
The writing interest paradox - xylon
http://www.naughtycomputer.uk/writing_interest_paradox.html
======
Pitarou
I think this is one of Stack Exchange's great successes: persuading
knowledgeable people to answer beginners' questions. There are plenty of other
things going on there, too, but that's part of the success story.

~~~
thr0waway1239
If you are familiar with Jon Skeet (who last time I saw had #1 rep on
StackOverflow), I will add one more - the most knowledgeable people frequently
were also just damn good writers.

You can quite literally see the evolution in Jon's answers - as time went by
his recent answers started becoming better. Today, most of his answers a) have
almost zero ambiguity and b) round off the knowledge you gained by adding a
few related points, preventing future ambiguity too.

Obviously I am a big fan of his writing, but I think he puts a lot of effort
into his answers and even reflecting on those answers. For example, I saw an
interview where he mentions the tradeoff between precision and concision in
writing, and then making it readable on top of that! Very, very few people can
succeed on all three fronts in technical writing.

~~~
Pitarou
I reckon this is another interesting consequence of the feedback system. Stack
Exchange encourages fair writers to get really good, and discourages poor
writers until they give up.

> Very, very few people can succeed on all three fronts in technical writing.

Indeed! A successful writer needn't be a brilliant writer. It's more important
that they know which combinations of precision, concision and readability they
can achieve, and they select the combination that is best suited to the task
at hand.

More talented writers can achieve better trade offs, but even Vladimir Nabokov
would get downvoted if he answered a hello world question with exhaustive
documentation of compiler flags.

------
soared
I've absolutely noticed this. The only reason I write blog posts now are to
(1) show off a project that I'm surprised I was capable of completing or (2)
"bullshitting" about marketing because my work pays me $50 a post.

I would add a third explanation: Too technical for laymen, not technical
enough for cutting edge experts. I sure do know a lot about my field, but the
things I would write about are too complicated for beginners, and have been
done before by experts. But I can definitely toss out a hypothetical and write
500 words about it once a week..

~~~
JasonSage
There was a recent episode of the Bikeshed podcast where the hosts had Sandi
Metz on as a guest for their RubyConf panel. At one point they took an
audience question along the lines of "What should I do a talk on? I'm sure
everybody already knows whatever I'm going to talk about."

Sandi Metz had a great answer. Something like "What have you learned in the
last year? Do your talk on that. No matter where you are now, there's somebody
out there now who is where you were a year ago. They still have those things
to learn."

I think this is a really healthy way of looking at blog posts as well. You may
say what you want to write about is too complicated for beginners but been
done before by experts, but that also means there are plenty of people out
there that just don't know it yet, even though they are ready. It doesn't
matter if you've been in your technical field 2 years or 10, there are other
people out there just behind you waiting to learn the same things you have.

If you wrote about everything that came to mind in this manner I am sure you'd
have some writing that goes over some basic stuff, but also writing that is
extremely relevant to some readers and will help them immensely.

~~~
vog
I've had a similar experience. I occasionally give talks, and often my best
talks were about topics where I didn't have to prepare much, because I'm
deeply familar their topic.

It's a win-win situation. Preparation mostly reduces to deciding on the order
of topics. Maybe researching some details I don't feel confident about. Maybe
drawing some diagrams and/or looking for nice pictures. That's it.

The only "trick" is to have an audience to which my topic is all news.

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CM30
Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like it's perfectly possible to be
interested in something and yet still have a lot of experience in the subject
matter. Lots of experts want to share their knowledge either to help the field
move along a bit or to get more people interested in whatever their expertise
is in.

The person on YouTube that makes tons of videos about the minute technical
details of Super Mario 64 and talks about half button presses and parallel
universes is obviously highly interested in the game and its mechanics and
also has a lot of experience with it.

There are people whose main passion remains the same for 20+ years and who
never get bored of learning more and more about the same subject till they
retire or die.

And no, I don't think objectivity must be passionless or bore the reader. It's
possible to present 'just the facts' in a way that's enjoyable to read and
doesn't try and pass off any viewpoints as objective. A good nature
documentary could still be interesting to watch after all.

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unabst
You can be inexperienced and still be completely objective, and vice versa.
Objectivity is the skill, and experience is the asset. Interest is also a
separate asset. The author seems to assume we get bored and lose interest with
experience, which is observable, but I think this rings truer with
entertainment (games) rather than craft (art, music, programming).

I wish I could be more entertaining, but the truth is not that exciting.
That's probably another writing paradox. Most of our entertainment is fiction.

(Personally, I write to think and to document. There is also no way of knowing
what people think of your thoughts if you don't share them.)

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rdtsc
That's basically why I don't have a blog. I know I would end up with a few
posts and then a multi-year gap in it.

But I like discussions on HN. There is just enough variety and interesting mix
of topics. Also the style is more conversational, while a blog is more
narrative (fire-side chat vs a presentation in front of an audience).

There should be an "HN-post-history-to-blog-format" library or service. Maybe
something that picks the most interesting discussions in last X years.

~~~
aethertron
That sounds like a cool idea. HN has an API [0] ... not sure if this is
possible or allowed though.

[0] [https://github.com/HackerNews/API](https://github.com/HackerNews/API)

Also, there's nothing really wrong with having a blog with no recent updates.
I know there's this idea that a blog needs to be regularly updated. But a blog
with just 2 valuable posts made 2 years ago, is a valuable thing!

If you just want to write some stuff and put it online, without the feeling of
some ongoing obligation -- here are a few options:

[https://medium.com/@jason.sackey/apps-for-super-fast-web-
pub...](https://medium.com/@jason.sackey/apps-for-super-fast-web-
publishing-e1e3d96756e9#.3oq3y2q9t)

I hope you will be encouraged to post some stuff.

~~~
rdtsc
Thanks!

------
pjc50
Objectivity is not only overrated, but the desire for it is part of the
problem here. Objectivity must be passionless, which bores the reader.

It's also very hard to achieve, which is why you find people going around
calling themselves "objective" when they're just refusing to acknowledge their
prejudices and privileges.

------
Mz
I think there is some truth to this, but it isn't universally true. I have
spent a lot of years trying to sort out certain things and I am finding myself
blogging more these days on various topics. I remain interested in exploring
and communicating about a number of different things.

Different strokes for different folks.

------
aethertron
I like this author's style. I don't think he's shown that blogging is a doomed
project.

Having interest in a topic may compromise one's objectivity. But we can become
aware of this, and correct for it. Other people's viewpoints can be helpful
here.

And having experience in a topic doesn't necessarily mean you're bored of it.
I've been web-developing for ~5 years and there's a whole bunch of stuff here
I want to explore and write about.

Regarding writing for the sake of money, Schopenhauer had some commentary:

[https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/essays/...](https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/essays/chapter1.html)

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glenndebacker
At work we are forced to spend some of our free time writing "commercial
interesting" articles mostly of topics that doesn't say a lot to me. It's
something that I (and a lot of my coworkers) dread a lot.

On the other hand I have my own blog where I have the freedom to write about
what I want and when I want. I'm having a lot more fun when writing for the
latter.

I also get a lot more reactions regarding articles that I write for my own so
I assume that fun or interest also shows in the quality of my writings.

------
cousin_it
That's why it's a good idea to ask some experienced folks for feedback on your
passionate writing before showing it to the public. The internet sentiment of
"yay we don't need editors or reviewers" is certainly inspiring, but it also
leads to a lot of writing that's passionate and wrong.

------
hliyan
I think the reverse becomes true when you replace "writing" with "speaking"
\-- most people love to talk about things they have a lot of experience in. So
the solution would be... videos and podcasts?

------
jbpetersen
Two possible exceptions:

Posts that are intended as a launching point for critical discussion.

Posts that journal a learning process such as an original project.

------
ForFreedom
That 2-3 mins read on black background and green font killed my eye for a
second there.

Anyone else got the feel?

~~~
wodenokoto
Both Firefox and safari come with a built-in feature to display Web articles
in a readable manner.

Almost every article I read on the Web benefit from using this function, and
I'd recommend you start using it too, and save yourself from looking at the
next horribly layed out article.

~~~
Chinjut
What is the function called? And is there a Chrome equivalent, by any chance?

