owning your own content

Feb 9, 2017 ∞

"Thread" Dread

I don’t mind people posting a tweetstorm, wherein they have a lot to say and do so via a series of linked tweets. I think there are better ways to do it; better places to host medium-length pieces of writing,¹ but whatever works for you.

And of course I don’t mind other people tweeting a link to the top of the thread and urging others to read it.

But I really don’t care for the habit of doing so while saying nothing other than, “Thread.”

I mean, come on, people: if it’s worth linking to, it’s worth writing few words to tell us why you think we should read it.

This post could fit in five or six tweets. I suppose I should have posted it that way. Except #OwnYourContent.

Actually the typical tweetstorm is probably still quite short. ↩︎

Jan 19, 2017 ∞

Syndication

Further on owning your own content, I practise what some call POSSE: Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere. One of the elsewheres, as I’ve mentioned before, is Medium.

Medium, though having troubles recently, is in part a platform that other publications can use to build their own sites.

After yesterday’s Politics and Poetry post, I got an email this morning from somebody called Steve Saul, telling me that a new Medium-based publication called EveryVote would like to use my piece.

EveryVote is made by the people who make a site called mycongressionalrep.org, which helps people find and get in touch with their representatives in Congress. A bit like They Work for You over here, I guess, but with a specific stated aim of resisting the Trump regime.

Obviously I’m broadly in favour of their goals, so I had no problem with saying yes to their using my piece. Though it occurs to me that it’s bad professional-writing practice, as they didn’t even suggest payment (and I must admit I didn’t think of it till now). But let’s face it, I’m not a professional writer, even if I’d like to be. And the possibility that more people might come here and read my stuff, or at least read my stuff on Medium, is a genuine one.

“Doing it for the exposure,” to an extent. But not so much, since I had already done it. Anyway, my piece is currently visible on EveryVote