Write Or Die

So, I was needing a kick up the backside to get some work done. And as is usual when trying to knuckle down, I found myself browsing Wikipedia again. This time I ended up at the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo for those in the know) page. This is something I’d heard about before (after all, I did try – and fail miserably – at NaBloPoMo) and always been pretty interested in. So I clicked through to their homepage. Turns out it was last month (November, i.e. the same as NaBloPoMo). Anyway three little words on their homepage caught my eye – “Write Or Die”. Liking the threatening tone (and I only realised later, probably drawing a subconscious parallel to the anime “Read or Die”, one of my absolute favourites), I clicked the link. It turns out some guy, aptly named Dr Wicked, has written a nifty little web app which doesn’t so much encourage you to write, as FORCE you to. You’re presented with a blank text box, but instead of being able to stare at it in horror while your mind is empty, you have to write. Otherwise the screen border will start to flash, and sooner or later it begins to play annoying sounds. And you have to KEEP writing, until you reach a word count or time limit that you set before hand. A particularly devious mode replaces the annoying sounds with something else – if you don’t keep writing new words, the old ones you did manage begin to disappear before your eyes. Genius.

So anyway, that’s how I managed to write this. It makes such a change from my usual, glacial writing pace, with popping back every few seconds to edit and re-edit, then realising I have to reword everything else to make sense. I need to use this more often. Now if only I could start going to bed at sensible times…

http://lab.drwicked.com/writeordie.html

P.S. I’m on twitter now – http://twitter.com/thewub

Oh dear god, it’s only now I’m previewing this post in wordpress that I realise how long it is compared to my usual. Yay, I guess!

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