Thread by @TrinityTakei: 1/n

Just attended a great

webinar by @david_perell on
writing on-line. David is
consistently pumping out
fantastic material on twitter
and h…
1/n Just attended a great webinar by @david_perell on
writing on-line.

David is consistently pumping out fantastic material on

twitter and his podcast, and I was not disappointed by
listening for an hour.

Summarizing some quick takeaways below - thread:

2/n

First thing you need:

First thing you are going to need: a note-tasking system

that he calls "The Capture Habit". If you read anything,
you need to save it!

Ebooks - highlight your notes

Instapaper + IFTTT
Webpages: Liner app
3/n

Why do you need a note-taking system?

Because modern writing is not created - it's assembled.

You don't need to be original.

Prolific writers synthetize ideas of other people.

David Foster Wallace: “Books Are Made out of Books”

4/n The compounding benefits of Note-taking doesn't lie

solely in the _amount_ of notes, but in the connections
between them.

Note to self: finally do a deep dive on Zettelkasten

5/n Ideas worth collecting

Inspiring
Useful
Personal
Easily Lost

You should have two types of notebooks: Hot notebooks

and cold notebooks.

See the explanation below for each.

6/n Hot notebooks are *action-based*

Ideas/thoughts/material that can be used in the short-

term (or even right away).

These are about topics you are currently working

on/interested/writing about right now.

7/n
Cold notebooks are *information based*

These are ideas you are passingly interested in, would

like to (maybe) research/write about in the future.

They are a smorgasboard of 'nice to have' stuff you might

or might not need later.

8/n

You can either write alone a.k.a. the Henry David Thoreau
method: go to a cabin in the woods for two years, full-on
hermit mode, and produce a book.

Modern writing is collaborative - rather than doing it

alone, you discuss, get feedback, percolate, improve,
distribute.
Collaborative writing: The Content Triangle

Start at the bottom - have a conservation, share it, get

feedback, refine, create a blog post, get more feedback,
refine further, etc.

Arriving at the top: collect all the info, write a book,

distribute it.

Rinse/repeat.
10/n Voice Transcription

Use - better than Siri!

This is the method @david_perell and @mrsharma used

to create some great written content.

They recorded then organized their discussion, turned it

into an outline, and used that as a base for writing.
11/n Myths of Writing Education

Write from abundance, not scarcity. "I had the worst

Writers block; but Nobody ever gets talker's block" (see
previous tweet on voice transcription)
12/n Forget "writing for the teacher" - you are spending
years and years writing for one person, who then puts red
marks all over it. It's boring, counter-productive,
demotivating, academic.

Writing should be simple and understandable, not

academic.

13/n
Write CLEAR Sentences

_C_reate a rhytm
_L_ink yor sentences
_E_liminate anything that's confusing
_A_dd colorful details
_R_emove unnecessary words

14/n

Compress your ideas:

* Write the essay

* Explain it to somebody
* if something is in your writing but didn't come up in your
explanation: drop it!

15/n
Don't just write words. Write music!

Combine short, medium and long sentences to create a

rythm

[this doesn't work very well as a tweet - on the webinar,

he read the passage below aloud (after readint text with
5-word sentences) and indeed, it makes a huge
difference!]

16/n

The Story Roller-Coaster

The slide says it all!

This reminded me of the greek drama story arc, thoug

that's just a big followed by a big down.
17/n

FAST writing (as taught by @david_perell) vs SLOW

writing (as taught in school)

FAST Writing:

_F_ind
_A_ssemble
_S_peak
_T_each
18/n

SLOW writing (as taught in school) vs FAST writing (as

taught by @david_perell)

SLOW writing:

_S_yllabus
_L_isten
_O_bserve
_W_rite
19/n “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted;
the trouble is I don't know which half.” Same with your
ideas - no way to know which ones resonate with others!

Talk to people, and you'll find out: if they get back to you,
you found ideas worth refining and distributing.

20/n

Audience building is just as important as great writing.

There are plenty of writers on-line who aren't read - don't

be one of those people!

Learn how to build your audience and get your message

out.

Get feedback, refine, connect with more people, rinse,

repeat.
21/n

Grow your audience on Open Platforms.

Build relationships on Owned Platforms.

You need a synergy between the two.

In the beginning, you need to piggyback off open

platforms.

However, don't get stuck there - you might lose your

work overnight (see examples below)!

22/n

As @naval put it:

"Building a following on Twitter is building a castle out of

sand, as the implacable tide shifts in and out. Invest in
the free and open web - blogs, podcasts, newsletters."

23/n Example of fails and successes (not) using the

Open-Owned principle

- Meerkat was built off of twitter, killed by Periscope

+ Youtube was built off of MySpace

+ Instagram was built off of Twitter + Facebook

Grow on other people's open platforms.

Channel it into your own

24/n Building a Personal Monopoly

"You do not merely want to be considered the best of the

best. You want to be considered the only ones that do
what you do." - Jerry Garcia

Make your own Kind of Music!

25/n Defining your Personal Monopoly

Do something on the intersection of various domains that

is unusual, specific, experimental and complimentary -
and above all, unique to YOU.
26/n

Example #1 of personal monopoly:

Of Dollars and Data - personal finance using data

analysis by data scientist Nick Maggiulli
(@dollarsanddata)
27/n

Example #2 of personal monopoly:

Travel Write Draw - celebrating the unique, bold, and

colorful worlds of travel, fashion, and art by Megan
Morrison (@TravelWriteDraw)
28/n

Recap: The Write of Passage Method - check it out on

This was one of the best webinars I've ever been to -

chock full of usable info getting my creative juices
flowing!

Thanks @david_perell!