4 ms·

Does this count as "Writing"? I write comments on HN, am I doing the "good" kind of writing? * Nobody (and I mean nobody) is asking me to write comments, * I

Does this count as "Writing"? I write comments on HN, am I doing the "good" kind of writing? * Nobody (and I mean nobody) is asking me to write comments, * I'm not documenting anything (perhaps my opinion on something), and * I am vastly under-qualified to write about the topics I "write" about. Does tweeting count? Does commenting on Reddit/Facebook/LinkedIn/MySpace/etc. count? If so, I think maybe it's time we give those platforms (and indeed this one) more respect; they're places that encourage people who wouldn't ever write for its own sake a way to express themselves through the written word.

abathur 4y ago
It can and it can't, I think. A lot of the value of writing is ~exponential, when you have enough to say that you have to start weighing structure. What to say first and last; what to leave out. It's value created by wrestling with yourself about what you think, why, whether anyone else would care, and how to make them. You can do this on social platforms. But you can also just poot out some brainfarts and scoot out of the room before anyone notices.
rollinDyno 4y ago
This is an interesting line of questioning. I value writing for similar reasons offered by the article, and I am very much invested in note taking methodology. I never thought of commenting as a way of note-taking. However, it makes a lot of sense to use one’s comment history as a way of looking back. It’s actually very contextualized. I was never someone to comment much, because I thought there was no value for other people in what I have to say. Alas, looking at it as a note-taking endeavor should definitely have insightful returns.
- cwalv 4y ago
  > I was never someone to comment much, because I thought there was no value for other people in what I have to say. I think this as well: if my thoughts are already well represented in other comments, or in popular/common thought in general, what's the point of repeating it? And if it's not popular/common, it's a lot of effort to articulate in a way that has a good chance of not being dismissed, and could even be inflammatory.
  - Juliate 4y ago
    Yes. And still, there's 1) an interesting parallel with art/creation, and 2) something missing in the web toolkit for people. 1) when you (want to) create something (whatever the discipline), it seems that everyone faces this dread that what they are doing is either not popular, or just too common and used, so what's the point in creating/doing it? When it might still be essential to do it first for oneself, because the prize is in the practice itself, not the by-product that is the result. Writing is thinking, so are 2) the idea of comments trail as a thought archive is good! I wish there was an integrated way (as integrated as "View Source") in browsers not only to comment (so publicly write something) about web documents or elements, but to annotate them - for private use first, with the option of making them public on a personal site (yes, there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation but...)
    - rollinDyno 4y ago
      I think hypothes.is is the nearest thing.
Juliate 4y ago
It does, if only in the sense of "writing as thinking". Stating something out of oneself does help to consider it objectively, not only subjectively inside your mind, before it even gets confronted to others' understanding. It all participates in refining the connections around the thing you're writing about, for you, and for others.

abathur 4y ago

It can and it can't, I think. A lot of the value of writing is ~exponential, when you have enough to say that you have to start weighing structure. What to say first and last; what to leave out. It's value created by wrestling with yourself about what you think, why, whether anyone else would care, and how to make them. You can do this on social platforms. But you can also just poot out some brainfarts and scoot out of the room before anyone notices.

rollinDyno 4y ago

This is an interesting line of questioning. I value writing for similar reasons offered by the article, and I am very much invested in note taking methodology. I never thought of commenting as a way of note-taking. However, it makes a lot of sense to use one’s comment history as a way of looking back. It’s actually very contextualized. I was never someone to comment much, because I thought there was no value for other people in what I have to say. Alas, looking at it as a note-taking endeavor should definitely have insightful returns.

cwalv 4y ago
> I was never someone to comment much, because I thought there was no value for other people in what I have to say. I think this as well: if my thoughts are already well represented in other comments, or in popular/common thought in general, what's the point of repeating it? And if it's not popular/common, it's a lot of effort to articulate in a way that has a good chance of not being dismissed, and could even be inflammatory.
- Juliate 4y ago
  Yes. And still, there's 1) an interesting parallel with art/creation, and 2) something missing in the web toolkit for people. 1) when you (want to) create something (whatever the discipline), it seems that everyone faces this dread that what they are doing is either not popular, or just too common and used, so what's the point in creating/doing it? When it might still be essential to do it first for oneself, because the prize is in the practice itself, not the by-product that is the result. Writing is thinking, so are 2) the idea of comments trail as a thought archive is good! I wish there was an integrated way (as integrated as "View Source") in browsers not only to comment (so publicly write something) about web documents or elements, but to annotate them - for private use first, with the option of making them public on a personal site (yes, there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation but...)
  - rollinDyno 4y ago
    I think hypothes.is is the nearest thing.

Juliate 4y ago

It does, if only in the sense of "writing as thinking". Stating something out of oneself does help to consider it objectively, not only subjectively inside your mind, before it even gets confronted to others' understanding. It all participates in refining the connections around the thing you're writing about, for you, and for others.