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"I've been really happy by how nonplussed they've been by the whole thing." -- Barack Obama on his daughters' response to the presidential campaign, People, Aug. 4, 2008
It seems even Harvard graduate/widely acknowledged smart guy/President-Elect Barack Obama doesn't know the meaning of the word nonplussed. He's in good company. I'd wager more people get "nonplussed" wrong than right -- frequently going so far as to use the word to express nearly the opposite of what they mean. As the misuse of nonplussed threatens to overwhelm the proper use, we feel duty-bound to set the record straight.
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No U.S. politician who professes to be an agnostic can hope for much of a career: a majority of Americans require their elected representatives to take the deity very seriously and insert "God bless America" into every speech. But in the world of business, and especially in high technology, agnostic isn't just accepted, it's practically — well, revered.
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You say you're not familiar with text messaging? Well, all the kids are doing it. It's so much easier than talking on the phone, which, after all, requires the laborious movement of one's jaw and the ever-taxing production of sound.
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If you were following the U.S. presidential campaign in late summer, it was easy to imagine you'd switched channels and were watching "Animal Planet." Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin compared "hockey moms" to pit bulls (with the addition of lipstick), and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama spoke of his rival John McCain's policies as " lipstick on a pig" (which he said meant "mere window dressing").
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Have you noticed people saying myself when, as far as you're concerned, they really should be saying me? It seems to have become an epidemic.
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A while ago I ran across a website written by a management consultant whose target audience included high-level executives. The home page copy was full of "I, I, I," as in "I do this, I do that, I was educated here, I've worked for these companies," blah, blah, blah.
Here's the plain truth: no one cares about you or your company.
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Advice to aspiring writers usually includes these words: "Write more." More words. More pages. More chapters, poems, articles.
But I have a different suggestion: To become a better writer, write less.
No, not less frequently. But with fewer words. Lots fewer. As in... no more than 140 characters' worth.
What? And why?
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November 17, 2008
