colinwalker
colinwalker

@jamesshelley This triggers all sorts of thoughts. I shall have to consider them properly.

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abhishek
abhishek

@jamesshelley I think along with wanting to find an audience, people post things without intending for these things to hold attention for a long term. We know there isn't anybody who want's to find something you posted two years ago. But we go back and read old articles often. Maybe in our collective psyche, writing has more longevity than posting.

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schuth
schuth

@jamesshelley I think the hinge isn’t the audience, but how the author’s ideas shape intent & hone form. Audiences (beyond the author) are nascent until any piece — post, poem, article, book — enters circulation. Intent & the craft decisions it informs seem more crucial.

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oyam
oyam

@jamesshelley I’m with @schuth here. Just because I have a blog, doesn’t mean I have audience, and yet I post anyway. To me it’s the thought process and ideas that go into the post, rather than who reads it.

Although, with social media it often seems like people keep throwing stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks – what the algorithms pick up. So maybe quantity vs. quality (trying to grab anyone’s interest vs. targeting specific interest group) has something to do with it.

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oyam
oyam

@jamesshelley interesting, I never considered somebody potentionally reading my journal (while I’m alive or after death), yet I’m ridiculously picky about how I word things, how it’s organized, and how it looks.

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schuth
schuth

@jamesshelley My thinking is that, once an idea is formed, the next question is "What form best transmits this message?" An author displays intent by selecting the form to express it, then makes further decisions about how to craft it in that form, further shaping the idea.

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schuth
schuth

@jamesshelley The author could just choose a format based on a perceived audience, but that suggests they’ve made a judgment centered around a form’s clarity or strength of transmission of the idea (calculated to reach the largest possible audience, or a very specific one, etc.).

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schuth
schuth

@jamesshelley The author can't choose their audience, only attract them by the quality & presentation of their ideas. The audience's decision to engage with the idea is informed by the writer's choice of form & their craft.

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schuth
schuth

@jamesshelley But whether or not something finds an audience shouldn't determine whether we view it as writing or just posting, I think. It's really about the decisions the author made to shape & transmit their idea. I'm thinking of Dickinson in particular here.

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colinwalker
colinwalker

@jamesshelley And here they are.

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colinwalker
colinwalker

@jamesshelley Thanks. I look forward to it as always.

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