Random Suggestions for Would-Be Writers

Printing, publishing, prepress, graphic design, business cards, printed materials, books, ebooks, sign printing, displays, banners

Trade-Show-Tips.com Articles, tips, product reviews for Trade Show and Event Marketers. Trade Show displays and portable displays for event marketers, sales professionals, trade show exhibitors, event presenters. Articles and advice for staff training, sales motivation, event planning, event website building, lead generation, event follow-up. Trade-show-tips.com is a member of the sbo-linknet.com network of websites.

Magazine Printing - Magazine printing at discounted rates at Printpelican.com

Brochure Printing - USAPrintingOnline.com - Online Printing for Catalogs, Brochures, Presentation Folders, Postcards and more.

Epson Ink Cartridges - Ink cartridges manufactured in ISO-9001 & ISO-14001 factory certified manufacturing facility and batch tested to ensure consistency.

Your Printing and Graphics Info Source - Winston Graphic Solutions is your best site on the net for topical pages and articles in the digital imaging, printing, graphics, photography or trade show industries. We can also manage any graphics project — large or small.

Full color printing - ThePrintwave.com produces high quality full color printing of postcards, business cards, brochures, pocket folders, and more.

For your electronics news visit electronic specifier.

Wedding Photography Toronto - International Wedding Photographer : Lifestyle Wedding Photography : Wedding Photojournalist : Engagement Session Photography : Wedding Reportage : Wedding Photojournalism

For advertising information see Linknet Promotions. Get your text ad on hundreds of pages, including blogs and articles distributed on many websites.

Random Suggestions for Would-Be Writers

by Rick Hendershot, Linknet Creative Resource Library

Recently I have been doing a lot of writing for the Linknet Resource Libraries I am creating. These "libraries" are collections of articles about a wide range of topics, spread across numerous websites. Since I need many articles in a fairly short time, I have resorted to some of the more well-known article sites such as GoArticles.com for material.

Many of the articles posted on article sites appear to be quickly written, and are often rather thin on original content. That is understandable since two of the primary objectives of posting articles have nothing to do with content or quality. The first objective is simply to stick your name in front of other people. The second one is to get a link or two pointing back at your website.

Of course this is a very short-sighted way of looking at the writing game. As serious writers will occasionally point out, what you say and how you say it are ultimately the two most important aspects of your writing. In the short term nobody much cares what you say. But in the long term your writing, and your worth as a consultant or advisor will be judged by the quality of your work.

With that in mind, here are just a few things I have noticed that bother me about many internet articles I have read. Some of these are grammatical points, and some of them are stylistic. Take them for what they are worth.

1. One of the most prevalent grammatical errors I notice is the inability to distinguish between contracted forms such as "they're" and "you're" and the possessive pronouns "their" and "your". If you are pretending to be a writer, shouldn't you know the difference between these things? Here is a simple test: if you can replace "they're" with "they are", then you have the correct form. If you can't, then you probably need the possessive ("their" or "your").

2. Many would be writers simply do not understand possessive forms and how they are different from other words ending in "s". I am not even talking about "it's" vs "its". I am talking about the difference between "ten boys named Billy" and "the boy's name is Billy". If you do not understand the difference, here is a very good article about apostrophes.

3. One of the sytlistic tendencies that is quite popular among internet writers is the use of short one sentence paragraphs. Often these sentences do not have the complete sentence structure we were told in elementary school they should have.

Sentences like this.

Or like this.

Frankly I think amateur writers should approach their "craft" with a bit more humility. They should take the time to learn grammatical rules, and they should stick with conventional sentence structure until they have proven they can actually write. This is especially the case with the type of relatively mundane subject matter dealt with in internet articles.

4. Some internet writers resort to what I call "lazy" techniques such as the use of "etc., etc.". I am really talking about myself here. To give an example of what I am talking about, imagine a sentence in which I am talking about words, sentences, paragraphs, etc., etc. This is a "lazy" technique because it allows the writer to leave a thought unfinished. The impression is that there are more things that can be added to the list, but in fact their aren't any. I have started to purge myself of this habit by replacing "etc., etc." with "and so on". I realize that isn't much better, but it will have to do for now. If nothing else, it looks less pretentious. Eventually I will just force myself to finish my sentences.

5. Another "lazy" technique is using "asides", especially with brackets (you know, like this). Many internet writers seem to think this enhances the informality of their work. I suggest it is just self-indulgence. The next time you are tempted to put an "aside" into brackets ask yourself if you are not just indulging yourself in an excuse for not creating a proper sentence.

Rick Hendershot has been involved in the graphic arts, prepress, and web design businesses for many years. He is founding publisher of the Linknet Creative Resource Library.

The Linknet Network is a library of resource materials spread across more than 25 websites and a number of blogs. You can place your link text on up to 50 pages spread out over at least 25 different sites for one small annual fee. For more information go to the Linknet Network website.