To Write and Rewrite
What I have up on DownsGenealogy.com is by no means static. I hope people realize that I have invited the family in to participate, and that I am still in the process of rewriting what is there now.
My normal process for writing something for the public is to write it once and finishish it. I then put it away for a few days or a week. I then revisit it and rewrite it. If time permits, I let it sit again and follow with another rewrite. This process hasn't completed itself yet. I am working on the rewrites for much of the site this month. These should be final rewites, but don't expect a piece you read lastweek to be the same next week.
This process is necessary for several reasons. The first of these varied reasons is that my normal mode for conveying information through the vehicle of writen prose tends to be rather loquacious and challenging for the average casual reader. My first rewrite would normally take a sentence like the one above and state it simply as, "I make it hard to read by using too many words." Cutting this down can be handy for the publisher of a website, since this cuts down on both storage and bandwith. My first rewrite usually gets rid of unnecessary wordiness, use of cliché, and needless similes.
My next rewrite will usually catch things like split infinitives, passive voice and inconsistancies of person and case. None of this has happened in the current version of DownsGenealogy.com, so pardon the cliché but "pardon our dust."
I assure you that if you began reading something and return to it at a later time, if it seems that half of it is missing, it really isn't. The same information is there, stated more clearly and with fewer words. I hope to have this process completed by the October update. From that point foward, everything posted on the site should be a final draft.
As far as September's installment goes, I'm already on my second rewrite. I should be able to make that a final edition too.
Bill
My normal process for writing something for the public is to write it once and finishish it. I then put it away for a few days or a week. I then revisit it and rewrite it. If time permits, I let it sit again and follow with another rewrite. This process hasn't completed itself yet. I am working on the rewrites for much of the site this month. These should be final rewites, but don't expect a piece you read lastweek to be the same next week.
This process is necessary for several reasons. The first of these varied reasons is that my normal mode for conveying information through the vehicle of writen prose tends to be rather loquacious and challenging for the average casual reader. My first rewrite would normally take a sentence like the one above and state it simply as, "I make it hard to read by using too many words." Cutting this down can be handy for the publisher of a website, since this cuts down on both storage and bandwith. My first rewrite usually gets rid of unnecessary wordiness, use of cliché, and needless similes.
My next rewrite will usually catch things like split infinitives, passive voice and inconsistancies of person and case. None of this has happened in the current version of DownsGenealogy.com, so pardon the cliché but "pardon our dust."
I assure you that if you began reading something and return to it at a later time, if it seems that half of it is missing, it really isn't. The same information is there, stated more clearly and with fewer words. I hope to have this process completed by the October update. From that point foward, everything posted on the site should be a final draft.
As far as September's installment goes, I'm already on my second rewrite. I should be able to make that a final edition too.
Bill
posted by Bill | 12:33 PM
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