What do you do?

You'd be surprised how often people ask me this question and don't get my answer. Perhaps it's because I say it, rather than writing it, and it doesn't come out the right way.

But today I found an excellent example of something I do, and I thought I'd share it with you.

Look at this:

This phrase was an error message I got on the Optus website:

Let's just be clear: this message reads "Please type the password same as above." It is supplemented by the word "Mediocre".

Among the things I do is make sure that language like this never makes it onto your site. My job is to make sure that every word that appears in association with your brand is a word you'd want associated with your brand.

(If you're wondering what's wrong with "mediocre", the answer involves targeting a mass market [and associated reading levels], brand values, and brand language. Are your eyes glazing over yet? I thought so.)

Terrifying

 

I'm not sure what I thought I was going to write about this sentiment, but I'm pretty sure I thought it applied almost exclusively to novelists and those pouring their soul (rather than straight technique) into their writing.

But in the last day or, oh, week or so, I've found myself terrified by the blank page. Moreover, I've found myself doubting my abilities to fill said page adequately by the (non-)feedback of what you might call stakeholders. 

But, this: I was in a meeting on Wednesday with what you might call a high-powered executive who gave me a small but meaningful piece of advice. She asked me how I got into writing, then told me that she thought it was a gift.

A gift.

"If you can write, you are very fortunate," she said. "It's a gift and you should use it well."

People talk about gifts all the time—he had a gift for running, or piano, or physics. And they say it ad nauseam about writing, so I've always ignored it.

But there in the empty boardroom, as the sun sank low over the skyscrapers and the evening chill crept out early from beneath the leaves of the trees in the park across the street, it struck me: a gift.

A gift.

What if I had a gift? Imagine.

If this was a gift, then writing would not be the mere putting together of words, puzzle-like, to convey some sense. If this was a gift, then I would have something unique, precious, unable to be replicated.

Imagine.

Somewhere around there, for the first time, I began to conceive of the merest spark of an idea that maybe this was something more than a commodity. Maybe I wasn't just a mouthpiece for this woman's corporation, and others like it.

Maybe I had something to offer of myself.

Thought for the day

Very often, I'll read a piece of text and have an automatic response that seems counter to what the writer intended. Case in point:

Automatic response: Looking at punching yourself in the face?

[what they weren't]

[door, wall—these were the things that were real. These were lasting, tangible realities devoid of the kind of interference that could somehow make them something else, that could, through conversation and connivance, mould them into what they weren't.

Things had become clear at last, and simple. There was no need to deliberate, or even to question. Finally it was as plain as the snow that kept falling, flake after freezing flake beyond the glass, as inevitable as death, as tangible as grief.

This just was.]

A strange confluence

Take You & Me, add All the Pretty Horses, mix with the late-night singalongs I've been party to recently, and temper with upcoming visits to a few country folk I know, and you have one hell of a strange confluence of events.

Maybe I really should plan that trip to Mexico after all. Or get a horse.

Studiofy: Q&A

So, you have a nightmare of a project and literally insufficient hours in the day to pull it off by the month-distant deadline?

You need to knuckle down, and crank it up, for a whole month?

Still your palpitations, sweet prince. The answer is clear: studiofy it.

Q. What is "studiofy"?
To studiofy is to turn your life, your living space, and your head, into a working studio. There is nothing else. Your kitchen is in your studio. Your weekend is your studio. That annoying, non-project-related email is breaching the sanctity of your studio; just delete it and turn back to work.

Q. But ... that sounds a lot like a kind of prison.
Listen. Do you want to meet this deadline—and meet it well, not just on time, but by turning out the best conceivable work you've ever freaking-well done—or don't you?

Q. Well, I—
I don't really have time for your objections. I'm in my studio. Do you have a thesaurus? No? Then you're no good to me.

Q. Okay. Can I call you then?
Not really. I mean, unless you're either calling with critical information for the project, or you want to suffer a painful phone-death inflicted by my interrupted rage.

Q. Really? Jesus Chri—
Yes really. Look, is this going anywhere? Can we do it in July? I have shit to do, dude.

The visual dilemma

Have you seen those  infographics for job ads yet? I'm living under a rock, so maybe this is old news. But for me, this alarming new trend brings my ongoing misgivings about the anything-goes world of infographics into the starkest possible relief.

I understand the point of infographics to be to tell a data-based story more clearly (or to tell stories more clearly using data) and in a more digestible way than is possible using words alone.

So why do the vast majority of infographics contain so much text?

Designers, of all people, should realise that the visual elements they add to an infographic add at least one layer of communication.

If a picture tells a thousand words, you don't just want fewer words in your infographic, you want fewer visuals, each with a clear, powerful message.

The current state of infographics champions form over function: designers dazzled by the prestige and viral potential of what, let's face it, is currently little more than a gimmick format choose the format before they consider the data, story, or message.

That's why we get infographics that try to express concepts like these:

Well, how do you list the disciplines required of a role in an infographic? I'd argue that you don't. It's not data, and it just adds words to what should be a visual message. (As for secret powers, that's anybody's guess.)

This information would be better written as bullets in a list. Why? Because as we look at that layout, our brains have to navigate an unfamiliar landscape (which—yes—captures attention!), and we start to wonder about aspects of that landscape. We're paying attention to the imagery and how it's positioned within the interface, and wondering what that implies about the text information.

If the answer's "nothing", as it so often seems to be with today's infograhics, then you're wasting users' time and mental energy.

I think text in infographics should be as reviled as fine print on financial documents.

Infographic text should succeed at a glance, the way a good site IA does.

If your graphics don't carry so much of the message that you can't say everything else you need to say about a given point in maybe three words or less, all your trendy infographic is doing is adding complexity to a message that could probably be more clearly expressed using just words.

And that's a sad, sad thing for a designer to spend time doing.

Sell what you love

Sell what you love!* Where? Why, on the internet, of course.

The things that make the web so great—its reach, egalitarianism, opportunities to connect, and handy, easy, DIY ethos—are also the things that make it such a great marketplace.

Here, you can take your precious passion and turn it into a money-making concern. Sell your cute crafts on Etsy, and the junk from an old, dead hobby on eBay. Grow today's Tumblr blog into an overnight sensation and start merchandising tomorrow. Solicit funds from strangers for that great business idea you had but don't want to sacrifice your lifestyle to build.

Make no mistake—this is serious business. And it's cool.

Take your innermost dreams, your hopes, your personal perspective, and of course your physical possessions, and monetize them. Put them to work for you. Why not? It's easy—just promote a friend's post/event/product, and they'll do the same for you. Thank your sponsors publicly, and they'll remember you when it matters. Before you know it, your shit will go viral. The sky's the limit!

You can also buy more things—dreams, hopes, perspective and possessions—for less. Whatever it is, you can always get it cheaper on the internet. You're not screwing someone over for it—they want to sell for less! That's their USP! Something's better than nothing, right?

Everyone's selling what they love, and boy are they happy. Thank God technology released us from the bonds of the dollar-dependent lifestyle our parents had. Now we're so free. Free to sell anything, everything—and love doing it. Everyone's an entrepreneur!

Get on board: isn't it time you turned your passions into profit?

*For the purposes of this post, "sell what you love" may also be read as "prostitute your passion". Up to you.