Irish Political News

Over at Poliblog Perspective I’ve put up a demonstration of the process that I go through when editing an article. Using Sadie Smith’s new Westminster Watch report, I have posted “before” and “after” examples. I have done the pair of articles as a tutorial demonstration for new people joining the blog, it may be of wider interest. Guidelines There are only a few guidelines I give to people writing for the blog, and I try to keep editing as light as possible: Nothing actionable (i.e., dont get me sued). Write as if for an intelligent tabloid publication or at the level of the Economist. Unless there is a good reason not to do so, use regular Subheads such that they convey the sense and flow of your argument or article. A good test is to delete the text, and see if the headings and subheadnings still give the gist of the article. Tags: wardman wire editing process, subheads, headingsm style guide, editorial guidelines

I’m currently doing a little work with a couple of the columnists who have been coming on stream with the Wardman Wire in the current period, and I have started to create our editorial guidelines. I’m therefore thinking about a number of questions around the nature of group blogs, and the process has raised some interesting questions. At what point does a group blog become a web magazine? Traditionally, blogs are distinguished by the architectural or technical features, such as “articles arranged in reverse date order”, “accept comments and trackbacks”, “syndicate content via RSS feeds”, or even “can be registered on Technorati“. I wonder if - in fact - we need to answer this question in editorial, managerial or subject matter terms: Is a group blog distinguished from a web magazine by the freedom given to the contributors? What is the difference between a group blog, a collection of individual blogs or a manually edited blog aggregator? What makes a blog attractive to read? I’ve also thinking about writing style this morning, and the factors that make a blog “easily digestible” - so that it is possible to appreciate the essence of the argument without having to ignore too many annoyances. If a blogger has something interesting to say, and a thought process that is logical and worth time for engagement, then what are the qualities of the writing that make a blog “sticky”? I’m not ready to post my own detailed reflections yet, but I would welcome others’ input on this debate. My Own Writing Style The only person that I am aware has commented on my writing style on this blog is the famous Blogpower curmudgeon known as “Baht At” - who could probably also be described as “Bah Humbug”, given the … er … incisive style of his reviews. He commented “decently written” - which is probably all I would hope for. There are two resources that I have found useful and challenging: The first is the Economist style guide, which lives here. The other is a Tim Worstall comment: So you wanna be a writer? OK .. write ! Tags: group blog, editorial guidelines, webmagazine, what makes a blog, plain english