Creativity

It’s good to repeat yourself. By default I think we believe to repeat ourselves is a bad thing. However, if we’re trying to communicate it’s through repetition that it gets across. The trick is to do this without becoming redundant  — in other words, knowing when enough is enough.

The other trick is to repeat ourselves but not in exactly the same way. While this post’s headline may not be the best example, it is an example of sorts. Put a better, more lengthy way, we might answer a question with, “Repetition is good. When we say something once only, it is easy for its essence to be lost in all the other communication that goes on between people. Thus, to say it two or three times helps to break through the clutter and make it more memorable. The lesson, then, is that it is good to repeat ourselves.”

Okay. That may be a bit too long, too wordy and too tedious but I think you get the idea.

Repetition is one of the ways we remember. Why do football teams in practice run the same play over and over? It’s to work out the weaknesses, get everyone on the same page and also to ensure every knows it, learns it and understands what to do almost without thinking when the play is called in a game situation.

I went off on this topic after reading Why Twitter was inevitable? over on Julien Smith’s blog. He begins by talking about recalling things he had forgotten about radio culture, such as the necessity to, “… constantly repeat the thing we’re talking about …”

I worked in radio as well, years ago. It was in commercial radio. I remember coming up with my own rule about ads which was, if you’re forced to choose between creativity and frequency, always go with frequency.

Ideally, you wouldn’t have to make this choice. You could have a creative ad plus frequency – meaning it got played a lot, hopefully throughout the day, particularly at the high listening periods (morning and drive). One of the reasons you hear and remember those awful local car dealership ads is because they forego creativity (well, maybe they think their ads are creative) and go with frequency – ads that are run a lot, often concentrated toward the end of the week and weekends when it was assumed anyone buying a car might be out shopping for one.

The theory was simple and, I think, true: an ad heard once would not be remembered, no matter how good it was. There is simply too much noise to break through. Our minds recall the things we hear, see and do frequently.

Repetition is how we learn and that is because it is how we remember. That is what makes repetition a good thing. It requires some skill to avoid becoming obvious and annoying but the bottom line remains: it’s good to repeat yourself.

Roll credits …

I went off on this topic by reading an interview with Julien Smith over on Mark Dykeman’s blog (Broadcasting Brain). That lead me to Julien’s blog and the post I referred to above.

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On the weekend I was going through some very old files. I bought a floppy drive for 3.5″ discs about two years ago with the intention of locating and moving files I considered important to my other hard drive, or burn them to a CD or DVD. Well, two years later I finally opened up the box with the floppy drive and went through some of my discs. (And believe me, it took a while going through the house and searching for where I had put them.)

The first thing that struck me was just how many of them there were. The second thing was just how much writing I had done over the years. They contained files from a number of different jobs I’ve had (as a writer) as well as a lot of personal writing such as fiction and poetry.

Good grief! I wrote a lot!

I was mainly interested in the fiction and poetry material. Or maybe I should say I was sidetracked by it.

Three things characterized the material: 1) the quantity, 2) how dreadful most of it was, 3) how good a very small amount of it was.

I think I knew even at the time that most of it was rubbish. But it was interesting to see what mistakes I was making (primarily three) and how, over time, I eventually began to eliminate those mistakes. In other words, there was progression in the quality. That has always been one of the aspects of writing I like most: seeing it improve.

And what were the three main mistakes I was making? First, there was too much telling and little showing, at least in the early stories. Second, there was a great deal of over-writing which could also be rephrased as pretentious writing. Thirdly, and related to the second, much of it tried too hard to be cute or clever.

But that was the negative side of things. From the positive perspective, a good deal of it was damn funny! I could also see I write fiction best when I begin with an absurdity. For some reason, that triggers my creativity. For instance, I had a very, very short story called The Itinerant Town. It was about a town that every day was in a different part of Canada. It was, as you can imagine, very difficult to find.

It was a fascinating exercise and, in some sense, gratifying because while I saw how utterly awful most of the material was, I saw the few that were pretty good. And even many of the bad stories and poems in those files have some good ideas at their core. It reminded me of Horace (I think it was Horace) who wrote somewhere that you should take what you write and bury it for a number of years. Then, when you finally go back and look at it, you’ll truly know if it was any good. In other words, it’s difficult to judge truly in the moment. Time gives you a more objective perspective.

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I’ve been up to no good, at least not in a practical sense. I’ve been doing what I’ve always done with computers, the Internet and writing: playing.

Some guys go out at 11:00 at night and play hockey. Some people go hiking or kayaking or running. Some people pour over recipes and try new cuisines. I play on my computer.

And as I’ve often done, I’ve put it online. It’s right up their in the header navigation, Harcourt. It’s actually a bit of silliness called Harcourt Goes to Hell.

The number of reasons to not put it online are legion. Personal branding, professionalism, and so on. As someone who works professionally as a writer — the SEO writing, the technical communications, the marketing communications, the web writing, copy and on and on — this kind of thing undermines the seriousness of my image, doesn’t it?

Probably. But years ago, in pre-Web days, when I first got a computer and first connected with the Internet, it was for the fun of it. It was for the possibilities it created for playing, which is how I look at writing (despite how frustrating it can often be). There were so many tools the computer offered and so many things to access with the Internet, I thought, “Wow! This so cool.”

Of course, I did pretend I had practical reasons in mind. And in truth, I did. I saw the communication possibilities, the efficiencies, and the cost reduction potential.

Eventually the world of marketing, and business generally, caught on to what the Web meant and the business aspects of Internet technology — software, social media, handhelds, apps etc. — and it took off like gangbusters.

The tenor of what was online also changed. (Perhaps that’s my own perception based on what interests me and where I go and how I use things.) It became more business focused and, with that focus, a bit more serious, much more aware of appearances and perception (branding).

But a lot of what is developed, at least what is developed with a consumer focus, is based on the idea that people play. Outside. Inside. And online. This is why I think putting something like Harcourt Goes to Hell online is okay. It’s a part of who I am — this aspect of playing, that is — but certainly not the whole of me. And while I don’t expect anyone to perceive it this way, as I do, it’s actually an important aspect for anyone hoping to do business online or use the tools available to market, discuss and “monetize” their business.

It means, I think, that I am in touch with people and what they often do with all these communication and other tools: play. I may not know or understand the specifics of how they play, but I do have the intuitive sense for why they behave as they do because it’s the same reason behind why I play. (That reason? It’s creative. And that makes it fun.)

Consumers are people, yes. But while people may consume (buy products and services), they do many other things as well. They aren’t automatons. They aren’t made up of code. They aren’t programmed with an overriding priority like, “To buy.” Unlike Isaac Asimov’s robots and their “Laws of Robotics,” consumers (people) don’t have a “Laws of Consumerism.” People do anything and everything and there is often no explaining why until years of research have been put in. It’s achieved after the fact.

Although we often appear to come close, understanding people isn’t a cerebral thing. It’s visceral.

Playing is a way of staying in touch with that.

Harcourt Goes to Hell is one way I play. It may be silly and not particularly good, but it’s creative and it’s fun.

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I had to repost this with the link to YouTube because there appeared to be a malware warning popping up when I used the TED Talks embedding (at least, when I used Safari – not so with Firefox).

This is worth watching. Elizabeth Gilbert talking about how we view writing and creativity andhow we might want to take another approach:

By the way, I love the Ruth Stone metaphor of the poem “coming at her.” Also love the Tom Waits story.

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Feeling small? Why not be amazing?

Needle Sized Art Very incredible story! Not only is this mans art cool but he got a ton of cash for it!

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Thanks to Daniel Pink, I took a look at a couple of interesting, if curious, items that revolve around the subjects of creativity and smarts. Apparently both sleep and boredom are used by the brain for some high falutin’ processing work. Both items are worth a look. From Scientific American:

• Sleep on It: How Snoozing Makes You Smarter

And from the New York Times:

• You’re Bored, but Your Brain Is Tuned In

Finally, today’s Globe and Mail had this somewhat discouraging item regarding the world of freelance:

• Freelance slackers, beware: Big Brother is watching

Monitoring a freelancer makes no sense to me. It seems to me you are paying for a project and it shouldn’t matter what someone is doing with his or her time if you get the results you’re paying for and it is delivered on time.

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Generally, people don’t read closely online. So it’s not a good idea to be too clever in your copy. We don’t pay attention and therefore we miss subtleties. I’ve seen instances where this is sometimes taken as meaning there are a lot of stupid people out there, but it isn’t this at all. Very intelligent people miss cleverness too.

Because of this, I think I sometimes come across as an advocate for bland. (The truth is I think bland equals disaster.) But Seth Godin has a great example of what I’m trying to get across to co-workers or clients who want to get too cute. Have a look at his post, In the end, copy wins. It’s a great example of how people read online and how copy has to take this into account.

When we encounter text online, we’re generally in an active, task-oriented state. We “read” in a rushed manner, impatiently. And more often than not, we just skim the first few lines, glance at what is remaining, and skip to the end where we skim again (if we even get that far). (This post is an example. A lot of people only glanced at the first paragraph and are not going to see this sentence.)

I know this is true with Seth’s original post and link. I confess, I didn’t know what to make of it when I saw it. Like others, I thought he was a bit daft calling the posted Clinton “exclusive” great writing. But I didn’t actually read the post – not all of if, and not closely. I’m just glad I didn’t do my usual knee-jerk thing and send off an e-mail telling him he was nuts.

The problem is, as he states in his first subsequent point, it’s too clever. I like to think I’m not a dullard. I certainly hope not. But I, and a lot of people, come across this way due to the way we tend to read online (which really isn’t reading at all).

So … While I don’t celebrate bland – not by a long shot – I definitely think you need to be plain and clear first, at least online. Too many people just don’t pick up on nuances. I don’t think this means you can’t be a bit creative too; it’s just the creativity has certain constraints. (As Seth indicates, good Web copy is something of a high wire act.)

I also wonder if this issue of how people read doesn’t extend beyond the Internet into other areas too. It could be our Internet habits are finding their way into other areas of our lives. It could be we now bring this partial, hurried attention to other areas like TV and print. But that’s just a suspicion. I’m not sure if this is true – but it may be.

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