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Great comment, thanks! My assertion is rather glib, however underlying it is this suggestion: If you have a choice between writing blog post and thinking abou

Great comment, thanks! My assertion is rather glib, however underlying it is this suggestion: If you have a choice between writing blog post and thinking about a process for handling feedback and self-improvement, I say write the blog post first and work out what to do with teh feedback when you have it. When I started pro to-blogging in 2004 by publishing raw HTML on a web server, I did not have a process. I still don't if you compare me to people like Jeff Atwood who (used to) blog on a schedule and could easily articulate things like his market demographics. I suggest that while it's better to be Jeff than Reg, it's still better to be Reg than Unknown. Of course, we probably agree on this as well.

knowtheory 15y ago
Yep! I agree that it's always better to write something than nothing. But, sometimes it's not much more. You have to have some basic levels of quality and coherence of thought to get picked up to the point where you actually have readers. And until that point, you're out shopping your content around yourself, asking your friends what they think. That's a process i find challenging unless i'm proud (at some level) of what i have written. Perhaps another angle on this is, you see a lot of good writers saying that all that they needed to do is write more. I have to wonder if there's an element of self-selection in such statements. All that said, i need to spend more time writing both code and prose. ;)
blasdel 15y ago
It is not ever better to be Jeff — what poverty of thought! I've enjoyed your blog thoroughly for the last 6 years or so, but I would much rather you be Reg to a smaller audience and Unknown to me than be Jeff to the world.
gnosis 15y ago
"I suggest that while it's better to be Jeff than Reg, it's still better to be Reg than Unknown." That depends on what you have to say, and on what your goals are. If what you say is controversial enough, you could make more enemies than friends. Alternatively, you could just expose that what you have to say is worthless garbage, or that you're an idiot. (I'm not referring to you personally, of course, just to writers in general) Of course, some believe bad publicity is better than no publicity, but I'm not so sure that's true. It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. -- George Eliot If a young writer can refrain from writing, he shouldn't hesitate to do so. -- André Gide I occasionally play works by contemporary composers, and for two reasons. First, to discourage the composer from writing any more, and secondly to remind myself how much I appreciate Beethoven. -- Jascha Heifetz
- raganwald 15y ago
  I don't know about controversy, but exposing yourself as an idiot is a very low risk, and has even lower likelihood of negative consequences. If I write something idiotic, and someone posts in on HN, it never makes it to the front page. This can happen 99 times in a row. AFAIK, there is no penalty for writing idiotic things, there is no ban applied to my blog. I think the kinds of things you are quoting are archaic. They belong to a world of books, where people write four or ten or at twenty books in a career, and each one is precious and carries with it much reputation. I don't see the same thing with blogging at all. Even if it was, so what? If you're young and make mistakes, who cares? Are you afraid that some day, someone will say "He's an experienced guy, but when he was nineteen he wrote a piece of garbage?" Self-censoring because you are an idiot or inexperienced makes no sense whatsoever: If you don't trust yourself to speak, how do you trust yourself to know whether what you have to say is interesting? Reputation is asymmetrical. People start companies and fail many times, but one success makes a career. While I was writing garbage in 2004, people told me that I had no idea what I was talking about, and then one day in 2005 I wrote a rant called "What I've Learned From Failure," and immediately everyone forgot the garbage. http://weblog.raganwald.com/2005/01/what-ive-learned-from-failure.html http://weblog.raganwald.com/2005/01/what-ive-learned-from-fa... Should I really have waited a year to write that? How would I know to write that piece but not to write "Are you a perfectionist?," which I wrote the week before? How would I know to write that one but not "Passionate Communication," which I wrote the following week?
  - gnosis 15y ago
    "there is no penalty for writing idiotic things" There might not be an obvious, direct penalty, like someone charging you money for every essay that wastes their time or which they find insultingly stupid. But there could be indirect penalties, such as a potential employer reading and disliking what you wrote and not offering you a job based on it. There could be other social penalties as well. And it's not like the people who snub you because of what you wrote are necessarily going to tell you that your writing was the cause. You might never know; but that doesn't mean there was no penalty. "I think the kinds of things you are quoting are archaic. They belong to a world of books, where people write four or ten or at twenty books in a career, and each one is precious and carries with it much reputation." What you write on the internet could have a much larger impact on your reputation than what one used to be able to get away with in the print world. It used to be that if you wrote something that sucked and yet still somehow managed to get it published, it wouldn't sell much, and it would be forgotten. Now whatever you write (on the internet especially, but also in print) may never be forgotten, and could haunt you for the rest of your life. So the potential consequences for yourself are quite a bit more severe than they were when those quotes were written. The other thing to consider is your reader, and the harm you do to them by publishing crap. You could be wasting a lot of people's times, if they actually read it. (Again, I'm using "you" in the general sense, not you in particular. For all I know, your writing could be marvelous) There's already a ton of garbage published, and more garbage is published every day. Do you really need to contribute to the tidal wave of crap? Now, there's a difference between writing a lot for yourself, stuff that no one else would ever see, and things that you actually publish. Writing a lot in private could at least make you a better writer. But it might be a good idea to be a bit more selective about what you actually publish. There's something to be said for publishing just the gems, rather than everything and anything that happens to come out of your mouth.
daniel71l 15y ago
while the quotes are of very interesting people, my belief is different: http://design-to-last.com/2011/06/shut-up-and-write/ http://design-to-last.com/2011/06/shut-up-and-write/

knowtheory 15y ago

Yep! I agree that it's always better to write something than nothing. But, sometimes it's not much more. You have to have some basic levels of quality and coherence of thought to get picked up to the point where you actually have readers. And until that point, you're out shopping your content around yourself, asking your friends what they think. That's a process i find challenging unless i'm proud (at some level) of what i have written. Perhaps another angle on this is, you see a lot of good writers saying that all that they needed to do is write more. I have to wonder if there's an element of self-selection in such statements. All that said, i need to spend more time writing both code and prose. ;)

blasdel 15y ago

It is not ever better to be Jeff — what poverty of thought! I've enjoyed your blog thoroughly for the last 6 years or so, but I would much rather you be Reg to a smaller audience and Unknown to me than be Jeff to the world.

gnosis 15y ago

"I suggest that while it's better to be Jeff than Reg, it's still better to be Reg than Unknown." That depends on what you have to say, and on what your goals are. If what you say is controversial enough, you could make more enemies than friends. Alternatively, you could just expose that what you have to say is worthless garbage, or that you're an idiot. (I'm not referring to you personally, of course, just to writers in general) Of course, some believe bad publicity is better than no publicity, but I'm not so sure that's true. It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. -- George Eliot If a young writer can refrain from writing, he shouldn't hesitate to do so. -- André Gide I occasionally play works by contemporary composers, and for two reasons. First, to discourage the composer from writing any more, and secondly to remind myself how much I appreciate Beethoven. -- Jascha Heifetz

raganwald 15y ago
I don't know about controversy, but exposing yourself as an idiot is a very low risk, and has even lower likelihood of negative consequences. If I write something idiotic, and someone posts in on HN, it never makes it to the front page. This can happen 99 times in a row. AFAIK, there is no penalty for writing idiotic things, there is no ban applied to my blog. I think the kinds of things you are quoting are archaic. They belong to a world of books, where people write four or ten or at twenty books in a career, and each one is precious and carries with it much reputation. I don't see the same thing with blogging at all. Even if it was, so what? If you're young and make mistakes, who cares? Are you afraid that some day, someone will say "He's an experienced guy, but when he was nineteen he wrote a piece of garbage?" Self-censoring because you are an idiot or inexperienced makes no sense whatsoever: If you don't trust yourself to speak, how do you trust yourself to know whether what you have to say is interesting? Reputation is asymmetrical. People start companies and fail many times, but one success makes a career. While I was writing garbage in 2004, people told me that I had no idea what I was talking about, and then one day in 2005 I wrote a rant called "What I've Learned From Failure," and immediately everyone forgot the garbage. http://weblog.raganwald.com/2005/01/what-ive-learned-from-failure.html http://weblog.raganwald.com/2005/01/what-ive-learned-from-fa... Should I really have waited a year to write that? How would I know to write that piece but not to write "Are you a perfectionist?," which I wrote the week before? How would I know to write that one but not "Passionate Communication," which I wrote the following week?
- gnosis 15y ago
  "there is no penalty for writing idiotic things" There might not be an obvious, direct penalty, like someone charging you money for every essay that wastes their time or which they find insultingly stupid. But there could be indirect penalties, such as a potential employer reading and disliking what you wrote and not offering you a job based on it. There could be other social penalties as well. And it's not like the people who snub you because of what you wrote are necessarily going to tell you that your writing was the cause. You might never know; but that doesn't mean there was no penalty. "I think the kinds of things you are quoting are archaic. They belong to a world of books, where people write four or ten or at twenty books in a career, and each one is precious and carries with it much reputation." What you write on the internet could have a much larger impact on your reputation than what one used to be able to get away with in the print world. It used to be that if you wrote something that sucked and yet still somehow managed to get it published, it wouldn't sell much, and it would be forgotten. Now whatever you write (on the internet especially, but also in print) may never be forgotten, and could haunt you for the rest of your life. So the potential consequences for yourself are quite a bit more severe than they were when those quotes were written. The other thing to consider is your reader, and the harm you do to them by publishing crap. You could be wasting a lot of people's times, if they actually read it. (Again, I'm using "you" in the general sense, not you in particular. For all I know, your writing could be marvelous) There's already a ton of garbage published, and more garbage is published every day. Do you really need to contribute to the tidal wave of crap? Now, there's a difference between writing a lot for yourself, stuff that no one else would ever see, and things that you actually publish. Writing a lot in private could at least make you a better writer. But it might be a good idea to be a bit more selective about what you actually publish. There's something to be said for publishing just the gems, rather than everything and anything that happens to come out of your mouth.

daniel71l 15y ago

while the quotes are of very interesting people, my belief is different: http://design-to-last.com/2011/06/shut-up-and-write/ http://design-to-last.com/2011/06/shut-up-and-write/