Sunday, December 14, 2008

Typing ahead: the idea


Hello everybody. Yes, I had this idea, it is a bit silly, but it may eventually turn into something interesting. The thing is that you should write without looking back. I don't know if it happens to you, but when I write a mail, a document or anything else, I go back again and again. I correct it, fix it, change it, update it, go back to where I was, remove part of it, until finally I get a perfect text. Very well structured, in which everything fits, or at least so I try. The pitty in all this is that the spontaneity of the flow of thoughts is lost. When you think, same than when you talk, there is no rewind button. You can rethink something, but not go back, and one thought leads to another, and this to another, until you link back with the original thought... or maybe not.

Well, this is my proposal with these notes. Typing always ahead, and never go back. You can use the backspace for one or two words maximum but you we cannot use the cursor, ops, I've almost done it. I was going to say that you can correct the spelling as you write, that, is allowed, because writing fluidly does not imply that you have to write incorrectly. And to read, the same rule applies. It is not allowed reading by pieces, or rereading again. You have to read these texts always ahead and never go back. I was thinking how I'm going to call this because there are several similarities. On one hand this is like speaking. It's as if you speak to an audience, or talk to someone. What you have said, it is said. You can repeat it, you can correct it, but there is no way to avoid that you said it in the first place, and nobody will forget. And there is yet another even more interesting analogy, and it is with those old typewriters. In the hey times, typing was done letter by letter, chack, chack and there was no way to go back. In the best case, you could use tipex to correct a few letters that were mispelled, but cut and paste, no my friend.


Well, I think that with all this, the rules of this game are now clear. I've thought that we can call this: "Typewriting: always ahead" and since I can not erase what I wrote, it will remain here. This does not mean that other day I think something different, or you, and we change it as needed. But what is written here, here stays . And of course, what we need now is to start writing interesting things. Make an effort so that typing ahead does not turn into a nonsense, or jumping from one topic to another, or into a set of random ideas. We have to put our head in order, think what we are going to "say" (write), take a deep breath, and to the podium. I strongly recommend that you try it. It's a different experience to what we are used to write, at least for me. Cheers for all who read this first typing ahead... in english.

Typing ahead: the source

Typing ahead is the english version of a Blog originally published in Spanish:

Escribiendo hacia delante
http://escribiendohaciadelante.blogspot.com