Hints for Better Post Writing

[Guest TOSGcentral]

I thought that I would stick this in as a potential help to people who want to express themselves to a greater and clearer extent on the forums – particularly as some thread topics are quite involved and cannot be developed, or even adequately treated, in a few line interchange.

 

 

Forums are a form of conversation and are lacking in some vital communication aids that face to face conversations automatically include. These will include body language, icy stares, loving looks, tone of voice etc.

 

 

Primarily the medium lacks the facility of being able to quickly correct misconceptions of what has just been said. In written communication you become entirely dependent upon what you have written and this does NOT include what you MEANT to say in all cases because this may not be discernable to the reader from what you have actually written!

 

 

This is a prime cause of threads going off-topic and producing side-line interchanges that divert attention from the prime purpose of the thread. There are a number of ways of dealing with this and most of them devolve down to some basic writing skills – a subject that intimidates too many people because they inherently feel that they cannot ‘write’. Well you can talk can’t you? If you can talk coherently then you can also write – even if your vocabulary, spelling and punctuation are not crash hot! The trick is to make your message understandable and acceptable such that the reader gets the message clearly.

 

 

I have split the following into a logical flow of headings where you can become more involved and use your own knowledge/opinion for the overall betterment of these forums.

 

 

BASIC STRATEGY. Do not write directly into the forums. Use Word, NotePad, or whatever word processor you have to get your thoughts down with the facility of rearranging them as you wish. Direct writing to the forums on involved topics will lead you straight into premature and not fully prepared expression that you are then stuck with.

 

 

COMPOSING POSTS. Have a good think about what you want to say and why you want to say it. Use a piece of paper to jot down headings of points and then rearrange these into a flowing and logical order. This will then be the structure that you write your post around – expanding upon the headings. Headings can be very handy in a large or involved post to keep a reader on track with a developing theme.

 

 

WRITING YOUR POST. Type in your sub part headings anyway whether you intend to use sub headings or not (you can always delete them as a form of tidying up later). Now write in the meat of what you want to say and your headings will steer your comprehension flow.

 

 

THE ‘HOOK’. This is particularly used in professional writing to get an editor’s attention to a manuscript but is valid in any form of writing. The objective is to incite the reader to want to read more. In our forum environment it could be – “We should be teaching spinning and I am going to say why!†– to - :â€Have you heard about the illegal flying going on at Goanna Creek? This is the hot goss!†(bit tricky that latter one – remember the laws of libel!).

 

 

SENTENCING , This is an important writing skill. Primarily you are not just after comprehension but also reading acceptability.

 

 

With sentence length you should be following speech patterns. Read your sentences out loud to yourself. If you are running out of puff getting them out in one breath then they are too long. Although reading is a mental exercise the reader is concurrently using reading methods in terms of attention span and comprehension as per speech. See how you can shorten long sentences, perhaps by splitting them into two, but still convey the same meaning.

 

 

PARAGRAPHING. This is the most common flaw in writing. Too often writers will get carried away with themselves and produce huge blocks of text. This will lead to readers rejecting even reading the post because it is daunting and seems impenetrable. The basic rules of paragraphing are that when you change the subject or item of the issue you are discussing then you change paragraphs.

 

 

Changing paragraphs should be done these days on computers not by simple indentation but by at least two line spaces, as you are reading here. This not only gives greater clarity to the reader but also breaks up an otherwise dense block of text that readers may be disinclined to penetrate.

 

 

COOLING OFF. When writing involved and/or complex posts – do the best you can and then LEAVE IT ALONE for at least half an hour to cool down, preferably longer. This is particularly so if you are responding to potentially contentious issues or other posts that cause you disquiet. Then go back and re-read what you have written is what you actually meant to say and refine accordingly.

 

 

POSTING. Once you are finished then post. First use your word processor to copy what you have written. Open the forum at the appropriate place and simply paste in your submission

 

 

I hope those few hints will assist you in being able to more fully express yourself in writing posts and so add to the quality of these most valuable forums.

 

 

Aye

 

 

Tony

 

 

[markendee]

Another good one to mention is brevity.

 

 

[drifter_driver]

just building on on tony's good work here's couple more:

 

In promulgating your esoteric cogitations or articulating your superficial sentimentalities and amicable, philosophical or psychological observations, beware of platitudinous ponderosity.

 

Let your writings demonstrate a clarified conciseness, a compact comprehensibleness, no coalescent conglomerations of precious garrulity, jejune bafflement and asinine affectations.

 

Eschew all conglomerations of flatulant, bloviated vapidity, jejune babblement and asinine affectations

 

Let your extemporaneous verbal evaporations and expatriations have lucidity, intelligibility and veracious vivacity without radomontade or Thespian bombast.

 

Sedulously avoid all polysyllabic profundity, pompous propensity, psittaceous vacuity, ventriloquial verbosity and vaniloquent vapidity.

 

Shun double-entendres, obnoxious jocosity and pestiferous profanity, observable or apparent.

 

sorry folks i know its the wrong section but could'nt help put a cut and paste job

 

 

[Captain]

I thought that I would stick this in as a potential help to people who want to express themselves to a greater and clearer extent on the forums – particularly as some thread topics are quite involved and cannot be developed, or even adequately treated, in a few line interchange.Forums are a form of conversation and are lacking in some vital communication aids that face to face conversations automatically include. These will include body language, icy stares, loving looks, tone of voice etc.

 

Primarily the medium lacks the facility of being able to quickly correct misconceptions of what has just been said. In written communication you become entirely dependent upon what you have written and this does NOT include what you MEANT to say in all cases because this may not be discernable to the reader from what you have actually written!

 

This is a prime cause of threads going off-topic and producing side-line interchanges that divert attention from the prime purpose of the thread. There are a number of ways of dealing with this and most of them devolve down to some basic writing skills – a subject that intimidates too many people because they inherently feel that they cannot ‘write’. Well you can talk can’t you? If you can talk coherently then you can also write – even if your vocabulary, spelling and punctuation are not crash hot! The trick is to make your message understandable and acceptable such that the reader gets the message clearly.

 

I have split the following into a logical flow of headings where you can become more involved and use your own knowledge/opinion for the overall betterment of these forums.

 

BASIC STRATEGY. Do not write directly into the forums. Use Word, NotePad, or whatever word processor you have to get your thoughts down with the facility of rearranging them as you wish. Direct writing to the forums on involved topics will lead you straight into premature and not fully prepared expression that you are then stuck with.

 

COMPOSING POSTS. Have a good think about what you want to say and why you want to say it. Use a piece of paper to jot down headings of points and then rearrange these into a flowing and logical order. This will then be the structure that you write your post around – expanding upon the headings. Headings can be very handy in a large or involved post to keep a reader on track with a developing theme.

 

WRITING YOUR POST. Type in your sub part headings anyway whether you intend to use sub headings or not (you can always delete them as a form of tidying up later). Now write in the meat of what you want to say and your headings will steer your comprehension flow.

 

THE ‘HOOK’. This is particularly used in professional writing to get an editor’s attention to a manuscript but is valid in any form of writing. The objective is to incite the reader to want to read more. In our forum environment it could be – “We should be teaching spinning and I am going to say why!” – to - :”Have you heard about the illegal flying going on at Goanna Creek? This is the hot goss!” (bit tricky that latter one – remember the laws of libel!).

 

SENTENCING , This is an important writing skill. Primarily you are not just after comprehension but also reading acceptability.

 

With sentence length you should be following speech patterns. Read your sentences out loud to yourself. If you are running out of puff getting them out in one breath then they are too long. Although reading is a mental exercise the reader is concurrently using reading methods in terms of attention span and comprehension as per speech. See how you can shorten long sentences, perhaps by splitting them into two, but still convey the same meaning.

 

PARAGRAPHING. This is the most common flaw in writing. Too often writers will get carried away with themselves and produce huge blocks of text. This will lead to readers rejecting even reading the post because it is daunting and seems impenetrable. The basic rules of paragraphing are that when you change the subject or item of the issue you are discussing then you change paragraphs.

 

Changing paragraphs should be done these days on computers not by simple indentation but by at least two line spaces, as you are reading here. This not only gives greater clarity to the reader but also breaks up an otherwise dense block of text that readers may be disinclined to penetrate.

 

COOLING OFF. When writing involved and/or complex posts – do the best you can and then LEAVE IT ALONE for at least half an hour to cool down, preferably longer. This is particularly so if you are responding to potentially contentious issues or other posts that cause you disquiet. Then go back and re-read what you have written is what you actually meant to say and refine accordingly.

 

POSTING. Once you are finished then post. First use your word processor to copy what you have written. Open the forum at the appropriate place and simply paste in your submission

 

I hope those few hints will assist you in being able to more fully express yourself in writing posts and so add to the quality of these most valuable forums.

 

Aye

 

Tony

Tony

 

 

 

Surely you aren't serious?

 

 

 

Yet I looked and looked (in line after line after line after line after line after .....) and can't find a punch line (or a hook) anywhere.

 

 

 

Oh well. Whatever turns you on, but don't you think your post is a tad pretentious as I have to say that I haven't yet found your tomes to be the best written or the most entertaining on this forum.

 

 

 

Geeeeeez mate. Lighten up a bit.

 

 

 

Regards Geoff

 

 

[Guest TOSGcentral]

Quite correct Captain – certainly in some eyes. It is always a risky business presuming to hand out uninvited free advice. This is particularly so when we do have excellent writers on these forums who do express themselves most clearly.

 

 

We also have some who do not but would like to and a few tips helps them to be more involved here. Those are the people the notes were written for.

 

 

Ultimately the reader has a choice of what they read so the situation is self-solving – if they do not care for the subject then they may pass it by. Everyone has different needs, comprehension and experience levels.

 

 

Personally I consider these forums as a major attribute to Rec Aviation and, like others, try to do my own bit in supporting them in a positive fashion.

 

 

[farri]

just building on on tony's good work here's couple more:In promulgating your esoteric cogitations or articulating your superficial sentimentalities and amicable, philosophical or psychological observations, beware of platitudinous ponderosity.

 

Let your writings demonstrate a clarified conciseness, a compact comprehensibleness, no coalescent conglomerations of precious garrulity, jejune bafflement and asinine affectations.

 

Eschew all conglomerations of flatulant, bloviated vapidity, jejune babblement and asinine affectations

 

Let your extemporaneous verbal evaporations and expatriations have lucidity, intelligibility and veracious vivacity without radomontade or Thespian bombast.

 

Sedulously avoid all polysyllabic profundity, pompous propensity, psittaceous vacuity, ventriloquial verbosity and vaniloquent vapidity.

 

Shun double-entendres, obnoxious jocosity and pestiferous profanity, observable or apparent.

 

sorry folks i know its the wrong section but could'nt help put a cut and paste job

I LOVE IT,

 

I LOVE IT,

 

I LOVE IT,;)

 

Tony is correct, however,... hhoww manny oof uss we6t to righting schwl tho.

 

We should have a section devoted to writing instruction and Tony could be the instructor.

 

Frank.

 

Ps, No pun intended,Tony.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

You know, i spend most of my time in the GA world, infact im the only RAA instructor (who isn't also a GA instructor) at a very busy airfield with quite a number of schools.. So you can imagine the reception i sometimes recieve.

 

Without putting to fina point on it, most seasoned instructors look down on a low time instructor like myself and add to that that i teach in "toy planes" and respect is a hard thing to come by.. And getting free advice is simply unheard of.. If i was to approach an instructor from another school with a problem, the response would be less then pretty.

 

On these forums however things are different.. Some of the most experianced guys are the ones that always post and offer free advice the most often.. Its a breath of fresh air for me ( can't speak for anyone else). Its surprising that guys with tens of thousands of hours and instructional time even read these forums let alone offer any sort of advice.

 

OK, so some of tony's post's can be a little long, agreed, but if you bother to read them they are full of good stuff, and most often backed up by personal experiance, something you can't buy, borrow or steal.

 

Members like tony, HPD, polerous, facthunter, (to name a few) bring a knowlage base to these forums that i believe is its most valuable rescource, and they offer this knowlage to us low timers at no cost. I mean these guys have eperiance in just about evry type of acft, in country's all over the world..And i for one will take knowlage from any good source..

 

So for mine, keep it up fella's.:thumb_up:

 

 

[Ross]

What really appeals is seeing a large post followed by half a dozen others containing the same post as a quote.

 

Regards

 

 

[farri]

You know, i spend most of my time in the GA world, infact im the only RAA instructor (who isn't also a GA instructor) at a very busy airfield with quite a number of schools.. So you can imagine the reception i sometimes recieve.Without putting to fina point on it, most seasoned instructors look down on a low time instructor like myself and add to that that i teach in "toy planes" and respect is a hard thing to come by.. And getting free advice is simply unheard of.. If i was to approach an instructor from another school with a problem, the response would be less then pretty.

.:thumb_up:

Hi Merv,

 

Been there.

 

Keep in mind that respect is earned not demanded and I`m not sugesting for a moment that you are demanding it.

 

The student is paying for your service,give the student the best service you can and you will get respect.

 

Instructing sorts out the men from the boys.

 

Frank.:thumb_up:

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Frank, yea i appreciate that fact. I have no troubles with respect from students. Not at all, i was talking about the other opperators in the area. Not so much that they don't respect me, its that a lot still have no respect for anything RAA.. Ive never given them any reason's NOT to respect me in the air.

 

My post was referring to the high respect given on this forum to ALL members.. Newbies and seniors alike, and that seasoned guys such as yourself have no problems passing pearl;s of wisdom onto guys like me, and its greatly appreciated.

 

cheers

 

 

[Guest airsick]

This is a prime cause of threads going off-topic and producing side-line interchanges that divert attention from the prime purpose of the thread.

Hehe

 

 

[motzartmerv]

 

 

[Guest High Plains Drifter]

Another good one to mention is brevity.

I think even Tony would admit markendee' post was funny :thumb_up:

 

.....Some of the other posts thumb_downthumb_downthumb_down

 

 

[farri]

What really appeals is seeing a large post followed by half a dozen others containing the same post as a quote.Regards

Thats easily taken care of.

 

Frank.

 

 

[farri]

Personally I consider these forums as a major attribute to Rec Aviation and, like others, try to do my own bit in supporting them in a positive fashion.

Tony,

 

I support you in that.

 

Frank.

 

 

[Flyer]

And then somebody comes along some time later and re-ignites the whole thing with something like the KISS principle....Keep It Simple St...

 

 

 

[facthunter]

Well?

 

All in all, it depends how simple you want to be. Nev..

 

 

[Timm427]

Hey - I read Tony's Post and found it was a bit to chew, but there was some good stuff in there.

 

I didn't see anywhere that said you had to read it or follow his suggestions.

 

The problem is this - If you ridicule someone who feels they have something to contribute but you don't want to read it. Then chances are they'll think twice about sharing their information in the future. Information you may have found valuable.

 

P.S. I think I just broke every one of Tony's guidelines.

 

 

[Allan]

And another one which gets mentioned from time to time on another aviation forum (peeepeeesomething:raise_eyebrow:):

 

Never post when pist:yuk:

 

PS. As a non-flyer, I quite enjoy Tony's posts. I actually consider them fairly well written, always topical and thought provoking. But then I suppose, to you aviators it might seem like teaching grannie to suck eggs.

 

PPS I was actually thinking of seeking permission from Tony to use his guidelines in another forum I frequent which gets absolutely feral at times (I hasten to add, it's nothing to do with aviation).

 

 

[Guest TOSGcentral]

Gracious words Allan (and Timm427) - thank you.

 

What I write for these forums is for public consumption and may be used elsewhere without any permission from myself.

 

T.