T’other day at work, I was asked to make a correction that was grammatically sound but that sounded really bad. So I ignored it. I try to err on the side of conversational English, not because I’m lazy (though I certainly am), but because I realize that writing for the Interwebs means having a conversation with all y’all. Moreso than if I were writing a novel or an essay or a poem (uh, as IF). Because of all the things — links, tags, comments, notes — that make the Internet one big conversation.
That’s also why I don’t hold with Washington Post copy chief and author Bill Walsh’s assertion that he’s “not a big fan of the idea of books and classes about ‘writing for the Web’ and similar nonsense. Writing is writing, on a Gateway or with a glitter pen.” Doesn’t good writing take the audience into account? In the case of the Web, that’s an audience who finds your words by linking from who-knows-where, an audience who can comment on whatever you say — either directly or via message boards or blogs — instantly and publicly, an audience who is only ever one click away from leaving your finely crafted prose. They’re talking to you, if only through their clicktastic behavior. Why not talk to them, in a language they understand?
Jane Espenson, Buffy/Battlestar/Gilmore Girls television writer extraordinaire says something similar about writing good dialogue — that conversational, non-grammatically-hamstrung writing is not only easier on the ears, it’s also more natural and engaging:
Writing dialogue should feel a bit like taking dictation from the same part of your brain that comes up with what you actually say all day long. If it gets tangled up, let it. If it hesitates, put in an “um”. If it stumbles to a halt and trails off, well that’s what ....s are for. You can massage it all later, take out all the stuff that makes normal speech so totally unlistenable... to. But the work of making dialogue sound natural gets easier if you let it come out of your brain that way.
Feel free to argue (see “conversation” above...), but I think the same goes for web writing. You’re talking to someone, even when you’re typing.
You can find more of the interesting word usements I structure* on Apple.com.
Read my article, Better Writing Through Design, on No. 242 of A List Apart.
Pick up issue 176 of .net magazine to read my thoughts on creating outstanding web copy.
Watch a video of the Design Eye for South By panel at SXSW Interactive 2008. Or view the slide deck at DesignEye.org.
*With apologies to Harris K. Telemacher.