On-Line Writing Advice from George Orwell

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George (Orwell) Bush

George (Orwell) Bush 02/10/2004 02:41 AM
Paul Krugman: Get Me Rewrite. I'd like to think that the administration's crass efforts to rewrite history will backfire, that the media and the informed public won't let officials get away with this. Have we finally had enough?

George Orwell Bush

George Orwell Bush 09/05/2004 06:48 PM

Frank Rich (NY Times): How Kerry Became a Girlie-Man. The flaw in Mr. Kerry is not, as Washington wisdom has it, that he asked for trouble from the Swifties by bringing up Vietnam in the first place. Both his Vietnam service and Vietnam itself are entirely relevant to a campaign set against an unpopular and ineptly executed war in Iraq that was spawned by the executive branch in similarly cloudy circumstances. But having brought Vietnam up against the backdrop of our 2004 war, Mr. Kerry has nothing to say about it except that his service proves he's more manly than Mr. Bush. Well, nearly anyone is more manly than a president who didn't have the guts to visit with the 9/11 commission unaccompanied by a chaperone.

Resume Writing Advice

Resume Writing Advice 04/11/2004 10:19 PM

The Rockport Institute has a six-part series on how to write a resume. (hat tip to Angie McKaig for the pointer.)

Their advice is fantastic, and capitalizes on the idea that you should do "active personal marketing" with your resume:

THE NUMBER ONE PURPOSE OF A RESUME

The resume is a tool with one specific purpose: to win an interview. If it does what the fantasy resume did, it works. If it doesn't, it isn't an effective resume. A resume is an advertisement, nothing more, nothing less.

A great resume doesn't just tell them what you have done but makes the same assertion that all good ads do: If you buy this product, you will get these specific, direct benefits. It presents you in the best light. It convinces the employer that you have what it takes to be successful in this new position or career.

It is so pleasing to the eye that the reader is enticed to pick it up and read it. It "whets the appetite," stimulates interest in meeting you and learning more about you. It inspires the prospective employer to pick up the phone and ask you to come in for an interview.

I would recommend this series of articles to anyone looking for a job change or career change.

Part two of the series says that resumes are scanned, not read. I'll agree with that point completely. I generally spend less than 15 seconds with each resume that I receive on the first pass. If nothing in the resume grabs my eye, I throw it away. If something catches my eye, I put it in a pile of resumes to follow up on later.

Parts three and four give a lot of great tips on writing a resume, some of them are especially powerful:

• To write an effective resume, you have to learn how to write powerful but subtle advertising copy.
• If you are applying for several different positions, you should adapt your resume to each one.
• The resume is visually enticing, a work of art.
• All the basic, expected information is included.
• A resume should be targeted to your goal, to the ideal next step in your career.
• Shorter is ususally better.
• Telephone number that will be answered. (I'd add that your email address better be a good one that won't bounce too.)

Part five covers 'choosing the right job' and is an advertisement for Rockport's services, and part six is a great list of power words that should be used over other passive words that might crop up in your resume.

Straw holds line on Iraq advice

Straw holds line on Iraq advice 03/24/2005 08:37 AM
The foreign secretary mounts a defence of the attorney general's advice on the legality of the Iraq war.

Police Anniversary: On-line Anti-fraud
Advice

Police Anniversary: On-line Anti-fraud
Advice 05/15/2004 01:02 PM
AGI Online May 15 2004 4:30PM GMT

Tiny Orwell

Tiny Orwell 09/07/2004 01:14 AM

Plugin Contest Entry 1: Tiny Orwell 1.0: Password-protect your Movable Type blog using this plugin.

Tiny Orwell is a simple TypeKey-like authentication system written in the spirit of the Trackback reference implementation and blosxom. This script provides an alternate to TypeKey for small groups using MT 3.0D or any other tool that supports the TypeKey API with a minimal amount of fuss.

You gotta love the name of this plugin, don't you? Kalsey already did something like this, but using PHP.

In other news, I noticed that the MT Plugin Directory has been redesigned to fit into the main Movable Type site design.

The Movable Type Plugins Directory has relaunched as an official Six Apart website, featuring a whole new look, simpler organization, and a list of plugins which have been tested with Movable Type 3.

Nice that it's finally official. I think the girls were running it up until this point. I'd like to see the Movable Type Wiki become official someday. I contributed a fair amount to this resource just before it went public.

Click here to comment on this entry

Orwell would be proud

Orwell would be proud 07/08/2004 12:32 PM
Eastasia plans attacks on Eurasia "Efforts each of you make to be vigilant – such as reporting suspicious items or activities to authorities – do make a difference. Every citizen using their common sense and eyes and ears can support our national effort to stop the terrorists. Thank you for your continued resolve in the face of the ongoing threat of terrorism. We must continue to work together – to ensure that the freedom we just celebrated continues as the hallmark of this great nation." Are you scared< /a> yet?

Orwell turns in his grave

Orwell turns in his grave 08/30/2004 03:46 PM
President Bush takes plenty of flak for his less-than-eloquent locution, but impromptu fumblings aside, his latest campaign statement on Iraq is a calculated exercise in cognitive dissonance -- an astonishing attempt to whitewash the post-invasion debacle by indirectly "blaming" the U.S. military's victorious surge to Baghdad last year. On the eve of the Republican convention, Bush said that the daunting problems now plaguing the reconstruction are a result of a "catastrophic success," of, "being so successful so fast that an enemy that should have surrendered or been done in escaped and lived to fight another day."

Trademarks, acronyms, and Orwell

Trademarks, acronyms, and Orwell 05/11/2004 12:09 PM
The other day I wondered why some well-known technology acronyms -- notably UPnP -- aren't expanded on the home pages of the organizations promoting those technologies. In the case of UPnP, at least, the reason is that it isn't (any longer) an acronym:

The UPnP mark is not an acronym and should not be represented as such. The mark is a single entity that happens to consist of four symbols (i.e., letters), which individually do not have any particular meaning. [Ti ps for using the UPnP Certification Mark]

Why the switch? Apparently it's because you can't trademark an acronym. So, for example, JDBC, like UPnP, has been uprooted and now exists as a free-floating string of "symbols (i.e., letters)". JDBC is a registered trademark, and although Sun was not able to expunge all references to Java Database Connectivity from its website, the JDBC home page nowhere mentions the term. ...

Orwell on political language

Orwell on political language 03/20/2003 08:30 AM
Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.

Words are to be likely casualties of the next few hours/days/weeks/months - time to double-check George Orwell's informative field medicine manual for the English Language...

Ari's doublespeak does Orwell proud

Ari's doublespeak does Orwell proud 03/14/2003 01:03 PM
Only a polical junkie of the first order could read/listen to much of this doublespeak by Ari Fleischer, but I thought a little taste would liven up this weblog. From the White House: Q Ari, the President was very clear last week, he wanted a vote in the Security Council: it's time for countries to show their cards. And now today, Secretary Powell says, among the options is to go for a vote, or not to go for a vote. What's going on here? MR. FLEISCHER: Okay, let me try to share or inform you about where things stand in the fluid situation with the diplomacy. The end is coming into sight, and there are numerous routes to reach that end through the diplomacy the President is pursuing. And the President has said that he seeks a vote, and we seek a vote. There are options, as the Secretary has said. I discussed with you this morning the possibility of the vote coming to a conclusion tomorrow, or it could continue into next week. There are numerous options to achieve in the end the President seeks, which is a diplomatic solution. I cannot predict for you every shape and turn of the road on the way to that end, but this end is coming into sight, and that's why you're seeing some levels of flexibility and discussion of options as it comes into sight. It can't be an easy job, trying to explain away the twists and turns of the Xanax Cowboy. Update: See this amazing letter from Washington Post reporter Jonathan Weisman, confessing how he and other reporters are "routinely submitting quotations for approval, and allowing those quotes to be manipulated to get that approval?" This is reporting? This is what the Washington Post that revealed Nixon's crimes is reduced to? O tempora, o mores....

Orwell Plaza in Barcelona has continuous
CCTV recording

Orwell Plaza in Barcelona has continuous
CCTV recording 06/05/2005 11:42 PM
Cory Doctorow: Barcelona's George Orwell Plaza sports closed-circuit TV cameras that spy on passersby in a very ironic fashion. Lin k (via We Make Money Not Art)

Bad Writing = Good Writing?

Bad Writing = Good Writing? 10/30/2003 11:56 PM
Bad Writing = Good Writing? The academic journal Philosophy and Literature used to hold a "Bad Writing Contest" to ridicule dense, unreadable academic prose... but a new book argues headache inducing sentences are necessary to express subtle theoretical points.

Keeping Party Line, Bottom Line Separate
(Los Angeles Times)

Keeping Party Line, Bottom Line Separate
(Los Angeles Times) 07/28/2004 05:45 AM
Los Angeles Times - BEIJING — Taiwanese video game salesman Simon Chang was drinking beer with a mainland customer at a nightclub here recently, laughing as a stand-up comedian delivered off-the-news material, Jay Leno-style.

End of the line? How mobiles are
preparing to replace your land line

End of the line? How mobiles are
preparing to replace your land line 05/24/2004 07:42 AM
BBC May 24 2004 12:15PM GMT

The checkout line -- or the
check-you-out line?

The checkout line -- or the
check-you-out line? 07/26/2004 07:21 AM
For librarians, new identification chips in books make life easier. But civil libertarians say the smart books are a scary invasion of privacy

Advice

Advice 02/17/2004 02:37 AM
Understanding Women & "The Rules" For Men, or Think of it Like Driving in England

john-ross.net/advice.htm
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Advice on anything except sport

Advice on anything except sport 12/08/2003 03:29 AM
Need advice? Ask Pud. Having apparently created a good income for himself, Pud will tell you how to do it too. And let you know what his kit's like. And brief you on the future of your career in the IT industry. And give you a tip on street food in NY. And tell you the quickest way to learn French. And he gets to the point about chickens and eggs pretty quick too.

Advice for the Dems

Advice for the Dems 12/19/2004 03:55 PM
The DNC sent me an email today touting their 2004 accomplishments and asking for feedback. OK, they did some good things. But there's also a whistling-past-the-graveyard quality to the note. Here was my feedback: • Spend more time on developing...

Jobseekers Advice

Jobseekers Advice 09/24/2004 05:41 AM
Jobseekers Advice
http://www.JobseekersAdvice.co m/

Jobseekers Advice is the original jobseekers website, setup to provide jobseekers a place to go for independent and unbiased information and free career advice. Their website states they are the largest independent free career advice website on the web run by professionals from around the world who volunteer their time to help you. This has been added to Employment Resources Subject Tracer™ Information Blog.

FC Now: Valuable Advice

FC Now: Valuable Advice 04/13/2005 06:43 AM
Quick, what are your company's values? Don't bother reaching for the corporate handbook - suffice to say most of us realize our companies have them, we're just not sure what they are. They come to us in a boring little...

Tomato Advice

Tomato Advice 03/13/2003 10:16 AM
I spoke to my mother about growing tomatoes last night. Her advice: Purchase the yummy-looking varieties, but also some early ones. The growing season in Maine is all too short, and a September frost can kill the late-bearing varieties. If this happens, you need to pick all the green tomatoes and take them inside, where they'll turn red--but never properly ripen. So if you want to be guaranteed that ripe tomato taste, you should plant at least one variety which ripens early.

WiFi Advice

WiFi Advice 08/27/2004 01:54 PM

Over at Technobiblio, Chris has a great post about Improving Wi-Fi's Workability Quotient in Your Library. A must read.

Advice to my 12 year-old self

Advice to my 12 year-old self 03/13/2003 10:25 AM
I read at Slashdot a great question: "What advice would you give your 12 year-old self?" Here's mine: Dear 12...

Sensible Security Advice

Sensible Security Advice 06/03/2004 04:46 PM
The Security Mentor provides sensible, well-written advice for keeping your data's nose clean: His advice often includes wireless networking tips, such as this post. The mentor writes in a way that reminds me of Brian Livingston's long-running and now-deceased Windows Manager column in InfoWorld....

Advice on Moving

Advice on Moving 08/27/2004 01:52 PM

One word of advice when moving make sure important keys get put in a place where you will be guranteed to find them. Need I say more.

Advice For Children

Advice For Children 07/17/2004 04:10 PM
Patrick Hughes has more excellent advice for children, but people of all ages will probably find it useful. Heed what he says about Skinhead Katrina. He knows of what he speaks.

FC Now: Free Advice

FC Now: Free Advice 03/22/2005 07:29 PM
I was just wandering around the blogosphere, looking for good design-related blogs (nominate your favorites here), and found this collection of advice from designers, collected by Ellen Lupton, the curator of contemporary design at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum and...

Dick Advice

Dick Advice 06/24/2004 09:19 PM
Mr. "Go Fuck Yourself" Cheney .. stupidity and vindictiveness .. angry, hostile, man .. Dick Advice .. Wonkette

wonkette.com/archives/dick-advice-016782.php
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Bad writerly advice

Bad writerly advice 05/18/2004 06:20 PM
Teresa Nielsen Hayden -- a swell writer and respected editor -- may not have invented the genre in which clueless advice to new writers is mercilessly dissected, but she certainly perfected it. Today. Teresa shreds a really stunningly gormless "cover-letter advice" page:

Tip Eight: Call. That's right, Call. Introduce yourself. Be confident. Let them know your work is coming. It's the surest way to get out of that slush pile and on to a desk. Too afraid to call? Write out what you want to say, call AFTER HOURS, leave a voice message. It's not as good talking to a real person, but hey, it's better than nothing.

The surest way? Say what? Calling in advance is an irritating waste of the editorial department's time, and will do nothing to get you out of a trade publishing slushpile. Leaving a message after hours is even more clueless. I can't imagine where he got this idea, unless he's been taking advice from someone who's secretly out to get him.

There is one significant effect this might have. Because you've phoned to say something about a submission, someone may write down your name and the title of your book, and pass the note on to the slush readers. They'll be puzzled--why did you say you were phoning again?--and will stick the note up on their bulletin board. When your manuscript crosses their desk, they may remember that there was something-or-other they were supposed to remember or do about it, and will set your manuscript on the "inscrutable problems" stack for later diagnosis. Some slow afternoon--of which there aren't many--they'll have a go at the "inscrutable problems" stack, and will look at your manuscript again. They won't be able to tell what the problem was. They'll set the manuscript aside for later. After several cycles, they'll either figure that any manuscript that's been around this long should be returned to its author on general principles, or they'll move on to another job and the new slush reader will run your manuscript through several more "inscrutable problems" cycles before returning it to you on general principles.

Link

Advice to newlyweds

Advice to newlyweds 05/17/2004 01:34 AM
John Scalzi, a very talented humour writer and novelist (I like to think of him as the "edgy Dave Barry"), has written a bunch of notes for the newly married gays and lesbians of Massachusetts:

It's your best man's (or the equivalent's) job to remind people that at a wedding reception, as at the Academy Awards, speeches are best very short. You didn't spend an obscene amount on the catering just to have it grow cold as Uncle Jim blathers on.

Remind the DJ or band that they work for you, and they'll damn well play anything you want. For some reason I think this may be less of a problem at gay weddings. Thank God.

There will be drama of some sort at the reception. If the wedding party lets any of it reach the newlyweds, they haven't done their job.

Don't fill up on bread. You'll have to dance later.

Link (via Electrolite)

Top Tip: Need advice on buying RAM!

Top Tip: Need advice on buying RAM! 04/23/2004 12:21 PM
I am building a new home computer for myself and I need to decide on some RAM for it. It will be built around a AMD XP+ 2500, 2800 or 3000 and I will get a new motherboard as well.

Show me the way to go (for e-biz advice)

Show me the way to go (for e-biz advice) 07/16/2004 11:52 AM
The Register Jul 16 2004 3:47PM GMT

Hey, Dummies, you can get advice on PC
too

Hey, Dummies, you can get advice on PC
too 07/26/2004 10:50 PM
Electric New Paper Jul 27 2004 3:18AM GMT

Writing for the Web

Writing for the Web 03/13/2003 10:15 AM
One of the things that traditional journalists find unsettling about the weblog medium is the notion that you're "working without a net" -- i.e., without an editor. In fact, everybody edits your stuff, albeit after the fact. The other day I wrote a column in which I asked:

How do we tune networks to deliver the right information to the right people at the right times?

The triteness warning bell sounded in my head, but not loudly enough to force me to find a better way to express that thought. And sure enough, somebody calle d me on it. (How do I know? I found that URL in my referral log.) I really enjoy this kind of thing. Writing is infinitely improvable, and too often mine goes unchallenged. Partly, that's because of my brain wiring. I have an unusually strong built-in editor, watching everything I do as I write, and complaining loudly. As a result, what I write for print publication is very close to what you see in those publications. If you added up the diffs, over the many hundreds of articles I've written over the years, they wouldn't amount to much. ...

Writing XML

Writing XML 09/03/2002 04:40 PM
This article shows you how to create XML documents using manual writing, DOM and SAX. It provides you with some excellent learning material, but using either DOM or SAX for creating XML still looks like overkill to me.

"zeldman.ming"

On Writing XML

On Writing XML 01/18/2004 12:24 AM
In a recent essay I offered, given demand, to author some XML-writing software. There’s been quite a bit of feedback, and the consensus seems to be that the Java community is fairly well-served with XML writing software, but that this would be real useful at the C level. So that’ll be my coding fun for the month of February. The rest of this essay lists some of the Java options that people told me about, and introduces some issues around the C implementation...

More On Writing for the Web

More On Writing for the Web 03/19/2003 10:28 PM

Writing RSS 1.0

Writing RSS 1.0 01/09/2004 09:54 PM

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On-Line Writing Advice from George Orwell

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