the official unauthorized blog for oneword.com

On November 18th of this year, oneword.com will celebrate its tenth anniversary.

(pause for cheering, hi-fives, gunshots)

I was thinking I should plan something. I thought, maybe it could be based around the very first word, which, for the life of me, I couldn't seem to recall. So I started digging around and found a site called The Wayback Machine and, bless their hearts, they had an archive from 2002 containing the entire site as it stood then.

First of all, I was proud of my branding instincts (or laziness). If you were to travel time back to the turn of the century, you would find an American president embarrassing the shit out of us; iPods with a laughable one-thousand songs; and if you wrote on someone’s wall—you could go to jail. But any modern-day oneword user would find one thing looking very familiar:

Yes, it's got a lot of lavender now, which a few people have complained about. Just trust that there are deep, psychological reasons for choosing that color.* Other than that, it's hardly changed.

Next, I began to scroll back through the entries—back, back, back—and as I got closer to entry #1, I began to anticipate the glory—the profundity—of this debut word; that delicious linguistic morsel, handpicked to inspire unforgettable, groundbreaking prose.

#4, #3, #2—I closed my eyes and clicked once more. I took a deep breath, then began to open my eyes slowly, almost afraid of how poignant one word could possibly be.

And there it was:

astroturf

The loudest mental WTF? I have ever experienced went off in my brain. Seriously. ASTROTURF? It’s not even a real fucking word.

Luckily there were only about twenty people, comprised mostly of friends and colleagues, on oneword that fateful day, left to suffer through writing about astroturf.

Maybe I thought, Hmmmm . . . astroturf. Can’t go anywhere but up from here.

And up we went.

---

*not really

 

I never thought I could be so impacted by the death of someone I never knew personally until the passing of Steve Jobs.

Since 1989, I have been using Apple products. Every day.

I have worked in print and digital design, post production, music engineering and composition, video editing, advertising, and as a writer—all on a Mac.

I know there are many like me who have never once entertained the idea of buying any other brand of personal computer; many who know that a Mac is more than a machine—it is the realization of a passionate vision; many who hold the Apple brand close to their hearts.

People mock the depth of emotion felt by myself and other Apple lovers, as they tweet (Twitter wouldn't exist) from their Androids that would not exist, while watching TV shows edited on machines that would not exist, as they run endless virus scans on machines that are distant knockoffs of machines that would not exist—living in a world that wouldn't exist without Steve Jobs’ contributions.

To clarify, I'm sure the world would still be here spinning on its axis without Steve Jobs. I just think it would be a little less beautiful—maybe a lot less beautiful. Anyone reading this would be hard pressed to take a glance around them and not see at least five things created on a Mac.

Although Steve Jobs didn't invent the Mac, I believe it was his vision that not only made it a reality, but made it art. Which, in turn, inspired art in the hearts of millions around the globe—art that will allow his legacy to live on for a very long time.

 

On my street there are two guys that, when not collecting bottles and cans, hang out all day doing god-knows-what and cat-calling every girl that walks by. Has that ever worked? Has anyone ever whistled at a girl, or yelled, "Daddy like!" at a girl and had any sort of success? I've never seen a girl get cat-called then pull over and offer up their phone number (or anything other than the bird).

Almost daily, there's a flyer imploring me to come to Jesus on my windshield, and/or between five and ten flyers announcing some dubstep DJ that's going to be at a nearby club next month. Has anyone ever been saved by a windshield flyer, or pulled a thick laminated DJ announcement from their car door and said, "Oh, cool DJ Asshat is spinning on the 22nd—I'll mark my calendar"?

There is a junk mail bin that fills to overflowing on a bi-weekly basis in my apartment lobby. Does anyone even know what it is? I've never even looked at it. It comes out of my mailbox straight into the bin, every day. Whoever it is, they obviously aren't focus-testing the effectiveness of their advertising budget.

Then there's the much more environmentally friendly email and comment spam. I can understand how this might have worked back in the 1990's when the internet was still young and email was still somewhat novel. But with the advent of spam filters, it's rare anyone ever even sees them. And most people moderating comments are savvy enough to know the difference after about a week of moderating a website with even the most modest of traffic.

In eight years of moderating comments on oneword.com, I've not once clicked on a spam link. I can spot spam in my peripheral vision at this point (or rather not-spam). Yet I can't help but think that someone, somewhere has to be clicking on this stuff. What keeps spammers spamming?

Please advise.

"Vodka."

That was the word of the day when our would-be friends at Christian Creativity happened upon our site. And just because they don't recommend our non-denominational site, doesn't mean we don't wholeheartedly recommend their site to any and all creative Christians out there.

For the record, since its inception eight years ago, oneword™ has provided a bevy of fantastic words that would please Jesus Christ and his friends, Buddha, Mohammed, Allah, and The Flying Spaghetti Monster alike, such as "holy," "integrity," "smiles," "meaning," not forgetting "sandwich."

We intentionally choose simple words to prompt intelligent responses, without stifling users who may not know some words.

Remember, it's all about flowing and being creative with whatever we throw at you. If you're getting hung up on the simplicity of the words, then—contrary to popular belief—this is the PERFECT site for you.

Word out.

Earlier today while moderating entries on oneword, I came across a particularly annoying entry—and it set me off. In fact, it set me off so much that I posted it here, complete with the culprit's IP Address. After it was pointed out that I was being immature, which I was, I decided that I should pull it. I apologize to those who happened to read it. No use subjecting innocent bystanders to others' stupidity.

The good news is that out of the thousands of entries on oneword.com this week, there was a infinitesimally small amount of stupidity, and only a single entry stupid enough to get a reaction out of me.

As a wise oneword.com enthusiast commented on our Facebook page earlier: "Don't let 'em get you... You have a good, positive thing going."

Word on that.

Before today, Digital Cinema Desktop Preview in Final Cut Pro had never worked on my Macbook Pro.

I finally figured it out and am posting it here so you don't have to sift through endless forums, reinstall software, etc. to no avail.

Solution:

It's just a checkbox.

Go to the Final Cut Pro menu to Audio/Video Settings:

Click the A/V Devices tab:

Check the Mirror on desktop checkbox:

That's it. It was for me anyway.

Click OK, hit CMD-F12 and you should be in business.

(Note: once in a while I'll post solutions I find to problems to save people the agony that I've suffered. I keep them to a minimum. But probably the most useful articles on here...)

Feeding birds appears to be a sign of either wisdom, boredom, or senility. I never see young people feeding birds. I assume it's boredom, but will give it a shot on the off chance that wisdom is involved.

One such wise and/or bored and/or senile individual had scattered birdseed across a nearby street the other day and the Pigeon Brigade was out in full force. As I watched them go to town while waiting for my dog to do her thing, a car approached the street-spanning flock, rolling to a stop a few feet in front of the birds. He sat there for a few seconds, then lays on the horn—

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!

The birds don't flinch. My dog doesn't flinch. I flinch.

"Hellooooooo?!" I yell, "did you just honk at birds?"

He looks at me and does the "What?" shrug thing, waits another second, then proceeds to plow through the sea of avian street diners. I thought for sure there would be casualties, expecting to see bird carcasses strewn across the street. Carnage en masse. But, no, they were fine.

My first thought was: Oh shit, pigeons don't exist! My second thought was: Pigeons are invincible. My third thought was: Pigeons are pigeons. Pigeons don't comprehend technology. Animals don't comprehend technology. That deer doesn't freeze in your headlights because he's scared—he freezes because he's confused.

Nowhere in nature does a multi-ton chunk of metal come rolling across a field. It's not natural. If a herd of buffalo had come charging down Yucca Street, you can bet the pigeons—and me and the dog—would be getting the hell out of the way. Animals don't invent stuff, so they don't comprehend invented stuff. Most things that they do acknowledge are things that are manmade equivalents of natural objects, e.g. Doghouse=cave; Bird feeder=flower; Carpet=grass; Hamster wheel—well, okay, hamsters are either just really smart or really stupid.

What's my point? Good question. First of all, honking at pigeons is stupid. Second, don't metaphorically honk at pigeons:

Are you posting to Facebook or Twitter about how you're having a bad day?—Honking at pigeons. Talking about the weather?—Honking at pigeons. Discussing politics?—Honking at pigeons.

Writing a blog post about honking at pigeons?—Honking at pigeons.

I love my iPad for many reasons—its capacity for creative writing is not one of them.  

That all changed the second I fired up this $0.99 pearl. Of course, writing is much more pleasant on my laptop, however, iA Writer at least makes it so I can write on my iPad in a way that doesn't make me want to throw it across the room every five seconds.

Its Focus Mode and Dropbox Sync features (more on these later) alone are worth the tiny price tag. However, what really sells it is the top row on the keyboard.

Attn. Apple: did you not see this at prettyfuckingobvious.com when you were designing the iPad? Take note.

Nothing derails my iWriting experience worse than having to stop, hold my finger down, scroll over to the iNevitable typos and fix them. Now I can just click the arrow keys and move the cursor—like we have been since the advent of the word processor. You can also scroll by word (which makes a cool sound). The Obvious Bar™ also includes a hyphen button, a semicolon button, a quote button, an apostrophe button, and a brilliant "smart parentheses" button.

And we're all looking forward to the Em Dash button in the next version (hint-hint).

It should have taken you about a minute to read this far. How do I know this? Well, screw page numbers—in the digital realm it's all about time—and the creators of iA Writer apparently got the memo, thus incorporating the ever-handy (we're at 1:14 now) Reading Time feature in addition to Word Count (255).

 

I could go on about Focus Mode, which turns off auto-correct and highlights just the last three lines typed. Or the beautifully designed monospaced typeface (suck it, Courier). Or the fact that it syncs right up with Dropbox—and therefore every other device I own. But I promised myself I wouldn't make this more than 1:43 long so you can hear all about it here.

(344 words up.)

 

   When light is observed

it becomes waves

illuminating and definitive

   When the Earth shifts

it becomes waves

tearing and indiscriminate

   When love combines

it becomes waves

peerless and infinite

I've written about my criteria for moderation of oneword.com entries before. This post is very specific, prompted by an ever-growing pattern I've noticed over the last few years. Let me start with one example:

The day's word: bee

"Nothing more than a struggling person trying to live their lives off someone elses salary who actually reaps the benefits of all his or her worker bees. More like his benefits, women don’t get to do shit in this world, but so what? It’s just a shitty game we all play, too bad we don’t know any other games. Fuck."

The above example is not profound, well-written—or even grammatically correct—but it follows oneword's admonition to "just write" well enough. The puzzling part is the lone, irrelevant f-bomb tagged onto the end of the entry. The term "f-bomb" is perfect here, because it really is like dropping a bomb on an otherwise relevant piece of writing. And I get anywhere from two–five entries that follow this pattern daily.

So we're clear, I have no problem with a strategically placed f-word. For instance, another entry on yellow and black, fuzzy, buzzy things:

"I am absolutely terrified of bees. A bee landed on my brand new white tee shirt in gym class when I was thirteen and it was huge. It scared the living shit out of me and I screamed and made a huge fool of myself amongst my snotty peers. I hate bees. Fuck bees."

In this example, though I don't personally hate bees, I'm right there with her.

In both cases, the entries will get approved. However, I'm taking the liberty of deleting all f-bombs as illustrated in the first example. Why? Two reasons: A) it takes the real firepower away from other people using the word intelligently, and B) it screams "I'm insecure!" which is not a part of flowing or stream-of-consciousness writing.

My mom vehemently disagrees, but I think it's the perfect word—not as a parachute—but when the parachute doesn't open.