Writing: October 2003 Archive Page

Please -- Never Do This!E-Mail)

This message, with the uninformative subject line "November Hours," an empty body, and a 45K MS-Windows attachment (see tips #1, #2 and #3 of "Writing Effective E-Mail: Top 10 Tips") went out to about 450 people

By my count, this single message consumed 20MB of storage space on computers across Seton Hill University. A better alternative would have been a plain text list, or posting the file online and inviting people to download it if they want it.

On the other hand, it also motivated me to learn how to use the "pixellation" feature on my image editor.

I know this is probably a very uncool and politically incorrect thing to say these days, but I am going to brave it anyway. | I have wondered why, with all the briliant people writing in the different group blogs, am I not toally enchanted with them? --Torill --No Personal Touch (Thinking with My Fingers)

The dynamics of group blogs are certainly complex. A colleague of mine. John Spurlock, recently noted that within the past week, the New Media Journalism @ Seton Hill group blog has been dominated by my own postings, with few if any contributions or comments from students (though this may be becuase the students recently turned in their blogging portfolios, and know they have several weeks before they are due again). WebWord, which is mostly the domain of John Rhodes but does feature a few other regular posters, has been down all this month, and John has stated that it's simply not a priority for him to finish it.

Because I am trying to participate as actively as I can on about 30 student blogs this term, I find I really have to pick and choose which posts to get involved in in GrandTextAuto or KairosNews... and last week for the first time Slashdot gave me some moderator points that I felt too virtuous to waste. While I used to blog only for myself, now part of my blogging is "work," and that has changed how I spend my blogging time. I've been conscious that I'm blogging much more than I really "want" to.

He never imagined just how unenthusiastic his research sponsors -- and others with a financial stake in atrazine -- would be about his discovery. | Six frustrating years later, Mr. Hayes and his defenders say they know only too well the lengths to which those companies will go to undermine his findings that atrazine may be harmful. --Goldie Blumenstyk --The Price of Research (Chronicle)

The author of this article is careful to check with scientists who say they were unable to repeat Hayes's findings. It would be an irresponsible exaggeration to claim that all corporate research is biased, or that research funded by non-profits or governments is free from similar pressure. In my "Practice of Journalism" class, we are learning to be skeptical of the statistics quoted in agenda-driven press releases, but this article shows the opportunities for the misuse of science are much broader.

P.S. Goldie Blumenstyk? Really?

[B]ooks at especially high risk include those that sell to the student (particularly college student) market as secondary reading. A student could easily grab the relevant chapter or two out of a book without paying for it. Students certainly have the time and most likely the inclination to do so, and, with the help of some willing colleagues, could print out the entire texts of books in the program. --Authors GuildAuthor's Guild Question Amazon's Full-text Search FeatureThe Imprtance Of)

I found the above via Slashdot, on The Importance Of's overview of the Amazon search controversy.

A high school freshman expelled for writing a fictional account of a student who falls asleep in class and dreams of killing a teacher can return to school Monday while officials reconsider the disciplinary action.... "It was a story about a girl who falls asleep in class, dreams she kills her math teacher, then wakes up and nothing happens," she said. --Girl expelled for writing story about killing teacher (CNN)

It's poor chemistry between writer and reader (pontificator and pontificatee, in the academic version), like lack of sizzle between jaded full professor and enthusiastic asst. prof. It's failure of Interrogator A to make the noises and gestures that work for Hegemonized Reader B. It may be Defamiliarizer A's clumsy attempt to shake up the ideological/emotional/instrumental reflexes of Overly Essentialized Reader B. It may be sheer incompetence at nouns, verbs, and adjectives. --Carlin Romano --Was It as Bad for You as It Was for Me? (Chronicle)

Another fine suggestion from Jim.

A professor agrees to review a manuscript that is under consideration for publication at a journal. He has promised to keep the paper and its contents absolutely confidential. When he reads it, however, he realizes that his student's experiments will never work; the paper shows that they are futile. Does he keep mum, or does he break the confidentiality rule and tell his student what he just learned? --Ethics 101: A Course About the Pitfalls (NYT (Registration; link will expire))

Another good suggestion from Jim.

The author of one of the books I blogged wrote me an interesting reply, but sent it via e-mail. Can I place her comment in my blog comments without violating some written or unwritten code? --John SpurlockBlogging E-Mailed CommentsE-Mail)

If I were to send a letter to the editor to a newspaper, I shouldn't be surprised if it were published -- that's what a "letter to the editor" is for. If I were to send an e-mail to a website that features published e-mails, I shouldn't be surprised if that e-mail were published -- that's how the site gets its content in the first place.

John's situation is more complex. As I understand it, he has written a traditional print review of a book, but posted a longer version of that review on his blog ("The Blue Monkey Review"). The author could have commented directly on John's blog (indeed, another author has done exactly that). Instead, the author chose to send an e-mail.

I think the context is very important here.

I presume that the audience for my own blog is net savvy enough to know one shouldn't e-mail anything that one wouldn't want to become public. (Though how often we all follow that guidline is open to question.)

Since John is asking the question about an e-mail sent to him by a book author (that is, someone who makes a living by writing), and since the academic subject of their correspondence is presumably not cyberculture or online writing conventions, I'd say I wouldn't think twice about mentioning the e-mail, paraphrasing it in order to write a response, or even quoting a sections for the purpose of defending/explaining/rebutting/continuing the intelletual discourse in another blog entry. It's possible the author simply wasn't familiar with the convention of posting comments in a weblog. Since the author didn't actually type it there, I'd do what I did here -- create a separate blog entry to introduce the e-mail, and link back to the original discussion. Still, before I'd post the whole thing, I'd ask the author's permission. And I'd start blogging my rebuttal while awaiting the reply. If the author doesn't reply after a few days and a telephone follow-up (if possible), I'd paraphrase the e-mail and/or quote selective, and post my response anyway (after briefly explaining my attempts to contact the author).

(And by the way, I did ask John's permission to post his inquriy and blog my response.)

Now soliciting proposals for projected philosophical anthology on any aspect of The Onion, America's leading satirical newspaper. Brief, informal proposals are welcome at this stage. Submit to Graham Harman at toolbeing@yahoo.com (deadline for initial proposals is October 31, 2003) --Philosophy and The Onion (APA)

ARRGH! I have way too much to do... way, way too much to do. Back away from the keyboard, Dennis! Stop!

Via Crooked Timber, which offers it under a title Mike Arnzen won't want to miss: "God is Undead."

Here's a suggestion that has worked for me: After leaving an employer, send your former boss and some co-workers very polite and thankful e-mails. Mention how much you enjoyed being there, knowing them, how much you learned and so forth. | Most of the time, you will get a reply. Bingo! There's your letter of reference, header and all, indicating where it came from. | Print it and place it into your portfolio. --K.K., writing in to Joyce Lain Kennedy's career advice column --Use E-Mail Notes as References[?] (Job Center, Dallas Morning News)

K.K. is right about the value of not burning one's bridges, and Kennedy is right to offer her "sunny thanks" for an optimistic and upbeat suggestion. But I wouldn't recommend re-using a personal e-mail from a former employer as if it were a formal letter of reference.

Most people who use e-mail professionally do understand that e-mail is anything but private, but asking permission before reusing somebody else's words in another context is at the very least a matter of common courtesy. (In fact, some companies, including my own university, require employees to append to every message legalese that explicitly prohibits the forwarding or sharing of e-mail upon which K.K.'s suggestion depends.)

Were I to learn -- from a potential employer, perhaps -- that a student had not even offered me the opportunity to revise a personal note for a more formal audience, I would wonder why the student felt it necessary to trick me into writing a letter of reference. My doubts would affect the enthusiasm I would be able to muster when called out of the blue to assess the skills and attributes of a student I might not have seen in years.

On the other hand, I would be pleased and flattered if the student who receives an informal e-mail of praise from me were to foward my own words back to me, with an enthusiastic note saying something like, "Thank you so much for these kind words. I know you are very busy, and probably get requests for letters of recommendation all the time... but would you mind if I used this e-mail as a letter of reference?"

Such a request -- particularly if it were accompanied by a subtle bulleted list reminding me of the student's accomplishments and updating me on his or her activities since our last contact -- would probably motivate me to block out a bit of extra time and reach for the official letterhead.

The student who demonstrates professionalism and a mastery of communication skills -- especially when making polite, subtle requests for recommendations -- will get a much better letter from me.

--Facing and Fessing Up to Old Age (MetaFilter)

A pleasant, if late, birthday present... a reminder on MetaFilter that I am not alone.

Letters from hometown soldiers describing their successes rebuilding Iraq have been appearing in newspapers across the country as U.S. public opinion on the mission sours. | And all the letters are the same....Sgt. Christopher Shelton, who signed a letter that ran in the Snohomish Herald, said Friday that his platoon sergeant had distributed the letter and asked soldiers for the names of their hometown newspapers. Soldiers were asked to sign the letter if they agreed with it, said Shelton, whose shoulder was wounded during an ambush earlier this year. --Many soldiers, same letter  (The Olympian)

It must be that time of the semester (no, no, Michelle, not that time): people are talking about grading student papers. --Ron Vitia --Grading Papers (Vitia)

I don't understand the in-joke referring to Michelle, but the conversation that ensues is good. Via Clancy on KairosNews.

News makers have always had ways of getting their news and views before the public. Often with the help of public-relations professionals, they've held press conferences, issued statements, offered interviews. In the past decade, they've created Web sites, though those pages have usually contained public-relations puffery, not candid communications.|Recently, a few forward-thinking news makers have seen the power of creating their own messages. --Dan Gillmor --Blog has become former actor's portal into new career (Mercury News)

This story places former Star Trek child actor Wil Wheaton's newfound success as a blogger into a greater context. Link via BlogsCanada, a site that reminds me both of what I loved about Canada when I lived there, and also why I was glad to come back to The States. (Blog on, eh?)

A while ago, I lamented that, when copying and pasting from an online source, it's a pain to have to re-create the links and other HTML embedded in the text. DrWeb sent me this e-mail, and gave me permission to post it here:

Just a note.. saw your post on the Kaironews site, and decided to write since I am not registered there to post or comment.. Re: http://kairosnews.org/node/view/3352

I found this pretty neat plug-in for Web Developers that works, from, um, Microsoft site, and it allows your wish for IE5.x versions. I tried it out tonight, and it works. You highlight text you want to blog and cite, and right-click, and on the menu, you pick "view partial source." It grabs the links and text in that partial source code --viola!

I found the answer via Blogzilla, see http://www.deftone.com/blogzilla/archives/ie_phantom_pain.html

and the small downloadable script/code is here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/previous/webaccess/webdevaccess.asp for View Selection [Partial] Source and a DOM tree.

Best,
DrWeb

--
P. Michael McCulley aka DrWeb
mailto:drweb@earthlink.net
San Diego, CA
http://drweb.typepad.com/

Quote of the Moment:
This tagline only to be removed by the consumer.

View Source add-in IE (to help in blogging)...E-Mail)

I've tested it out, and it works just fine. I'll still have to do some hand coding, but this is a great time-saver. I've been virtuously keeping my blogging to a minimum today, since I've got a backlog of student papers to grade.