Please Don’t Feed the Writer

My goal in this installment is to show how you can use the World Wide Web as an idea tool for your stories, blog entries or whatever else you happen to be writing.  Everyone knows that you can use the Internet to play games, view pictures, chat or check the weather.  Most writers know how powerful it can be as a research tool as well.  There are a myriad of helpful web sites available, regardless of the genre you write in, or your topic of the moment.

Can you use the web as a brainstorming catalyst?  Yes, if you use the right tools.

The tool I use as a brainstorming inspirational medium is StumbleUpon.  StumbleUpon is a social bookmarking service, much like digg or Technorati.  All of these tools allow you to add sites that you like to a list of favorites, keep track of the sites that are most popular with their subscribers and browse through the hot topics of the day, but StumbleUpon has a distinct advantage in the realm of brainstorming, they call it Stumbling.

Once you’ve signed up for a free StumbleUpon account, then fill in your interests in your profile.  Then you’ve got the option to install their toolbar in either IE or Firefox.  Install it, then click on the “Stumble!” button.   This will take you to a website that your preferences suggest you’ll be interested in.  If so, click the “thubms up” button to save it to your StumbleUpon favorites and click “Stumble” again.

Each time you give a site a Thumbs up or thumbs down, StumbleUpon refines the sites that it guides you to, which gives you the opportunity to view places and gather new ideas and inspiration.  As a plus, if you give a site a “thumbs Up”, you’re letting other people know that you liked the site and giving them the opportunity to visit it as well.

As an example, My interests are writing, recipes, cooking, guitars and humor. I click the “Stumble” button in my toolbar and:

• The first site is of no interest to me whatsoever, Thumbs Down
• The next is a blog entry titled “I’m too poor for Bisquick Biscuits“  that I think isinteresting and a bit funny, thumbs Up!
• The next site is called “Writer’s Resources and Links For Writers” Thumbs up, they’ve got some good information here, and I’ll probably be blogging about it soon, so it’s good to have it in my favorites.

My interests are pretty varied, so I end up with quite a variety, but I think you’ll see the value here.  If you focus your interests on just those topics that really inspire you, StumbleUpon can be incredibly useful in generating ideas, inspiration, adn occasionlly just a good laugh.  Give it a shot, I think you’ll be surprised.

Can magazine writing help you as a writer? I’ve always thought so, especially if you write nonfiction. Apparently W. Terry Whalin thinks so too. His article on right-writing.com titled Magazine Writing Leads to Book Publishing covers the topic in an informative and no-nonsense way that I’m sure will benefit a lot of writers out there.

While you’re there, be sure to look over some of Mr. Whalin’s other articles, and take the time to check his research materials.  Everything is incredibly well thought out and definitely worth the read.

Continuing on my theme of great style resources, I’ve stumbled on yet another great place, BetterEditor.org. Not only does BetterEditor offer a full list of style guides, but lists of good software, writer’s resources and more.

I was pleasantly surprised at how comprehensive the site is, and definitely recommend giving it a look.

I’ve mentioned before that I feel that PayPerPost is one of the best methods a blogger can use to generate revenue through their site, and I’ve just gotten word that the folks at PPP just pulled in another whoppin’ chunk of capital to keep things moving along.

For those who scoff at paid blogging, let me say this; Revenue from PayPerPost has allowed me to upgrade my server architecture and is singlehandedly paying for all of my hosting and bandwidth charges. Yes they pay people to advertise on blogs. I feel that this can be a very good thing. It keeps good bloggers working harder to bring YOU, the reader quality stuff to fill your gray matter.

I also feel strongly that as long as the “Posties” monitor what they’re willing to write about that the model will continue to work, and if not, people will just stop reading blogs that are set up simply for the sake of advertising. I’ve personally turned down hundreds of dollars worth of opportunities that just don’t fit either of the blogs I’m approved for, and i’ll continue to do so if i can’t see a benefit for my readers. (Yes, I see this as a benefit. Go sign up and make a buck or two yourself!)

The press release follows, with some of my thoughts afterward:

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I mentioned the AP Style Guide in a previous post, but honestly, knowledge is power and the more references you have at your disposal the better prepared you are. (If you use them, that is.)

The Economist Style guide is based on the style book given to all journalists at the Economist magazine, and is a great source of information if you’re looking to produce some very concise articles or just improve your writing skills in general. The guide covers topics ranging from metaphors and jargon to common spelling problems and pluralization in an easy to navigate format, with definitions that are far simpler to understand than the ones I remember from my high school textbooks.

If you just have to have your reference books on the desktop next to you, the economist has a bound version of the guide available for purchase on the same page.

I’ll post more tools like this as I find them. I hope that it helps your writing!

If you’re anything like the writer’s I know, you probably read just about everything you can get your hands on. If you’d rather not pay full price for those reference books or books by your favorite authors, try clicking over to Coupon Chief for some great discount coupon codes for your favorite online stores.

Why pay full price if you don’t have to? Coupon Chief makes it easy to get some great Amazon Deals that you might not be able to find anywhere else, at the very least you can get free shipping. And if you’re looking for something other than books they’re still worth a look with over 1,000 online stores to choose from.

I came across an article the other day that covers the basics of writing an outstanding article. While the information is primarily geared towards writing web content for blogs, I think that the information provided there translates equally for freelance article writers as well.

So pop on over and take a look at Writing an Outstanding Article. It’s worth the read.

If you’ve been on the Internet for any length of time, you’ve heard that spyware is something you’d like to avoid, and nothing could be more true. Spyware can have many downsides, from slowing your computer to a crawl to allowing an outsider access to your financial records. It’s not something you want to toy with.

I’ve always used software to keep my computer protected, but I once set up a computer for my kids and the spyware software was somhow disabled. the results were nothing short of memorable.

I wasn’t worried about identity theft in this case, as the system was locked down with parental control settings and segregated from the rest of our home network. but somehow my son had managed to load the machine down with every imaginable piece of spyware out there, from toolbars to cursor-changers and other seemingly innocent toys, all of which were, at the very least, tracking each and every website he and my other kids visited.

I wouldn’t have been aware that there was a problem if he hadn’t told me that his system was running slowly. Terribly slowly. As a matter of fact, there were so many intrusive pieces of software on the system that I couldn’t even run my regular spyware removal software to get rid of it. I had to reinstall everything from scratch.

Talk about a wasted Saturday.

There are new tools available to combat this menace. Tools that would have prevented this problem from ever occurring by blocking the spyware before it ever had a chance to install on the system. The most comprehensive I’ve found so far is Spy Sweeper. I wish I’d had that then, it would have saved me and my family a lot of grief.

Spy Sweeper is award winning anti-spyware software that monitors your computer, and in the event that it detects a threat, it will stop the nasty little spyware infested program from installing in the first place. I definitely recommend running this in conjunction with your AntiVirus software.

Be safe, spyware can compromise your system and allow other people to get information you don’t want them to have. At its most benign, it’s collecting information about the sites that you visit without your permission, that’s just wrong, and you can stop it by using products like Spy Sweeper.

Don’t let spyware get you.

Amazingly enough, spam seems to be good for something. I was double-checking my junk mail folder and came across this line in the body of an email. (for those that don’t know, this text is usually hidden in spam, and is only there to fool your spam filter, but I digress.)

The thought:

“Rock journalism is people who can’t write, interviewing people who can’t talk, for people who can’t read.” - Frank Zappa

How true is this!