad about it, especially since they're someone in my own field and it feels like a betrayal. But I threw him out, blocked his posts and essentially blacklisted him from my life. Why? Because he was flooding my stream with garbage. If I wanted that, I'd read JA Konrath's Twitter stream-- not him, but all the people who follow him. Seriously, do you realy think I want to know your every thought? Do you really think everyone you're sharing with really wants to know the latest breaking back-page news?

Then why are you cluttering my space and time with it?

I've been on Google+ now for almost 2 weeks and I really like it. I mean, I really, realy like it. I love the humor; I love the relevant editorials and advice; I love the snarkiness. But most of all, I love the fact that pretty much everyone there gets it. Sure, I don't mind the occasional photo of the pet, the occasional update on the kids or what you had for dinner (looks good, by the way). These are things that make it worth connecting and sharing with you; they make you more human, not just a bunch of digitized content delivered to me over the ether. And, yes, every once in a while, I'll share such nonsense with you, too. Once in a while. But I'm trying to work here, and if you're constantly getting in my way of doing that, then it's not worth having you around.

What do you think? Am I being too harsh? Or do I have unrealistic expectations for this newest social media platform?

Twitter and Google Plus: Shouting out to (or over) the crowd

As much as I love being on Twitter and the feeling it gives me of being able to connect to others who share my interests, sometimes it feels a bit like an exercise in futility. I don't say much; I'm a man of few words (except on paper, or screen), so when I do have something to say I like it to count. I extend the same courtesy to others, even fretting that I can't see everything being said by the people I follow. I worry when the people who follow me are streaming the tweets of a thousand other tweeps as well. Do my words get heeded when, mere seconds after posting them, they're already lost in the barrage of 140-character quips and quotes?

It makes me wonder if anyone is even listening anymore, if we're all just shouting into the chaos, hoping to be heard above the din. I know I'm not the only one who thinks this. I've been told by many others that to be heard, you have to shout louder and more often.

I've been on Google+ now for a week and so far I like it better, in part because it's still new and there are a lot fewer people on it. Even so, it's a definite improvement over Twitter. I like how you can share more and your followers can comment directly within the stream of the post. It's much more...responsive. I feel like I can actually catch my breath, comment, and people will actually see what I've said. For now. But the "crowd noise" is eventually going to take over like it did on Twitter. Already I can see it happening. We're flooding the world with our thought pollution, saying everything that's on our minds with little consideration to self-censorship.

What's the remedy? I don't know. It's not more shouting, though. It's not more spewage.

I think maybe it's saying something that people want to heed. If you say something of importance, it will find its audience. Your words will cut through the fray.

At least, I hope they will.