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PR, Sources and HARO Because I write for a variety of sites, I receive a lot of pitches for article ideas, reviews and so on. Because of the sheer volume, I’m not always able to respond to all emails. With that in mind, here are a few guidelines that can help make sure thatyou’re
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
When talking to entrepreneurs, it seems like everyone has a ‘crap job’ story: the tale of the a job so bad that it forced the person telling it to decide how to get out of a situation she absolutely hated. I have held a few crap jobs over the years. They all had theirown
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Among the property you own, you might count a house, a small business and the rights to your written work. And those rights — even if they aren’t to the Harry Potter novels — are worth something. Because your rights to your work (selling it, publishing it, etc.) are considered property, they are a part of your overall estate and comprise, in particular, your literary estate.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Latin is a strange language. No one speaks it as their first language and few people speak it regularly outside of Vatican City. Yet many schools still offer Latin classes and most of us know a few words (even if we aren’t always aware that we do). We still use Latin roots for forming newTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
The inverted pyramid format is one recommended for journalists (as well as other types of writers), where the most important information comes right at the beginning of an article, perhaps even crammed entirely into the first paragraph. Important details come next, with general background information coming last. It’s a format that was developed for newspapers,THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I’m excited to share the template I use for creating in-house style guides, as a reward for The Responsible Communication Style Guide Kickstarter reaching $10,000 in backing. Want to really improve your company’s communications? Back the Kickstarter today! TL;DR: Here’s the link to download my in-house style guide template: the style guide as a .docx!THURSDAYBRAM.COM
성경의 주요 용어의 의미와 기원을 알아보십시오. 90.000개 이상의 성경 문고가 있는 성경 사전® 하나님의 말씀과 그분의 아들 예수 그리스도의 말씀을 이해하는 데 도움이 될 것입니다. 구약과 신약의 심각한 연구에 필요한 참조 응용 프로그램. † 90.000 이상 사전, 백과 사전 및 일치 항목.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
SimCity faz também com que a série seja mais acesssível a jogadores novatos. Ele deixa de lado algumas complicaçáes dos capítulos anteriores e facilita construçáes, meios administrativos das cidades e muito mais. Para construir uma rua, por exemplo, basta selecionar o modelo da rua, clicar e arrastar o 마우스 pelo cenário – precisater ainda
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Easy는 시카고에 거주하는 여러 개인을 따라 가며 사랑, 관계 및 일반적인 지식과 같은 문제를 탐색하려고 합니다. 리뷰는 현대 사랑의 다른 품종의 현미경 묘사로 시리즈를 설명했다. 그것은 에피소드 선집 형식을 가지고, 이전 의 볼 필요가 없습니다 독립 실행 형 에피소드와.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
산돌은 제570회 한국을 기념하는 특별전을 연다. 산돌커뮤니케이션이 주최하고 서울디자인재단이 후원하는 이번 전시는 한글글폰을 만드는 과정과 흐름을 암시하는 것, 유기체를 형성하는 세포처럼 표현하여 관람객이 쉽게 이해할 수 있도록 것이다. Sandoll은 창립 35주년을 기념하여 필리핀THURSDAYBRAM.COM
PR, Sources and HARO Because I write for a variety of sites, I receive a lot of pitches for article ideas, reviews and so on. Because of the sheer volume, I’m not always able to respond to all emails. With that in mind, here are a few guidelines that can help make sure thatyou’re
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
When talking to entrepreneurs, it seems like everyone has a ‘crap job’ story: the tale of the a job so bad that it forced the person telling it to decide how to get out of a situation she absolutely hated. I have held a few crap jobs over the years. They all had theirown
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Among the property you own, you might count a house, a small business and the rights to your written work. And those rights — even if they aren’t to the Harry Potter novels — are worth something. Because your rights to your work (selling it, publishing it, etc.) are considered property, they are a part of your overall estate and comprise, in particular, your literary estate.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Latin is a strange language. No one speaks it as their first language and few people speak it regularly outside of Vatican City. Yet many schools still offer Latin classes and most of us know a few words (even if we aren’t always aware that we do). We still use Latin roots for forming newTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
The inverted pyramid format is one recommended for journalists (as well as other types of writers), where the most important information comes right at the beginning of an article, perhaps even crammed entirely into the first paragraph. Important details come next, with general background information coming last. It’s a format that was developed for newspapers,THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I’m excited to share the template I use for creating in-house style guides, as a reward for The Responsible Communication Style Guide Kickstarter reaching $10,000 in backing. Want to really improve your company’s communications? Back the Kickstarter today! TL;DR: Here’s the link to download my in-house style guide template: the style guide as a .docx!THURSDAYBRAM.COM
성경의 주요 용어의 의미와 기원을 알아보십시오. 90.000개 이상의 성경 문고가 있는 성경 사전® 하나님의 말씀과 그분의 아들 예수 그리스도의 말씀을 이해하는 데 도움이 될 것입니다. 구약과 신약의 심각한 연구에 필요한 참조 응용 프로그램. † 90.000 이상 사전, 백과 사전 및 일치 항목.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
SimCity faz também com que a série seja mais acesssível a jogadores novatos. Ele deixa de lado algumas complicaçáes dos capítulos anteriores e facilita construçáes, meios administrativos das cidades e muito mais. Para construir uma rua, por exemplo, basta selecionar o modelo da rua, clicar e arrastar o 마우스 pelo cenário – precisater ainda
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Easy는 시카고에 거주하는 여러 개인을 따라 가며 사랑, 관계 및 일반적인 지식과 같은 문제를 탐색하려고 합니다. 리뷰는 현대 사랑의 다른 품종의 현미경 묘사로 시리즈를 설명했다. 그것은 에피소드 선집 형식을 가지고, 이전 의 볼 필요가 없습니다 독립 실행 형 에피소드와.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
산돌은 제570회 한국을 기념하는 특별전을 연다. 산돌커뮤니케이션이 주최하고 서울디자인재단이 후원하는 이번 전시는 한글글폰을 만드는 과정과 흐름을 암시하는 것, 유기체를 형성하는 세포처럼 표현하여 관람객이 쉽게 이해할 수 있도록 것이다. Sandoll은 창립 35주년을 기념하여 필리핀THURSDAYBRAM.COM
The 1619 Project by Nikole Hannah-Jones — Interactive Website (Content Warnings for slavery, racism, and violence). The 1619 Project comprises essays, poetry, photography, and more — all of which are worth your attention. Hannah-Jones developed the project to observe the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first african slaves inAmerica.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
When talking to entrepreneurs, it seems like everyone has a ‘crap job’ story: the tale of the a job so bad that it forced the person telling it to decide how to get out of a situation she absolutely hated. I have held a few crap jobs over the years. They all had theirown
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Latin is a strange language. No one speaks it as their first language and few people speak it regularly outside of Vatican City. Yet many schools still offer Latin classes and most of us know a few words (even if we aren’t always aware that we do). We still use Latin roots for forming newTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
The inverted pyramid format is one recommended for journalists (as well as other types of writers), where the most important information comes right at the beginning of an article, perhaps even crammed entirely into the first paragraph. Important details come next, with general background information coming last. It’s a format that was developed for newspapers,THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I spent last week at PyCon NA (in Portland this year — how convenient!). I made a zine to hand out explaining the Python community in Portland, along with suggesting some events for out-of-towners. Here’s a PDF you can download if you want to check it out. Even better, I wasn’t the only zine makerTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
The job of the curator is far different right now than it was a few centuries ago. Personal curation solves some small element of this question: quietly saving links that will help you go back and cook exactly the recipe you’re after or purchase the perfect outfit can let us handle a lot of the small questions in our lives.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I’ve been finding Hemingway surprisingly useful when working on ghost-writing projects lately. It’s a useful sort of a writing hack to get some quick insights when you’re trying to mimic someone else’s writing style. Of course, Hemingway is fundamentally intended to help writers sound more like the man himself. But it does that byhighlighting
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I have opinions on the internet. You might have seen some of my opinions because: I founded The Responsible Communication Style Guide (along with some other things); I write for publications ranging from Entrepreneur Magazine to Bitch MagazineTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
Tax Write Offs: Paypal Fees. 06. Dec. It seems like every client these days wants to pay me via Paypal, which, unfortunately, takes a nasty little bite out every payment. While a dollar here and 75 cents there doesn’t seem like much, it adds up pretty quickly. The thoughtTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
The 2014 Annual Report from Berkshire Hathaway came out recently. I always look forward to reading Warren Buffett’s letter to shareholders, but I found this year’s report especially worth reading. 2015 is the fiftieth anniversary of Buffett Partnership Ltd. taking control Berkshire Hathaway (then a faltering textile manufacturer). The textile manufacturing part of the businessTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
ThursdayBram.com is my personal blog. I get to choose what to put on here and, as a result, I keep to topics I find interesting. I promote friends and projects I think are cool. I’m pretty uninterested in 98 percent of pitches I get for this site. Comments If you’re interested in sharing a commentTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
PR, Sources and HARO Because I write for a variety of sites, I receive a lot of pitches for article ideas, reviews and so on. Because of the sheer volume, I’m not always able to respond to all emails. With that in mind, here are a few guidelines that can help make sure thatyou’re
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
This text was the basis of my recent talk at Write the Docs NA 2018, mostly about the glory and greatness of creating your own style guidesfrom scratch.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
TL;DR. I’m working on The Responsible Communication Style Guide with Recompiler Media. This project is something I’ve been thinking about for years and I wanted to write up how I got to this place. Our Kickstarter is here — backing at the $15 level is the fastest way to get a copy of The Responsible Communication Style Guide to use in yourown work.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I bet you didn’t even know that there was a freelance resume conundrum, did you? It’s pretty basic – the typical resume format of objective, skills and as much employment history as you can come up with just doesn’t work for freelancers.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Among the property you own, you might count a house, a small business and the rights to your written work. And those rights — even if they aren’t to the Harry Potter novels — are worth something. Because your rights to your work (selling it, publishing it, etc.) are considered property, they are a part of your overall estate and comprise, in particular, your literary estate.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I have opinions on the internet. You might have seen some of my opinions because: I founded The Responsible Communication Style Guide (along with some other things); I write for publications ranging from Entrepreneur Magazine to Bitch MagazineTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. The whole book is a useful read, albeit a bit dated — it was published by a professional organizer in 1971. But Alinsky’s rules remain widely applicable: Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
성경의 주요 용어의 의미와 기원을 알아보십시오. 90.000개 이상의 성경 문고가 있는 성경 사전® 하나님의 말씀과 그분의 아들 예수 그리스도의 말씀을 이해하는 데 도움이 될 것입니다. 구약과 신약의 심각한 연구에 필요한 참조 응용 프로그램. † 90.000 이상 사전, 백과 사전 및 일치 항목.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
ThursdayBram.com is my personal blog. I get to choose what to put on here and, as a result, I keep to topics I find interesting. I promote friends and projects I think are cool. I’m pretty uninterested in 98 percent of pitches I get for this site. Comments If you’re interested in sharing a commentTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
PR, Sources and HARO Because I write for a variety of sites, I receive a lot of pitches for article ideas, reviews and so on. Because of the sheer volume, I’m not always able to respond to all emails. With that in mind, here are a few guidelines that can help make sure thatyou’re
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
This text was the basis of my recent talk at Write the Docs NA 2018, mostly about the glory and greatness of creating your own style guidesfrom scratch.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
TL;DR. I’m working on The Responsible Communication Style Guide with Recompiler Media. This project is something I’ve been thinking about for years and I wanted to write up how I got to this place. Our Kickstarter is here — backing at the $15 level is the fastest way to get a copy of The Responsible Communication Style Guide to use in yourown work.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I bet you didn’t even know that there was a freelance resume conundrum, did you? It’s pretty basic – the typical resume format of objective, skills and as much employment history as you can come up with just doesn’t work for freelancers.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Among the property you own, you might count a house, a small business and the rights to your written work. And those rights — even if they aren’t to the Harry Potter novels — are worth something. Because your rights to your work (selling it, publishing it, etc.) are considered property, they are a part of your overall estate and comprise, in particular, your literary estate.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I have opinions on the internet. You might have seen some of my opinions because: I founded The Responsible Communication Style Guide (along with some other things); I write for publications ranging from Entrepreneur Magazine to Bitch MagazineTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. The whole book is a useful read, albeit a bit dated — it was published by a professional organizer in 1971. But Alinsky’s rules remain widely applicable: Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
성경의 주요 용어의 의미와 기원을 알아보십시오. 90.000개 이상의 성경 문고가 있는 성경 사전® 하나님의 말씀과 그분의 아들 예수 그리스도의 말씀을 이해하는 데 도움이 될 것입니다. 구약과 신약의 심각한 연구에 필요한 참조 응용 프로그램. † 90.000 이상 사전, 백과 사전 및 일치 항목.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
ThursdayBram.com is my personal blog. I get to choose what to put on here and, as a result, I keep to topics I find interesting. I promote friends and projects I think are cool. I’m pretty uninterested in 98 percent of pitches I get for this site. Comments If you’re interested in sharing a commentTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
Download My In-House Style Guide Template to Use However You Want. I’m excited to share the template I use for creating in-house style guides, as a reward for The Responsible Communication Style Guide Kickstarter reaching $10,000 in backing.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
Here are 19 works I read in 2019 that I am still thinking about. I’ve divided the list into fiction and nonfiction, but that’s the only organizing principle at work here.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
TL;DR. I’m working on The Responsible Communication Style Guide with Recompiler Media. This project is something I’ve been thinking about for years and I wanted to write up how I got to this place. Our Kickstarter is here — backing at the $15 level is the fastest way to get a copy of The Responsible Communication Style Guide to use in yourown work.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
TL;DR. I’m working on The Responsible Communication Style Guide with Recompiler Media. This project is something I’ve been thinking about for years and I wanted to write up how I got to this place. Our Kickstarter is here — backing at the $15 level is the fastest way to get a copy of The Responsible Communication Style Guide to use in yourown work.
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I spent last week at PyCon NA (in Portland this year — how convenient!). I made a zine to hand out explaining the Python community in Portland, along with suggesting some events for out-of-towners. Here’s a PDF you can download if you want to check it out. Even better, I wasn’t the only zine makerTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
I’ve been finding Hemingway surprisingly useful when working on ghost-writing projects lately. It’s a useful sort of a writing hack to get some quick insights when you’re trying to mimic someone else’s writing style. Of course, Hemingway is fundamentally intended to help writers sound more like the man himself. But it does that byhighlighting
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
I have opinions on the internet. You might have seen some of my opinions because: I founded The Responsible Communication Style Guide (along with some other things); I write for publications ranging from Entrepreneur Magazine to Bitch MagazineTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
Offline, I spend a lot of time helping friends with their resumes. I’ve even given a couple of workshops about technical resumes. This is the template I use in helping someone get started in creating aTHURSDAYBRAM.COM
I’ve been working on PyDX for over a year. So have my phenomenal co-organizers, Rachel Kelly, Georgia Reh, Melissa Chavez, and Christopher Swenson. This weekend — October 10th and 11th — all of that hard work is going to pay off.THURSDAYBRAM.COM
THURSDAYBRAM.COM
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19 READS I RECOMMEND FROM 2019* 03. Jan
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Here are 19 works I read in 2019 that I am still thinking about. I’ve divided the list into fiction and nonfiction, but that’s the only organizing principle at work here. Please note that while I read these works in 2019, not all were published in 2019.FICTION
* Gideon the Ninth
by Tamsyn Muir — Novel (Content Warnings for violence, body horror, and a whole bunch of necromancy). Are lesbian necromancers in space your thing? If so, read Gideon the Ninth immediately. If not, reassess why you feel that way, then read Gideon the Ninth immediately. * Programmer at Largeby
DRMacIver — Novella (Content Warnings for social anxiety, privacy, and discussions of gender. Based loosely based on the Qeng Ho from Vernor Vinge’s “A Deepness in the Sky”, DRMacIver explores updating millenia-old computer code alongside discussions of how society might evolve with computer mediation. You don’t need to have read Vinge’s work (and, in fact, I haven’t read “A Deepness inthe Sky”).
* Operation Spring Dawn by Mo Xiong, translated by Rebecca Kuang — Novella (Content Warnings for human extinction). Xiong also examines a potential future, with the story of a super ice age playing out over tens of thousands of years. The story isn’t a happy one, but it is meaningful.* This microfiction
by O.
Westin — Flash Fiction (Content Warnings for ghosts). This story is just a couple of lines long, so go read it. I’m not going to write a critique of a story that’s longer than the story itself. * Sisters of the Vast Black by Lina Rather — Novella (Content Warnings for virulent illnesses, violence, and religion). Rather’s world-building in this novella is exceptional, with small details that elevate the story from yet another story of the aftermath of an interstellar war.* Hot and Badgered
by Shelly Laurentson — Novel (Content Warnings for violence, smut, snakes, and ableism). Let me preface this item with a confession: I read romance novels of all kinds, including novels about shapeshifters. Especially about shapeshifters. There’s a certain level of absurdity that goes with the standard plots of shapeshifter romance novels which I adore. The pinnacle of that absurdity may very well be “Hot and Badgered,” in which a honey badger shapeshifterfinds true love.
* Ironheart
by Eve Ewing and Kevin Libranda — Comic Books (Content Warnings for racism, violence, and ageism). Marvel’s “Ironheart” is just finishing a 12-issue run. Superhero Ironheart, AKA Riri Williams, is a genius who reverse-engineered Tony Stark’s Ironman suit when she was 15. She’s awesome, though enjoying her series may be hard if you don’t have at least a vague idea of the Marvel universe. Watching “The Avengers” probably covers the bare minimum of backgroundknowledge.
* The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal — Novel (Content Warnings for racism, sexism, natural disasters, and anxiety). The Calculating Stars won the 2019 Nebula Award for Best Novel, the 2019 Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, and the 2019 Hugo Award for Best Novel. Kowal’s alternate history of the space race won those awards for areason.
NON-FICTION
* Malfunctioning Sex Robot by Patricia Lockwood — Article (Content Warnings for misogyny, sexism, and John Updike’s particular brand of weird sex writing). Lockwood’s review of a recent reissue of John Updike’s work is a truly beautiful piece of criticism. She sets the tone from the start, exclaiming “You don’t bring in a 37-year-old woman to review John Updike in the year of our Lord 2019 unless you’re hoping to see blood on the ceiling.” and slogs through Updike’s career with an admirable persistence. The article is probably better if you’ve read any of Updike’s work (watching “The Witches of Eastwick”doesn’t count).
* American Radicals
by Holly Jackson — Book (Content Warnings for slavery, racism, sexism, and violence). “American Radicals” offers background on the organizations and activists who championed slavery abolition, universal suffrage, and a variety of other causes during the 19th century. Jackson provides the context that reading about these movements on their own just can’t provide. I enjoyed the book thoroughly. My sisters, however, may not have appreciated me reading this book because, when we watched the new “Little Women” movie, I kept wanting to talk about Louisa May Alcott’s references totranscendentalism.
* The 1619 Project
by Nikole Hannah-Jones — Interactive Website (Content Warnings for slavery, racism, and violence). The 1619 Project comprises essays, poetry, photography, and more — all of which are worth your attention. Hannah-Jones developed the project to observe the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first african slaves in America.* Jurassic Emoji
by
Courtney Milan — Proposal. Milan is a phenomenal romance novelist, but her application for the expansion of dinosaur emoji options is a great piece of writing and even includes scrupulous research into the need for such emojis. Milan has also created a timeline , if you’re curious about the process of creating new emojis. * The Israeli Black Panthers Haggadahtranslated
by Itamar Haritan — Booklet (Content Warnings for Zionism and racism). Created in 1971 as a protest of the treatment of Mizrahi Jews in Israel, this haggadah uses the story of the exodus as a uniquely Jewish way to protest. * Being “Polite” Often Gets Women Killed by Scaachi Koul — Article (Content Warnings for murder, sexual violence, and stalking). Koul’s deep dive into the culture and communities of true crime podcasts is fascinating (kind of in the same way that true crime shows are fascinating). She uses the topic as a way to examine women-oriented media’s ability to cover the reality that women face violence at higher rates than men in our culture. * Algorithmic Colonization of Africa by Abeba Birhane — Article (Content Warnings for racism, colonialism, and privacy). A discussion on the ethics necessary for new technologies, Birhane highlights the way startups are recreating destructive systems in digital form. In particular, the article highlights how importing technology means importing the ethics of that technology’s creators. * You Should Have Askedby Emma
(Content Warning for emotional labor and gender). Emma managed to sum up some of the feelings I’ve had about emotional labor. If comics aren’t really your thing, Zoe Fenson’s article, It’s so muchmore than cooking
is
also a good read.
* How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Immerwahr — Book (Content Warnings for colonialism, racism, violence, genocide, incarceration. If I’m being precise, I still have a few chapters to read in this book, but I’m already convinced that every American needs to read this book. I like to think of myself as fairly conversant in the history of this country, but Immerwahr surfaces new information and offers new context to the point that I feel like I’m relearning centuries of history as I read. * How Desire Built One of the Best Information Archives Online by Thursday Bram — Article (Content Warnings for privacy and links to sites that may host explicit material). Since this is my list and I make all the rules, I’m allowed to include my own work. This article is probably my favorite piece of my own writing from this year. Basically, my editor let me write about information architecture, fan fiction, and how sexy stories set new expectations for privacy. * Reasons and Strategies for Avoiding Obsolete Termsby Erin
Grace — Article (Content Warnings for slavery and racism). Editing this article caused me to immediately change how I wrote about certain topics. Sure, I’m biased because I worked on the project, but reading this article improved my writing. This is hopefully enough reading material to keep everyone out of trouble for the next few months. * fiction , non-fiction, reviews
THE WHYS AND HOWS OF “A HAGGADAH OF OUR OWN”* 17. Apr
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TL;DR
I’m excited to present _A Haggadah of Our Own_, along with an accompanying Host’s Guide. I’m making it available to download. You’re welcome to download it for free here. If you’re inclined to support the project monetarily, you can pay whatever you feelcomfortable with.
This is the culmination of close to six months of work, including the Kickstarter I ran in December. I’m considering doing another print run in time for Pesach next year (2020), so keep an eye out for thatlater this year.
For those who are interested, here’s a deep dive into how this Haggadah was developed.CHOICES
The goal of _A Haggadah of Our Own_ is to offer an inclusive Haggadah for as many readers as possible in one volume. Inclusion is a broad term: Within inclusion, we can talk about what can prevent a person from accessing the contents of a Haggadah. We can also talk about whether the story of Pesach is told in words that make a reader feel excluded or disconnected. I say “as many readers as possible” because different readers have different needs. Throughout the process of developing _A Haggadah of Our Own_, I had to choose which needs I could meet. This article lays out some of those choices and the context around them, as well as details about the processes I used to make those decisions. This is going to get pretty meta. This article is also going to cover where I’d like this project to go in the future. _A Haggadah of Our Own_ is not the last Haggadah I expect any of us to buy (though it will last you a while). Some of the approaches in _A Haggadah of Our Own_ are experimental — as results and responses come in, I fully expect to be able to improve on this initial version. In the meanwhile, though, we’ve got a morewelcoming Haggadah.
One of those choices was the level of religiosity in this religious text. Rather than perfectly parsing Jewish law, _A Haggadah of Our Own_ focuses on the participation of all attendees. It’s primarily in a vernacular language (English) and offers alternative blessings for Jewish humanists. It’s not the Haggadah for some readers, of course: for some Jews, precise observances of Pesach traditions are a higher priority. The priority here, however, is inclusion. No one should have to prove that they are Jewish enough to participate in Jewish life. _A Haggadah of Our Own_ includes traditions from all over the world but has a bias towards those from Ashkenazi and Sephardic communities. The availability of Pesach materials from different Jewish communities reflects underlying divides among those communities. Frankly, Ashkenazim have a sort of Jewish cultural hegemony that routinely erases other Jewish identities. I worked to minimize that primacy within this Haggadah but was limited by the resources (especially research materials) I had. Furthermore, I’m Ashkenazi and favored Yiddish over Ladino, along with transliteration that reflects Ashkenazi pronunciation. I can justify that decision by saying that I’m more familiar with Yiddish and could find more editorial support, but I know that it’s a weakness in terms of our inclusivity and an area I want to improve in. I also chose to include gender-expansive blessings throughout the Haggadah. The decision to do so was one of the hardest decisions I made during the development of this material. There are many different factors at play here: * Hebrew is a gendered language,
meaning that words are grammatically masculine or feminine. Spanish is another example of a gendered language, which is evolving to provide more options. “Latinx,” for instance, is an alternative to Latino (which is masculine) and Latina (which is feminine). * While there are many proposals on how to update Hebrew, there isn’t yet a standard on how to do so. All of the options I reviewed are effectively experimental linguistics. * Hebrew’s linguistic history is complicated: By 400 CE Hebrew was only used for communication between Jewish communities and religious purposes. In the 19th century, Zionists revived Hebrew. Modern Hebrew is used in Israel today. Hebrew is the only successfully revived dead language. That means that each update to Hebrew must navigate millennia of history and bias. * I received conflicting feedback from sensitivity readers about relative comfort levels with these blessings. It was a crucial reminder that communities aren’t monoliths and required me to make a decision that addressed all of the feedback I received. The result is that I expect to need to update these blessings in the future. As new approaches to updating gendered languages become available in the future, Jewish communities will develop new norms. In the meanwhile, though, we can’t ignore the discomfort of trans and non-binary attendees. I chose to include gender-expansive blessings after research and feedback, while adding context and linking to criticism within the Host’s Guide. Lastly, I decided to keep the Haggadah itself as clear as possible, so that it can easily be used and expanded by as many communities as possible. Suggestions for implementation are in the Host’s Guide, because so much of that material is relevant in planning a seder, rather than conducting a seder.RESEARCH
During the research process, I read dozens of Haggadot. I prioritized reading materials created by communities over those prepared by publishing houses because many of the professionally published Haggadot are similar. I also spent a lot of time Googling the word “haggadah” in combination with different communities, accommodations, and negative experiences. I spent a lot of time looking at bad examples and reading criticism about how to fix those issues. Those updates were low-hanging fruit and I’ve listed the articles and authors in thebibliography below.
As useful as all of those research materials were, though, talking to actual people about their experiences around the seder table wascrucial.
When researching and developing appropriate accommodations, I have to give specials thanks to Elea Chang and Melissa Chavez . I’ve worked with them on several projects and I’ve tried to reflect their dedication to accessibility best practices in this Haggadah.WRITING + EDITING
Developing _A Haggadah of Our Own_ was more about editing and updating than writing new material. On the other hand, the Host’s Guide isall new writing.
The Kickstarter allowed me to work with amazing editors and sensitivity readers, who really helped me bring this project to a level I couldn’t hope to reach on my own. If you ever get a chance to work with any of these folks, you should grab that opportunity. Check out their projects at the links below * Melissa Chavez (Website /Twitter )
* Lior Gross (Website ) * Bogi Takács (who was nominated for a Hugo during this project!) (Website / Twitter/ Patreon
)
* Rebecca Pierce (Website / Twitter/ Patreon
)
A special thank you to my partner, who has helped at every step of this process, from crafting artisanal HTML to make my EPUBs work properly, copy edited basically everything, and doesn’t get financial compensation. In fact, he backed the Kickstarter, so he kinda paid to get to work on the project… that’s definitely truelove.
DESIGN
Because different people need different types of accommodations, I had to decide what needs to prioritize when designing the print and digital book. I knew from the start that I wanted to create a Haggadah that worked with screen readers. I also chose to focus on making the print version of the Haggadah visually acceptable. The font used in the Haggadah is APHfont , a font developed by the American Printing House for the Blind. The font’s features include: * More even spacing between letters.* Higher crossbars.
* No serifs.
* Wider letters.
* Heavier letters.
* Underslung “j” and “q”. * Letters more open. * Larger punctuation marks. I went back and forth quite a bit, debating whether to use a font developed for readers with dyslexia, but APHfont offered the best all around accessibility. I would like to offer at least digital copies adjusted to meed different accessibility needs, such as a version optimized with that font developed for readers with dyslexia. Laying out a Haggadah comes with some special design issues, by the way: the only way I was able to correctly layout Hebrew text (which flows right to left, rather than English’s left to right) was by downloading the Middle Eastern version of Creative Suite. As it turns out, the standard edition doesn’t allow for flowing text right toleft.
Hebrew and other non-Latin alphabets also present a challenge when using screen readers. Many screen readers don’t support non-Latin alphabets and those that do have some quirks. VoiceOver on Mac, for instance, does support Hebrew — but that means reading off each individual letter, rather than words. Within the ebook, those screen readers that don’t support Hebrew use transliterations. The pronunciation isn’t ideal, but that’s a future project. VoiceOver presented some other issues, as well, requiring a version of the ebook optimized just for VoiceOver. I also originally planned to include more design elements. I underestimated the time I’d need to commission and layout art. I hit a point where either I could get art or printed copies and I chose to make sure I could send out printed copies. I hope to create a new version with added art in the near future.PRINTING + SHIPPING
Printing locally is important to me, partially because I can go over and look at proofs. The locality is important because every project faces delays and usually winds up a little tight, so being able to go physically get the books and mail them is nice. Morel Ink , a Portland, Oregon-based printer, printed the Haggadot. In addition to being easy to work with, Morel is a women-owned, union shop that values community. They support local non-profits and community organizations, making me happy to give them money. And a special shout out to Libby at Morel, who mademiracles happen.
I also owe special thanks to Audrey Eschright, who let me copy and paste _The Recompiler_ ’s shipping process. In case you’re wondering why return labels listed _The Recompiler_, Audrey printed my paid postage labels. While my printer offered mailing services, packing and shipping the books myself was cheaper. And when I say myself, I need to include my amazing sister who told jokes and put books in envelopes in between work shifts.COPYRIGHT
Copyrighting a Haggadah is kinda silly given that most of the material is sourced from millenia-old stories, especially given the importance Judaism puts on sharing knowledge as widely as possible. But then again, I find a lot of copyright law pretty silly. Both _A Haggadah of Our Own_ and the Host’s Guide are licensed under Creative Commons, allowing anyone to use this material for non-commercial uses without needing to ask first. I chose a non-commercial license not because I’m against the idea of other people using this material in commercial settings, but because I want to be aware of such projects and can ensure that they have thesame sort of ethos.
MONEY
I’m never going to run a Kickstarter again. I said that after the RCSG Kickstarter campaign, but this time I mean it. I ran the Kickstarter because paying contributors of all kinds is super important to me. I did wind up with a little extra budget, due to not being able to integrate the art I was hoping for. As a result, I increased pay rates for sensitivity readers and editors. I also have a little money left over (after setting aside money for taxes) which I plan to use as the seed funding for a future edition with more art.FUTURE
I’d like to do an update for 2020. I’m not sure yet what that means. In particular, I’ll only do another print run with a pre-order sale. I do have some goals: * I’d love to be able bring in more people, with more perspectives * Make available in more formats. I’m hoping to just keep adding to the versions of this Haggadah that are available, such as a version that better accommodates readers with dyslexia. * Bring in Ladino — this is going to require money because I definitely need to bring in a subject matter expert with editorialexperience.
PARTIAL BIBLIOGRAPHY_Articles_
Dunn, Mason. “Four Questions About Trans Rights.”
JewishBoston.com.
Gross, Lior. “Nonbinary Hebrew Project. ” NonbinaryHebrew.com. Shalev, Asaf. “When Israel’s Sephardic Black Panthers Used Passover to Decry Racism.”
Forward.com.
Takács, Bogi. “Nonbinary Hebrew.”
Twitter.com
Twitty, Michael. “I’m Dreaming of an … African American …Passover.
”
Afroculinaria.com
Ungar, Eli. “My First Racist Haggadah.”
Jewschool.com.
_Books
_
Angel, Marc. _A Sephardic Passover Haggadah._ KTAV Publishing House. Barenblat, Rachel. _The Velveteen Rabbi’s Haggadah for Pesach._VelveteenRabbi.com.
Biber, Benyamin. _The Machar Haggadah._Machar.org
Broner, E.M. and Naomi Nimrod. _The Women’s Haggadah._ Harper San Francisco. JACS. _The Anonymous Haggadah._JB FCS.
Jewdas. _The Jewdas Cut and Paste Haggadah.__
_Jewdas.org.
JFREJ. _#BLM Haggadah._JFREJ.com.
JFREJ. Juneteenth Haggadah.JFREJ.com.
JFREJ. _Mixed Multitudes: Nobody’s Free ‘til Everybody’s Free._JFREJ.com.
Pearce-Glassheim, Elizabeth. _Haggadah for Jews and Buddhists._ Modern Haggadah Distribution Company. RTI. _The Revenge of Dinah._DePaul
University.
T’ruah. _The Other Side of the Sea._Truah.org.
Waskow, Arthur. _The Freedom Seder._The
Shalom Center.
_Websites
_
Haggadot.com
RitualWell: Passover .RitualWell.com.
My Jewish Learning: Passover.
MyJewishLearning.com.Chabad: Passover
.
Chabad.org.
* haggadah , kickstarter DOWNLOAD MY HANUKKAH ZINES HERE* 02. Jan
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I shared 8 zines on Twitter, one each day of Hanukkah. I’ve gotten around to scanning and posting. So here they are as a PDF._Hanukkah Zines PDF
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Feel free to print and share these zines for personal use, but please talk to meee if you’re interested in selling copies of any or all ofthese zines.
To cut and fold your one page zines, you can follow this tutorial —it has pictures!
I’ll try to remember to share these again next December, before Hanukkah starts on December 22, 2019. WHAT THEY DON’T TELL YOU ABOUT CREATING STYLE GUIDES* 10. Jul
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This text was the basis of my recent talk at Write the Docs NA 2018, mostly about the glory and greatness of creating your own style guides from scratch. It highlights some of the major lessons I’ve learned about writing style guides, because I really like style guides — like, a lot. I make style guides for my own personal projects which only I will ever work on. I also help make style guides for wider use, including _The Responsible Communication Style Guide ._ My current project is a style supplement for people writing ABOUT the Python programming language, so you will almost certainly hear me complaining about disambiguation if you run into me in person. I believe I’m among fellow style-guide enthusiasts if you’ve read this far, but let’s just go over a couple of givens for this article. First, style guides are amazing. They’re basically lists of style decisions your team needs to stick to while working on a project that you no longer have to keep in your head. When you’re writing with a team, sharing a style guide will help ensure you all write with a similar style. Readers won’t get confused by different spellings, editors don’t have to correct the same errors over and over again, and writers can eliminate internal debates about when to capitalize the word “internet”. Style guides aren’t limited to written content, either — there are design and coding style guidesas well.
It’s easy to build up a whole bookshelf of style guides. There are references like _The Chicago Manual of Style_, industry-specific style guides like _The Bluebook_ which covers legal documents, organization-specific style guides like _The Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications_. Depending on the project you may need more than one style guide — you might use an internal style guide when you’re writing documentation, then need to grab something broader to look up what your internal guide doesn’t cover. Sometimes you may need to even pull a more general guide off your shelf, like _the Chicago Manual of Style_. It’s a somewhat graceful deprecation, keeping the guidelines we need close at hand, with a fallback plan for anything an internal guide doesn’t cover. Those internal style guides are mostly what we’re talking about here — though I still have more space on my style guide shelf if any of you are thinking about something bigger. Making your own style guide is a relatively easy process. _RCSG_ started as a list of notes I kept for my own writing and then shared with a couple of other people as a template to adapt for their projects. That list turned into a book because it just kept getting longer. You too have the power to create your own style guide deep inside of you. I have faith in each of you. A lot of developing a style guide is exactly what you think it is. You make a list of what you want to cover in your style guide, maybe words that you need to make sure you capitalize correctly or a list of the colors you should avoid for buttons. You keep adding things when you hear a new suggestion or make a novel mistake. Personally, most of my style guides are just a list of errors I’ve already made and reminders to not make them again. Seriously, I’ve already got a list of errata to update for the next printing of the RCSG because I’ve made new and interesting errors since the book went to the printers. You edit your list, realize you’ve missed some things, edit again. You ask some people to read it and give you feedback, then you incorporate that feedback. At some point, you’ve got something you’re ready to share with a broader audience. Consider that version a first edition, because style guides are not carved in stone. You’ll start a list of things you want to update in the next version the moment you print a single copy, too. It’s not too different from other process documentation. There’s no secret sauce when it comes to creating a style guide. You make the tool you need. There’s no magic software that will automagically pluck words from your documentation and shove them into a style guide. You can get the job done in a text file if that’s the only software available to you (though I encourage you to learn from my mistakes and move your style guide out of your word processing software of choice before it’s longer than five pages). A style guide can live within your other documentation or be available separately, depending on what you need. The mechanics of putting together a style guide probably already feel familiar and I don’t want to spend too much time on them. Let’s talk about the major issues that come up when creating a style guide instead. There are three key sticking points we’re going to coverhere:
* Questioning assumptions * Bringing in unheard voices * Providing tooling and education QUESTION YOUR ASSUMPTIONS Sometimes I think that writing documentation is just a constant process of asking people to break down one step into smaller and clearer pieces. Everyone assumes that certain knowledge is universal. But unless we can develop species-wide telepathy, we can’t make that assumption. Every reader who looks at a piece of documentation brings their own experiences to interpreting it and may interpret it in an entirely different way. That’s doubly true when working on a style guide. We can’t assume how other people use language. Consider the word “literally.” When I tell you that I am literally freezing, you know I’m cold. But am I actually literally experiencing a concerning drop in my core temperature? Not so much. Despite my own feelings on the interchangeability of the words “literally” and “figuratively”, we haven’t just suddenly agreed to switch the meaning of a word out of nowhere. Different communities use different words in different ways. Language grows and changes to cover new concepts constantly, like how the word “computer” used to refer to a person making calculations, but now refers to a bunch of different types of devices. These changes are routine, through conversation, slang, academic use, memes, translation and literally every other time we communicate. We can’t assume we know what someone means when they say “literally” anymore, at least without context. We need to ask. I would go into a whole bit about user research here, but Jen Lambourne already said everything I was going to say, plus quite a bit more, so I’m just going to refer you to Jen’s talk at Write theDocs 2018 and keep
talking specifically about style guides. Ultimately, the more you can question your own assumptions around the meanings of the words you’re trying to define, the better equipped you’ll be to create style guides that speak to everyone. Jargon, acronyms, idiom, and slang may all have their place in writing — especially within technical writing — but only as long as they improve our ability to communicate. EXAMINE THE STATUS QUO That’s a side benefit of creating a style guide to share with other people, by the way. To create a good style guide requires asking questions about the status quo. If your documentation is all in advanced technical jargon, developing a style guide is a chance to ask why. If there isn’t a reason, style guide development will also offer an opportunity to make some changes to the way your organizationcommunicates.
Many people won’t argue with a style guide once it’s established. I would never encourage any of you to use this fact for evil. For good, though? It’s an opportunity to advocate for changes to the status quo. When you’re making or updating a style guide, you get to choose whether to capitalize the word “Internet.” You also get to choose how members of your organization refer to people, what metaphors are considered inappropriate in your materials, and whether images must have alt text tags. Each of these decisions is an opportunity to create a more inclusive organization as much as a way to coordinate the voice of your organization. Of course, you should go through all the appropriate approval channels before implementing a style guide, and of course, you should work with your team to make sure decisions are acceptable to as much of your organization as possible. You can adapt and update your style guide as appropriate for your organization. But that one dudebro in your office who refuses to give you input during the process and then wants to know what they can do to change the whole style guide after the fact? Yeah, for that dudebro, your style guide has already been sent out to be chiseled in stone. Sorry,dude.
I should also warn you about the danger of swinging too far in the opposite direction. While requiring writers to match an organization’s voice and style makes sense, style guides are not meant as ways to police other people’s tone or voice. There is no one true way to write in English and we should only attempt to describe how to use language in our own context. We need to empower writers to do better. It’s never our job to tell people they’re writing incorrectly At best, I’d consider any attempt to enforce particular ways of writing or speaking to be classism. At worst, doing so is a well-established and particularly destructive method of colonization. It also results in bad writing. So, yeah, writing a style guide is more responsibility than it might look on the surface. Pulling together lists of words and styles isn’t nearly as hard as understanding the impact of a style choice. We have an obligation to take extra care when developing style guides, especially those intended to be used by a diverse audience. We need to balance the voice of the organization with the voice of the writer. We can clarify how we communicate, without policing other people’s writing in a problematic way. BRING IN UNHEARD VOICES Empathy is the best tool we have for building effective style guides. We need a lot of compassion in this process, too. We need compassion for our users — the people who will use this style guide to write documentation — but we also need empathy for our users’ users — the people who will read the documentation our users write. Finding enough empathy may be the hardest part of writing a style guide. Hopefully, you can find compassion for fellow writers, whether they write documentation full-time or write on top of other responsibilities. To empathize with your readers, you need to make sure that you have an understanding of the many backgrounds your readers may come from. I’m not just talking about understanding if someone has the technical know-how to get through your documentation. I’m talking about understanding cultural context around the words we use and repurpose for technology. I like the example of the Chevy Nova. According to urban sales legends, the Chevy Nova sold poorly in Latin American markets because “Nova” means “doesn’t go” in Spanish. Snopes has disproved this story , but I still use it because all of the actual examples I could use require contentwarnings.
We’re all aware that listening is a key skill for documentation. We know that we need to listen to as many people as we can who create, consume, or otherwise interact with the materials. But there are still voices we can learn from who we fail to hear. We need to listen to programmers with dramatically different backgrounds. I know how to write for the 20-something dudebro with a computer science degree, but I don’t know if the same materials will work for a single parent trying to learn to code in between taking care of kids. The only way to learn is to listen to people who are not in this room. If we want to build a truly inclusive industry, we need to meet the needs of people who haven’t been able to join us yet. We need to go out andfind them.
You won’t be able to ensure your style guide is all things to all people. Starting with the intent to listen, and iterate on feedback on as it comes in is the right place to start, though. Include the people you already have access to — as many editors, sensitivity readers, beta testers, and users as you can practically manage — and build on that base to include new voices as you find them. Pro tip: Inclusion during the development process also gives other members of your organization a sense of ownership and improves the likelihood they’ll use your style guide when it’s complete. It’s nice when doing the right thing makes your life easier. EMPOWER COMMUNITY MEMBERS And, of course, what’s the point of a style guide that no one uses? I feel like there should be a good punchline here, but there’s not really a joke. There’s no value in a style guide no one will use. The best style guides empower their users. In my ideal world, I could hand anybody a style guide and some workflow documentation and they’d immediately be able to contribute to a writing project. That might be a little utopian, but it’s not as far off as you think. Consider Wikipedia. The site’s Manual of Style is somewhat buried, but the editing FAQ is a mini-style guide, covering things like link formatting and how to write article summaries. It’s more than enough to get someone started on their first Wikipedia edit. The Wikipedia Editing FAQ is a gateway style guide. It empowers people to make immediate changes. Honestly, you’ll know your style guide is top-notch when someone outside of the docs team can hate-edit inaccurate documentation without needing to talk to an editor. I can tell you from experience that most style guides and contributor onboarding systems are not atthis level.
PROVIDE EDUCATION AND TOOLS Ultimately, a style guide should democratize the writing process in your organization. Style guide users should be able to write more clearly without relying entirely on editors or experts. That’s a big “should.” There are a lot of assumptions there — and since we’re questioning our assumptions, we need to unpack that “should.” ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL, a style guide should democratize the writing process in your organization. Those other things are the tricky part, though. We can’t just hand people a tool and assume everything will be fine. We need to educate our communities on how to use those tools. Planning for education needs to be a part of your style guide development before you ever look up your first acronym. For experienced documentation writers, that education may mean a short workshop on the specifics of *this* style guide, while other users may need more of a “Style Guides: How do they Even” class. Ideally, someone should be able to pick up a style guide and use it without a class but given that very few people seem to read style guides all the way through, personal walkthroughs is a really good idea. I like to start my educational plan with materials on how to contribute to new iterations of the style guide, by the way. The more people who can add to and improve a style guide, the more the workload is spread out, which isn’t exactly altruistic but is a necessarypracticality.
If you can create a culture of contribution for your style guide from the start, you’ll enable improvements you can’t imagine ahead of time. Go beyond writers, too — if you’ve got a developer who needs to write at least some of their own documentation, giving them access to your style guide files can let them build tools that work for them (and that might work for you, too). Don’t fall into the trap of thinking of a style guide as a book or a handout. Digital style guides put information in a wider variety of hands and create a world of potential right now, from providing a basis for new kinds of linters to upgrading spellcheck to something far more useful. Imagine how great the future will be if we make all of our style guides available via API! MOVE THE OVERTON WINDOW Style guides represent the future, whether we know it or not. They streamline production processes and give people power to work on theirown projects.
They also give us the opportunity to talk about how we write and why. Those discussions have the power to change the world. Style guides offer a clear indicator of how an organization wants to discuss different questions. A style guide that cautions users against terminology that some readers will find offensive is an explicit Overton window. An Overton window is a guide to what we consider appropriate to share in public discourse. For example, women wearing pants in public was considered highly inappropriate — until the Overton window moved as more and more people decided pants are perfectly reasonable apparel. Our communities, both technical and not, are facing big questions about what we want to look like in a year, in five years, in ten. Within technology, many of these big questions are about inclusivity. Some communities have hard-coded styles of communication that exclude everyone who hasn’t personally written a programming language. Some communities want to make sure that the benefits of technology are available to everybody. The ways we style materials dictates, in part, what side of the divide our organizations land on. The more tools we have to create inclusive documentation and other materials, the faster we can move the Overton window towards expectations of respect and inclusion, at least within our own organizations. I’m not expecting anyone to go back to work just to lead a style guide based-revolution (though if you want to, I’d love to hear about it). I am hoping, though, that you’ll start thinking about how you style your own work and whether a style guide will help your organization communicate more effectively. I’m hoping you’ll think about the cultural assumptions that go into a style guide and how to give a voice to more people in yourorganization.
I’m hoping you’ll think about the communication status quo on the projects you work on and whether that status quo is effective. I’m hoping you’ll drive big conversations about the future of our communities and how to welcome more people to those communities. To sum up: style guides are awesome. You should make at least one style guide in your life, if only so I have more people to commiserate with, I mean talk shop with. When you’re making style guides, consider the assumptions you make, how you can empower the people who will use your guide, and what you hope the future brings, at least in terms of communication. Lastly, making a style guide is an awesome responsibility. It gives you the opportunity to guide conversations, defeat miscommunications, and maybe even inspire newcomers to your communities. Subtle, yes, but style guides are powerful — and with great power comes greatresponsibility.
_You can watch me give the original version of this talk at Write the Docs here , with bonus digression into why peanut butter isn’t the All-American treat wethink it is._
_You can buy a copy of _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_here._
* inclusion , responsiblecommunication
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guides , write the docs ANNOUNCING THE PORTLAND PROSPECTUS* 03. Apr
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I help with sponsorship at a lot of tech conferences here in Portland. Last week, someone even tried to give me money for a conference I’m not helping with because they assumed (correctly) that I knew how sponsorship worked for that conference. Apparently, I have areputation.
I’ve had my own little cheat sheet on what tech conferences are happening when in Portland, along with who to talk to about speaking, sponsoring, and so forth. I realized I might as well pretty up that cheat sheet and make it available, since it will help sponsors work effectively with more tech events. So here’s what the Portland Prospectus contains: * My recommendations for getting the best value for your sponsorship money here in Portland if you’re hiring or marketing to developers, designers, and other tech industry professionals * A spotter’s guide to specialties and languages across differentconferences
* A list of the conferences happening here in Portland through the end of 2017 (based only on the conferences I have dates for) * Highlights of some local vendors sponsors can work with to amp upimpact
_Please note that I am not an organizer for most of these conferences and I haven’t necessarily talked to the organizers of each conference. I used information available online to create this document. If you see incorrect information, please let me know and I’ll update it right away._ I am asking you for your email address in exchange for this PDF. First, I’d like to be rewarded for my work, not just in creating this PDF, but also because I do a lot of free labor on tech conferences here in Portland. Knowing who is interested in sponsorship and how to reach you makes my life a lot easier, so, yeah, I’m charging you the currency I find most useful for access to my tools. Second, I’m considering sending out an update version of the Portland Prospectus towards the end of the year. I plan to send out a notification of when the new version is up. I’m also considering sending some other updates, like information about when local callsfor proposal close.
If you’re not in Portland, you’re still welcome to download this PDF and sponsor our local tech conferences. You’re also welcome to copy this concept for your local community — I’ll even give you some spreadsheet templates if you contact me. Then, please, send me a copy of your finished local prospectus! DOWNLOAD THE PORTLAND PROSPECTUS * indicates requiredEmail Address *
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GLITTER, RADICAL PROTESTS, AND TEE BALL ON THE SOUTH LAWN.* 20. Jan
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SAUL ALINSKY’S _RULES FOR RADICALS___ The whole book is a useful read, albeit a bit dated — it was published by a professional organizer in 1971. But Alinsky’s rules remain widely applicable: * Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks youhave.
* Never go outside the expertise of your people. * Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy. * Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. * Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. * A good tactic is one your people enjoy. * A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. * Keep the pressure on. Never let up. * The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself. * The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. * If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through andbecome a positive.
* The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. * Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. A GLITTER-INFUSED PROTEST Reading today’s headlines would have made Saul Alinsky proud: around 200 activists grabbed the national news cycle by holding a dance party.
Of course, holding the dance party outside of the vice president-elect’s home in Washington, D.C. definitely helped. A BRIEF BUYER’S GUIDE: GLITTER I do not like the aftermath of glitter. Glitter gets everywhere and stays there for approximately the rest of forever. Seriously, glitter is so good at adhering to things that forensic scientists have written lengthy odes to glitter’s value in solving crimes.
But we’re going to need a lot of glitter for protest dance parties in the near future, so let’s talk about the environmental impact of glitter. On Amazon, you can buy glitter by the pound for under $20 per pound (which I’m not linking to, because no one should have that sort of power). When you buy a pound of glitter, you’re buying a pound of tiny pieces of plastic you fully intended to scatter around. Glitter is really does stick around forever. So we need to switch to the biodegradable stuff. Luckily, biodegradable glitter comes in a variety of lovely colors,
perfect for adding that something special to your next protest. No word yet on what forensic scientists think of biodegradable glitter,though.
FIREWORKS, ANOTHER BRIGHT AND SPARKLY OPTION Every American Inauguration Day has been celebrated with fireworks. The
president-elect is keeping the fireworks for tomorrow’s festivities, even though he fired Charlie Brotman, who has announced every American presidential inauguration since 1957 , when Brotman swore in Dwight D. Eisenhower for a second term. Brotman also was the stadium announcer for the Washington Senators, as well as announcing tee ball games on the South Lawn of the White House.via GIPHY
* activism , charliebrotman , fireworks
, glitter
, inauguration day
, rules for
radicals , saul
alinsky
DOWNLOAD MY IN-HOUSE STYLE GUIDE TEMPLATE TO USE HOWEVER YOU WANT* 26. Sep
* /
* My Work
, Writing
* /
* No Comments
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_I’m excited to share the template I use for creating in-house style guides, as a reward for The Responsible Communication Style GuideKickstarter
reaching $10,000 in backing. Want to really improve your company’s communications? Back the Kickstarter today!_
TL;DR: Here’s the link to download my in-house style guide template: the style guide as a .docx! KEEP READING FOR SOME CONTEXT! Whenever I sit down with a prospective client to work on their content, I ask about style guides: Does the organization or project rely on a particular style guide? How do they enforce style guidelines? How do they update the style guide? I get a lot of blank stares. That’s okay, because very few of the organizations I work with are founded by trained content creators. While I know that anyone who already has a style guide in place will be easier to work with, I don’t consider a lack of a style guide a problem — at least before we start working together. I do insist, however, on making a style guide before we start on any other content projects. I NEED A STYLE GUIDE BEFORE I CAN CREATE NEW CONTENT, AUDIT OLD CONTENT, OR EVEN DECIDE ON WHAT BELONGS IN AN EDITORIAL CALENDAR. Creating an in-house style guide isn’t that difficult of a process, provided you’ve made a couple dozen style guides over the length of your career. Part of that is experience. Part of that is building a template that can be customized to different organizations quickly. While I can’t give you a self-serve package of my expertise, I can give you the template that I’ve built up over the past decade or so. I’M SHARING THIS DOCUMENT AS A .DOCX SO YOU CAN EASILY ADAPT IT TO YOUR OWN ENDS. You’ll want to start by reading through the style guide and adding in the information your organization needs to reference regularly (like exactly how to spell, space, and capitalize your company name). After that, you can share it with your team. Remember, YOUR STYLE GUIDE IS A LIVING DOCUMENT. Whenever new questions come up, add the answers to the guide. Whenever your organization hires a new person or releases a new product, add them to the guide. Whenever a content creator screws something up, add the information they need to avoid future problems to the guide. Schedule a regular review to update and clarify your in-house style guide. This template, by the way, is also a living document. I keep adding information to it, tweaking it, and looking for ways to improve it. You’ll notice that there’s some information about writing inclusively in this guide. If this is a topic you’re just starting with, I recommend reading the white paper I released with Recompiler Media on quick changes your marketing team can make to dramatically increase your audience(PDF!)
with an inclusive approach. If you aren’t thinking about inclusivity, you’re probably reaching only a fifth of your potential audience. If you are thinking about inclusivity, you can take your content to the next level by backing The Responsible Communication Style Guide Kickstarter.
* style guide ,
template
THE RESPONSIBLE COMMUNICATION STYLE GUIDE: A KICKSTARTER AND ANEXPLANATION
* 06. Sep
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* My Work
, Writing
* /
* 1 Comment
__
TL;DR
I’m working on _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_ with Recompiler Media. This project is something I’ve been thinking about for years and I wanted to write up how I got to this place. Our Kickstarter is here — backing at the $15 level is the fastest way to get a copy of _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_ to use in your own work.CONTENT NOTES
This post is over 2,500 words. There’s some heavy emotional stuff in here (lived experience + the Holocaust, how language affects our lives, and diversity in technology). I do hope you’ll read the wholething.
HOW TO SCREW UP AS A JOURNALIST IN ONE EASY STEP I screwed up early in my career as a freelance writer: I conducted an email interview with an individual named “Chris” for an article I was working on. In the article, I referred to Chris with a male pronoun. My source emailed me immediately after reading the article to say that “Chris” was short for “Christine” and that she would appreciate me fixing the error. Chris was super nice about the whole thing, making me think that I wasn’t the first person to make this particular mistake. Now I do some obsessive Google-ing if I’m not sure how to describe a person just from an interview — though even Google can’t always tell meenough information.
Ever since, I’ve also been looking for a guide or workshop or some sort of education on how to ask questions about identity without being offensive. Sure, asking someone their pronouns is one of my standard interview questions (along with how to spell their name and what their professional title is), but that’s not enough. * How do you even begin to ask a trans person about referring to them by their dead name if you’re writing about them during a time when they still used thatname?
* How do you make sure that unconscious bias doesn’t influenceyour writing?
* How do you write about someone engaged in activism without bringing an internet shitstorm down on their heads? * Heck, how do you even determine if you’re only telling stories about people like you or if you’re finding diverse sources orstories?
I don’t have the one true answer to all these questions. Figuring out how to handle these sorts of topics requires both empathy and context. Context, in turn, requires lived experience. What is ‘lived experience?’ Lived
experience, or the experiences, emotions, and impressions of a person living as a member of a minority, is easily dismissed as a buzzword from a women’s studies class. Hanging out in tech circles, I mostly hear people talking about their lived experiences and how they differ from what other people may see (such as a woman talking about an act of discrimination, only to be told by a man that he’s never seen any problems in the industry). While I don’t think that this sort of gaslighting should be dismissed, there are even bigger dangers to ignoring others’ lived experience: My paternal grandfather was a Holocaust survivor. He spent six years in concentration camps. When he was liberated in 1945, he was 18. He weighed 85 pounds. In the years that followed, my grandfather encountered Holocaust deniers. These people told my grandfather that the hell he went through never happened. I don’t want to turn this blog post into an example of Godwin’s Law, but every time I hear someone discounting lived experience, I see them become a little more willing to accept anti-Semitism and other bigotry. Suffice it to say that I strongly believe in the importance of involving someone with lived experience when creating training materials about their identity, history, community, and other relatedtopics.
BACK TO THE QUESTION AT HAND: IMPROVING OUR ABILITY TO COMMUNICATE At the same time, expecting anyone (no matter their lived experience, expertise, or knowledge) to educate either individuals or organizations purely out of the goodness of their heart is both rude and unreasonable. My landlord doesn’t let me live in my apartment out of the goodness of its warm, fuzzy, corporate heart, so I need to spend my time in a way that gets my rent paid — and I expect the same to be true of every human I encounter. (Kronda Adair has written several brilliant posts on this topic — start with this post.) In the event
we all wind up living in a communist utopia, remind me to revisit thispoint.
That means paying multiple editors to look over my work who can bring the right context to it, right? Since I don’t have a lot of money, I generally can’t afford to work with more than one editor on a project. As it happens, since I write for the web, I often can’t afford to work with even one editor. When I’m flying without a grammatical net, there are some options for improving my writing without spending a ton of money: * I use a ton of technology. There are tools to analyze common grammatical mistakes, such as the spell check tool built into most word processors. But there are also tools that do more specific editing tasks, such as the Hemingway app, which helps writers to follow Hemingway’s writing advice (limited adjectives and adverbs, short sentence structures and so on). * I got an education in writing and communications, and then kept learning. I have a couple of degrees in communication, which included loads of classes on writing. I also still read a ridiculous amount about writing. I kept learning after getting a degree, using self-education materials available from experts, ranging from writing hacks to full-fledged textbooks. A degree isn’t necessary in this field and an in-person class isn’t even required. * Lastly, I adore my style guide. I don’t (usually) sleep with the AP Stylebook, but I still keep both the digital and print copies handy. I also own a bunch of other style guides. I ask the publications I write for if they have their own style guides. I also have made my own style guides, both for individual publications I work on and more generally (i.e., I’ll go to bat with an editor to make sure ‘internet’ is not capitalized). The resources for writing responsibly and ethically are few and far between. During my education, the closest I got to a class on how to write with some level of sensitivity was a graduate-level course on how to write about controversial topics — where ‘controversial’ was read as ‘political’ or ‘religious’ more than anything else. (Side note: That class was taught by Arthur Magida, author of _How to Be a Perfect Stranger _, which I have referred to as _The Book that Keeps Me From Screwing Up Other People’s Weddings_. I highly recommended it.) That particular class was incredibly valuable, but I had to wait until I was working on a master’s degree to have an instructor start talking about how to start thinking about dealing with difficult topics, despite taking my first journalism class in middle school. How is there not a basic class in every journalism, public relations, and marketing program on how to write for diverse audiences? We teach basic interviewing techniques, like how to ask a question to high school journalism classes, but fail to teach those same students which questions to ask or who to ask questions of. I don’t know what your student paper looked like, but mine didn’t exactly reflect the demographics of our student body. It reflected the perspectives of the teachers leading the class and of the kids in accelerated English classes — despite having a big ESL program at our school, I can’t remember a single ESL student writing for the student paper. I’m not advocating for fully restructuring journalism (yet!) but we do need to make a point of teaching empathy in journalism. We’re at the beginning of conversations about representation in the media. There are a few organizations now that try to track statistics on authors and writers, like the VIDA Count . Getting more diverse writers (and other media makers) into big publications is just a first step. Telling stories of underrepresented demographics is the next step — and I’m not talking about tokenism. Pro tip: it’s perfectly fine to have an article about a technical project led by a woman without ever asking her about whether she thinks tech is a tough industry for women. As a matter of fact, skipping the focus on how different the story’s subject is means that you get to spend more time on how cool the actual project is. Some individuals and organizations have started working on this problem, but many resources are fragmented. I have more than a dozen style guides and media guides just for covering religion. (I’ll get more into what’s out there in another post I’m already workingon.)
We still have a long way to go to get to a truly diverse media scene, though. I keep thinking of our current media landscape as the beginning of a very long journey — we’re still outfitting ourselves for the trek and don’t really know what’s on the trail ahead. We won’t even know some of the work we need to do to get to that far off Wonderland until we get on the road. We know that we need to remodel or replace many of the systems in place to produce journalism and other media, but until that work is done, we won’t know many of the steps that come after. LET’S TALK IDEALS AND INFRASTRUCTURE FOR WRITERS In my ideal world, I could just use pronouns that aren’t based on gender for writing and everything else. I recognize that I have to stick to the current system if I want readers to be able to understand everything I publish, but I certainly don’t like the existingsystem.
Until there’s a good opportunity for a linguistic revolution, I’m focused on making the existing system better. That means starting with the writers who make the articles, blog posts, and other things we read (along with the scripts for plenty of the audio and video content we see, too). Style guides are a good starting point for talking about how we cover things because we’re already used to looking up detailswe might get wrong.
In fact, some organizations have put out specialized style guides for how writers can cover their specific communities. These resources are all over the place, however, and sometimes contradictory. Creating a standard resource is the first step to making improvements in who writes what stories. Having discussions about diversity and inclusion before publishing anything will, at least, limit some of the more thoughtless headlines and references that we see constantly. As a personal goal, I’d like to see publishers avoid referring to an Olympic athlete as someone else’s wife.
I have thought of other formats this style guide could take. I kept coming back to the idea of doing the research and running an in-person workshop, geared towards newsrooms. But while we clearly need more educational materials about writing responsibly, style guides have more power than classes. I’ve taken more writing classes than I can count. I don’t remember where all the handouts and notes are from those classes, though I can point to the occasional writing hack and say that I picked it up from a particular instructor. You could have swapped out most of my writing teachers for other writing teachers and I would never have noticed. But taking my _AP Stylebook_ from me would turn me into a mess. And while I could manage if you took my _Chicago Manual of Style_ or one of the other style guides I rely on, I would be pretty unhappy. These reference books have impacted my writing far more than anything oranyone else.
MAKING A REAL DIFFERENCE WITH THE RESPONSIBLE COMMUNICATION STYLEGUIDE
I’ve spent the past couple of years casually talking about making a style guide that answers some of the questions I have. Audrey Eschright, the publisher of _the Recompiler_, heard me talking about the idea for _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_ this spring. She said that she wanted something similar and would be willing to work on the project. Working with Audrey is amazing — we’re on the same page about everything except whether there’s a hyphen in ‘ebook’ (I’m anti-hyphen , while Audrey is pro-hyphen, if you’re wondering). Perhaps the most important thing we agree on is how to construct _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_. Our particular manifesto for this project can be broken down into the following bullet points: * We’re hiring the right people to write each of these sections and we’re paying them. None of that crap about asking people to educate us for free here. * We’re creating a printed resource, as well as a website. Different people use different formats (and we’ve got some cool ideas for even more approaches once we’ve got the initial iterationready).
* We’re developing training around The Responsible Communication Style Guide, because people only use resources they have somefamiliarity with.
* We agree that this sort of style guide isn’t just about writing clearly. It’s also about being able to communicate in a manner that doesn’t harm anyone: writers, editors, and publishers influence culture and attitudes so directly that we have an obligation to use that power responsibly. Yes, we’re both absolutely scratching our own itch with _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_. But we’re also creating something that we know there’s a need for — and something with the potential to guide major conversations in technology. Yes, journalists working in this space need the guide. But there’s more room than that in the long run. Ultimately, everyone in technology is a writer: a programmer writes documentation, technical blog posts, and internal talks, even if they never publish a single word outside of an employer’s media. Designers, marketers, and even business analysts create reams of written material every day. This guide gives people who don’t necessarily think of themselves as writers a starting point for thinking, talking, and, yes, writing, about users in an empathetic way. There’s a real potential for _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_ to equip us for important conversations by providing an introduction to concepts of identity and a framework for writing about those concepts. So here we are. There’s a big chunk of my heart and soul up on Kickstarter right now.
I’m a bit terrified, especially of getting things wrong with the people who I want to contribute to _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_. I’m ridiculously hopeful about what bringing this project to life means for the books and blogs I’ll read in the future. I’m wound up waiting to see who will back this project. We’ve got just under a month to make this happen. Let’s go.We Need Your Help
If you are as excited as I am, we are looking for help! * Please consider backing our project, even at a low level. If everyone just bought an ebook copy at the $15 level, we would need just over 1,300 backers — and there are far more than 1,300 people writing about these topics. * Please share our Kickstarter with everyone who you think might be interested. From our perspective, that means journalists, marketers, speakers, and other folks who write publicly. But once the Responsible Communication Style Guide is a reality, we expect people to use it in ways we never considered. * Please let us know if you think of any ways to make this material more accessible to your community. We have some ideas (I want a linter for writing!), some of which will be incorporated into this first iteration of the guide and some of which we’ll work on after the Kickstarter (including my hopes for a linter). Thank you for reading this whole long post and thank you for yourhelp.
* empathy , kickstarter, lived experience
, recompiler
, responsible
communication
, style
guide , writing
infrastructure
PYCON, BY THE ZINES
* 06. Jun
* /
* My Work
* /
* No Comments
__
I spent last week at PyCon NA (in Portland this year — how convenient!). I made a zine to hand out explaining the Python community in Portland, along with suggesting some events forout-of-towners.
Here’s a PDF you can download if you want to check it out. Even better, I wasn’t the only zine maker at PyCon! JESSICA GARSON organized a zine open space where I met a few other media makers. Jessica also gave a lightning talk about teaching with zines (her slides are here).
ROXANNE JOHNSON presented during the poster session (Data People:Learn Python
) and
brought a zine she made called “Build Your Skills in Data Analysis.”
AUDREY ESCHRIGHT was working on _The Recompiler _while at PyCon and announced the next call for contributors, covering hardware.
* audrey eschright
, jessica garson
, pycon
, roxanne johnson
, the recompiler
, zine
WHAT WRITING FICTION WILL TEACH YOU ABOUT WRITING DOCUMENTATION* 24. May
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* Freelance Writing
* /
* 1 Comment
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I gave this talk at Write the Docs this morning and wanted to share my slides. They’re embedded below, but you can grab a PDF here and a link to a Google Drive version with my notes here.
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TL;DR
I have opinions on the internet. You might have seen some of myopinions because:
* I founded _The Responsible Communication Style Guide_ (along withsome other things)
* I write for publications ranging from Entrepreneur Magazine toBitch Magazine
* I make zines, mostly about Portland, Oregon-specific issues * I buy domain names like most people buy candy bars — not every day, but plenty often TOPICS I’M CURRENTLY INTERESTED IN * Emergency response techniques and tools * Community-based organizational models * How we recombine technology (especially through IFTTT and similar tools) to make it more accessible * Meaningful and useful land acknowledgements * Baking accessibility into projects during planning stages * 갤럭시 드라이버 다운로드 * 꽁음따 시즌4 다운로드 * 허니셀렉트 커마 다운로드 * 프라임 다운로드 * 평생 너만 다운로드 * 링 마벨 다운로드 * 드림하이1 다운로드 * 록가수 다운로드 * 네이버 tvcast 동영상 다운로드 * 무한도전 음원 다운로드 * 산돌 고딕 네오 1 다운로드 * 성구사전 다운로드 * 카카오 스토리 동영상 다운로드 * 의지의 히어로 버그판 다운로드 * 윈도우10 프로 iso 다운로드 * 원피스 필름골드 다운로드 * 갬블 시티 다운로드 * xavc 코덱 다운로드 * mysql 테이블 다운로드 * futura bk 폰트 다운로드Details
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