Creating an internet persona for Writing for Interactive Media presented a unique opportunity for me to explore my online writing style. I considered several different projects before settling on the character of Zero, a homeless cat who finds himself in a life-changing circumstance.
My decision to create a blog and Twitter from the point of view of a cat expands upon my prior experience. Many of my internet outlets—my blog, Twitter, Facebook, my internships—have allowed me to create an online presence. In the aforementioned projects, I present myself in my voice. However, I have two additional projects in which I assume the voice of a house cat.
The first is a Facebook account I created in 2007 for my own sidekick, a five year old Tortoiseshell cat whose name I will withhold for the purposes of anonymity. I mostly use the account to post photos of her, and she makes the occasional comment about feline-related topics.
The second is a blog I created for my employer, a local humane society. We have a real live spokescat with a large Facebook fan base. I expanded on this endeavor by creating a blog in his voice. He discusses important topics and events that relate to the organization. It has been a very positive experience.
Although I considered branching out and exploring other voices for this class, I decided to stick with my current theme, continuing to develop my feline persona. It’s amazing how influential other species can be online. (Check out this article on how talking cats help the SPCA.) Wanting to experiment a bit with creative writing—which I never get to explore—I decided to create the character of Zero. My plan is to tell his story over the course of the next seven weeks. Happy reading!
My decision to create a blog and Twitter from the point of view of a cat expands upon my prior experience. Many of my internet outlets—my blog, Twitter, Facebook, my internships—have allowed me to create an online presence. In the aforementioned projects, I present myself in my voice. However, I have two additional projects in which I assume the voice of a house cat.
The first is a Facebook account I created in 2007 for my own sidekick, a five year old Tortoiseshell cat whose name I will withhold for the purposes of anonymity. I mostly use the account to post photos of her, and she makes the occasional comment about feline-related topics.
The second is a blog I created for my employer, a local humane society. We have a real live spokescat with a large Facebook fan base. I expanded on this endeavor by creating a blog in his voice. He discusses important topics and events that relate to the organization. It has been a very positive experience.
Although I considered branching out and exploring other voices for this class, I decided to stick with my current theme, continuing to develop my feline persona. It’s amazing how influential other species can be online. (Check out this article on how talking cats help the SPCA.) Wanting to experiment a bit with creative writing—which I never get to explore—I decided to create the character of Zero. My plan is to tell his story over the course of the next seven weeks. Happy reading!
Well, I think it is pretty clear you love cats. I would too if I wasn't so allergic to them. Do you love dogs as much as you love cats? I'm definitely a dog person.
ReplyDeleteI also can't help but wonder if you will stick to cats for your capstone assignment.
Try to loosen up your writing style over these next seven weeks. I think Zinsser's comments on clutter will help you to find a more concise voice. His comments have helped me to break free.
Thanks. I am looking forward to experimenting more with my style. I do like dogs, but I cannot relate to them in the same way I relate to cats. I have a low tolerance for obnoxious dogs. Some dogs I like, some I don't. However, I like all cats. I even appreciate feral (wild) cats even though humans cannot go near them. --Zero's Narrator
ReplyDeleteAh ha! We dig ever so deeper! How do you relate to cats?
DeleteI understand their body language more easily than I do dogs'.
DeleteAs a narrator for our Intrepid Feline, I would say you have the credentials to be a very credible voice. You have both the personal and professional background with cats, and clearly have a genuine concern for their welfare. I look forward to exploring the world through young Zero's eyes.
ReplyDeleteInformation is arranged logically, and the narrative cascades revealing both you and your intentions for this work. However, I am left knowing more about the author than the cat—they are easily separable on the blog, and so some of the illusion is lost. Nonetheless, in practical terms, links to the other pages you curate would have profoundly benefited this post; I a reader would acquaint my self with your work and potentially be more inclined to follow your current venture.
ReplyDeleteThat would ruin the (futile) attempt at anonymity.
Delete-Zero's Narrator
I’m not going to make font suggestions. You have plenty of classes for design questions. I’ll only say that there is a reason the web defaults to simple serif and sans serif typefaces.
ReplyDeleteFonts deliver your content. The more whimsical they get, the harder they become on the eyes. Every book in the library, including the children’s section, uses a simple font because messing with the letters otherwise… will stop any massage in its trucks.
I don’t mind the photographs, but you could just put the cat’s words in italics.
Hiding your words from the search engines brings up the same question as the pseudonyms. If you are hiding, then why are you writing online? (If you are doing it solely because I asked you to, then ignore the question.)
The cat answering questions is good. What you are doing differently from your other cat blogs? What are you investigating or trying out here?
Your bio is well written and well organized. I use these first assignments to explore author and subject, individual and credibility, narrator and cat. They are usually interchangeable. A good bio or about page is going to highlight this connection for the reader.
This is why your second assignment is the stronger bio. It is less the life story, more focused and engaging.
Even though the sentence that stood out for me, from either piece, was in the first.
She loves this meaningful and important work despite its inability to pay a useful wage.
That was abruptly not self-deprecating. It is sincere. It says a lot.
And while I understand why Strunk & White can leave you cold, I don’t think they or I are suggesting you do to your words what I just told you to do with your fonts.
(Or maybe we are. Maybe that is simplicity at work too. Letters are simple. We don’t need a twenty-seventh letter. They work.)
When writing works, it works too. There is no excess. You never want to remove the beauty of your work. We are not telling you to eliminate what makes your work unique. But beauty doesn’t repeat itself. Two beautiful sentences that say the same thing diminish one another. Three adjectives that say the same thing bury one another.
Make each word count. Make each sentence rich and you will need less of them.
And so far that is what you are doing.
Zero is a cat. His life is about to change.
There is so much mystery in that headline, and so much potential.
Your photographs are brief. Like a daily haiku, we only get a moment. You don’t linger. And the transiency of Zero, even his name, is very clear. This isn’t a cat spending a long well fed life on a pillow. There is an arc here.
That tweet – I’m bored! – says the same thing. It’s the opposite of boring. It invites.
No, this is a very concise and solid character. Things are about to change.
I have no doubt.
Your comment on design is rousing.
DeleteI am allowed to create a piece of art for anyone to see? How exciting! I can use color and style and form...
I see a web page as a piece of art. I understand that there are "norms," but I do not want to follow those rules. I am thrilled that I can play with design. This is not something I'm allowed to do very often.
Because I am not a business looking to make a buck or an organization looking to gain a following, I don't have to obsess over being "normal" or adhere to any standard rules.
On the other hand, I don't want to alienate those with whom I've chosen to share my work. In this case, it's my classmates. I want my pieces to be legible.
YouTube has this function that I often use. I can set my videos to "private" so that they are not searchable, but I can give the link to friends so that they can view the film. It's great.
This blog is similar: it's something I want my classmates to see, and something I may share with friends once the class is over, but not something I want to distribute all over the web. If it were for a larger audience, I would have to worry about design.
We were told that our text was the important thing and that we should avoid design. I chose a very simple template and made it more simple by changing the colors to solids. I did decide that the text itself needed a design. To me, the words themselves should look a certain way.
I've changed to a more "normal" font. I hope my readers agree with the change.