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To Speak or To Write, That is the Question

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October 1, 2007

About This Editor: Karen has enjoyed her many varied experiences in corporate business management, dance education, and preschool assistance. She hopes to write about these past lives-and more-from her home in Pittsburgh, PA, where she lives with her husband, daughter, and 3 cats.

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Wow. What will they think of next?

I just received an email asking me to trial a new device that would allow me to dictate my blogs into a cell phone and have them appear right in front of your very eyes. Whoa- that’s getting a little scary.

It almost sounds like something we would have seen in a futuristic movie on the scary movie channel when young: Just speak into a phone and instantly your words can be known around the world…Not even could the head of a country have that kind of power!

Can you imagine the amount of blog entries if everyone could bypass a keyboard? We would be inundated with so many choices that we couldn’t possibly follow our favorite bloggers. Furthermore, even with more words, less would end up being said. (Sometimes the only way I can curb and edit myself is to keep hitting the delete button…if my first thoughts about a subject were recorded for all posterity, they’d be three times as long and make 1/3 the sense!)

Do you know what would be really funny? If someone with teen-speak recorded a blog and the content was comprised primarily of the word “like”.

Personally, I feel that I can tell a great deal about somebody after I’ve seen their writing, and I think this is true for many writers. Written communication is an aspect that is so revealing, I need to see a person’s written word before I feel that I really know them. You can ascertain education, detail orientation, thought process, emotional depth, and so much more that you can’t see from hearing a person speak.

I once corresponded with a woman from a message board who had the most atrocious spelling and who consistently forgot to type necessary words. Her content was good, but it was extremely difficult to get through to her meaning. She even admitted that one of her past pen-pals told her to quit writing because the quality of her emails was too poor to follow! I’m not that much of a written-word snob, but I understand the frustration.

Now, let’s take this a step farther…say this person recorded her thoughts instead of writing them. Her disregard for accuracy and careless manner of presenting herself wouldn’t be obvious. Would people then view her differently? Whether it’s right or wrong, they would, and it would be to her benefit. Thus, anyone can look as if they’ve toiled over a keyboard to get everything perfect, when all they’ve had to do is talk. They can be considered a writer without even knowing punctuation, which is pretty dismal for the future, when you think about it.

Hmmm…I don’t think I want to trial this after all. I want you guys to know that I am toiling over a keyboard and hitting my delete button every few seconds. You all deserve that kind of attention, and the amount of energy that it takes to choose just the right word. That doesn’t always happen when we open our mouths, does it?