Internet words

Recently, I've been reading a lot of my life is average. And in due fashion, I came up with my own. [My life is so average, though I doubt my submissions would be posted]

Yesterday, I went to a sausage sizzle [nothing unusual here] and the pretty young man asked me if I would like my sausage straight or diagonal on the bread. MLIA

That made me think. When doing things in the marketplace or in any sort of advertising, people must ensure that the needs and wants of others are taken into account.

In a way, writing for the internet is much like the being the [pretty] man handing out sausages. [see what I did there]

I thought i'd relate e-writing to one of my favorite topics, food.

1. The internet is in real-time. Newspapers and magazines are not. If a reader has a query about a story they can comment on it straightaway. On websites like stuff.co.nz readers can post questions and comments instantly. With newspapers, the reader's rants and concerns might not be published till the next day. Much like the man with the sausages, I can give instant feedback if my snack was undercooked.

2. The internet is like a food court. There are millions and billions of sites people could go to. You need to attract them to yours. Much like signage, there's certain things that make your site attractive. According to a somewhat ditzy magazine exec, "pictures are the new words". Why use 1000s of words when one picture will suffice. Same goes for site navigation, make it easy for readers to traverse your site.

3. E-writing needs to be timely. Picture this: you go to your favourite fish and chip shop [insert different food type here] to get your weekly fix. But when you get it the food is cold, shriveled and smells off. It would make you mad, right? Likewise, no one likes logging onto their favourite news site to see information that broke in the media weeks ago. Keep it timely and fresh, because there's plenty of other sites to go to. The best thing about the net is that content is updateable. As new information comes in you can post it.

4. It needs to be casual. Not too casual however, we all know about my love for punctuation and spelling mistake websites. If writing for the internet was a restaurant, it would be more smart casual than black-tie. The tip here is to make it conversational and less formal than a newspaper.

5. Don't overwhelm readers. We all know daunting it is when faced with a ginormous menu. With this fact in mind, make it easy for your readers. Place text into easy to read paragraphs not 1 huge block. If in doubt think of chocolate - no one [that I'm aware of] eats a family sized block in one bite. That's why it's in segments. Let that fact inspire your writing - several little parts rather than a BIG part.

E-writing is a bit like making a Soufflé, it may fall flat the first few times, but just follow some tips and keep trying.

Dear Erica... I mean, Dangeresque...

Some people I think I am dangerous, I am not. By anymeans. Some people, however are. I may have survived the past 2 weeks on nothing more than rice and lentils but I am in no way risky. My limit is going to SEX-ercise, and now it't been changed to "goddess" class, so I sound way less cool slash dangerous slash bad. Now it just sounds like some women's empowerment class.
Once upon a time I was crazy and wild. I used to find myself at a good amount of random parties, random cars and hanging with random people. I once found myself hanging out by a stove for *no* apparant reason with a internationally famous dj at someone's flat in South City. I must reiterate it was for "no" apparant reason. Danger? I laughed in the face of danger. Camping in the snow, bathroom parties, mightnight walks. Likewise I found myself hitching to Timaru with a truck carrying frozen meat in the back and live rabbits in the cab. Bar hopping at 16, then instead of paying $10 divided by 4 for a taxi we'd just walk... several kms.

Geeky things I enjoy:

1. wearning my pjs as much as humanly possible (And yes, I do have a onesie pjama suit, however they do not make adult ones with feet.)

2. Planning meals. I have my next 15 dinner meals planned, and a good number of lunches

3. Cutting out good recipies and pasting them into a book. There must be more of us on the internet? Links wanted. I know of one other person who delights in this practice, needless to say we are friends.

4. Reading self development books. I, however detest calling them self-help. I have a good number of them.

5. Reading books because I think I should. I know certain books should be read, because that's just what you do. Eg Lolita, War and Peace and Picture of Dorian Grey; which is co-incidently beign made into a movie. That they hope to attract teenagers to. Good Luck guys.


Misc: having a tea pot collection, silky scarf collection, soaking my own lentils/chickpeas rather than resorting to canned.

Well, I'm off to do something overwhelmingly exciting, finish my dissertation which is not due will the 25th of this month. One day I hope to be rebellious like Dragon Man and do my assignments one night before.. or at 5am on the day. One day also, I will say yes to everything I get asked to do. But I am still working up to this.

Your imput is needed.