The Future of Digital Longform Project has launched with a five-part package on the history and future of online narrative journalism. Author Anna Hiatt, a research fellow for Columbia University’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism, writes: "To say this is about 'longform' is to undermine this moment in our digital evolution. This is about creativity and blowing up templates and designing for the story, and helping the reader better understand harder to grasp stories."
Miscellaneous
This collection of quotes on writing by writers comes from Australia's Aerogramme Writers' Studio. It includes Kurt Vonnegut on semicolons, Joyce Carol Oates on the difference between technique and content, and this from Dorothy Parker: "If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they're happy."
Keyboards have replaced paper as the note-taking medium of choice, especially for college students. But Wray Herbert writes about an experiment that concluded the old-fashioned handwritten method is more effective for understanding: "The students using laptops were in fact more likely to take copious notes, which can be beneficial to learning. But they were also more likely to take verbatim notes, and this 'mindless transcription' appeared to cancel out the benefits."
Caleb Hannan thought he was writing a story about an innovative golf club. He ended up writing about its inventor's personal history, including a false resume and sex change. Then his subject committed suicide, the story was published, and Hannan's ethics were quickly called into question. Paige Williams has a roundup. More from Marc Tracy, Mallory Ortberg, and Josh Levin.
Not much, writes Steve Almond in response to a reader's question about another writer's apparent reuse of his own work. As long as no one's legal rights to the work were infringed by its appearance elsewhere, the reuse "feels like more of a victimless misdemeanor," Almond says. "Am I suggesting that the writer in question did nothing wrong? Actually, if the editors in question knew he was using the same piece for both venues and didn’t object, then yeah, I guess I am."
Rebecca Rego Barry writes in Fine Books Magazine about a California auction house's offering of letters from Jack London, in one of which the author cajoles his editor into a slightly higher fee: "I couldn't see why an article ten times stronger plus my name was not worth five cents a word," London wrote. Two other letters in the group include some advice from London on managing "the threads of the plot" and a query to an authors' group in search of advice on rates.
Brevity may be a virtue, but not when it comes to your bio, Jane Friedman writes in a guide to the different types of bios — long, short, custom — and how to write them: "For some writers with short bios, it’s an attempt to convey status. Other writers may be putting on that 'mysterious' act … but as an editor and curious person, the message I take away from the writer of the short bio is: 'I don’t care about, nor do I need, you or your opportunities.'”
It's a simple yet flexible tool for copyright compliance, but most media professionals who use Creative Commons licenses aren't following the rules, Sarah Laskow writes: "Material licensed under CC isn't just free stuff. James Bond had license to kill. CC is your license to copy. And although using CC is not as dangerous as using a .25 Beretta three martinis deep, there are conditions, there are risks, and there are, occasionally, consequences for breaking the rules."
When in doubt, get permission. That's the essence of a CJR post by Sarah Laskow, who covered a session on the subject at the recent Online News Association conference. Attendees heard from two attorneys who outlined what's covered by fair use, and what's uncertain about it: "Copyright law wasn’t designed only to help creators make money; fair use provisions help guarantee that other people can criticize, teach, or transform existing work. But it’s not a fail-safe."
Absolutely not, Olga Khazan writes in an Atlantic post that won her a deluge of criticism: "If you want to be a reporter, learning code will not help," Khazan writes. "It will only waste time that you should have been using to write freelance articles or do internships — the real factors that lead to these increasingly scarce positions." Rebuttals from Noah Veltman, Steve Buttry, and others.