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Posts by Mark Baker‭

1.1k posts
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Meta Reclaiming you content if you no longer have an SE account

It's not the end of the world if this is not possible, but I would like to reclaim my content. The problem is, I no longer have an SE account of any kind. I asked them to delete my main account bec...

1 answer  ·  posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by ArtOfCode‭

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Q&A For starting a blog, is a niche blog or general/misc content better?

What do you want a blog for? If you just want to share your day to day life with the world, that's what Facebook and Instagram are for now. People who blog these days are either selling something o...

posted 3y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 3y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Good exposition examples

Exposition is a problem for movies, because movies, generally, do not have a narrator. The audience sits and watches events unfold. But if the story needs the viewer to be aware of events that woul...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A What's the difference between time-tested and formulaic?

I think that the answer, broadly, is that structure is necessary but not sufficient. You need both structure and vision. Yes, you can have works that don't follow conventional structures, or don'...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Tools to overcome a block from: "My words are bad"

I've never subscribed to this notion that you should just start writing. Sure, depending on your level of skill and experience, some number of things about your first draft will probably be bad. A ...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Need basic tools and ways to practice and polish my writing skills

Grammar is to writing as driving a nail is to architecture. Yes, you need the nails to be driven in straight, but it is not what architecture is about. A good writer is, first of all, a good obser...

posted 2y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A HTML tags versus CSS classes: is one preferred over the other for the same styling?

In my book, Structured Writing: Rhetoric and Process, I make a distinction between three domains of markup, the subject, document, and presentation domain. CSS is a presentation domain language. HT...

posted 2y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 2y ago by Canina‭

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Q&A Should you write character description points in bulk or spread them out?

People skip details that they don't care about at the moment. If people are not interested in the details, it won't matter if you put them in a lump or spread the out. They still won't be intereste...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A How shall we handle our old (imported) content?

The model on SE was moderation, not curation. Nothing was ever removed. Duplicates, were marked, but never resolved. The only way any kind of curation occurred at all was through voting, and voting...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Meta Email subscription

This place is not exactly lively yet. That is not a surprise. But one quickly loses interest in visiting just to find nothing new day after day. Pretty soon you don't come back at all. What would...

3 answers  ·  posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by ArtOfCode‭

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Q&A How many character flaws can the main character overcome?

None of the things you list are character flaws. They are forms of disability. A person can suffer multiple physical and psychological disabilities and still be of stirling character. A character f...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Dumping an entire world for dramatic effect?

The question you should be asking is not how big a change this is in the world, but how big a setback it this for the protagonist and how does it impact his/her moral arc. The basic structure of st...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A How do I get beta readers?

What you want in a beta reader is someone who you trust to tell you the truth in the spirit of helping you improve, without attempting either to stroke or destroy your ego. You can't trust friend...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Choice of words on writing

Travel writing is not about the destination or about the journey, it is about the company. It is the personality of the travel writer that make travel writing worth reading. Otherwise, you might ju...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Is the first page of a novel really that important?

Yes, the first page is vitally important. It is the place where engagement happens. It is the place where the reader either sinks into the world of the story or skates of the words without engaging...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Do readers primarily identify with or judge heroes in a novel?

I wrote a blog post a little while back about what it means for a reader to identify with a protagonist: https://gmbaker.net/avatar-friend-and-shrink-three-modes-of-reader-intimacy/ I identified t...

posted 3y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A How do I distinguish between self-doubt and objective recognition of fault?

Some of the stuff you write is going to suck. Some of it is going to be without substance or inconsistent or just dull. And some of it is going to be brilliant in conception but dreadful in executi...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Has self-publishing killed the in-person critique group?

I belonged to an excellent critique group for many years. More than one member of that group went on to commercial publication of the works that they refined in that group. But since we moved a cou...

4 answers  ·  posted 6y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by Amadeus‭

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Q&A Can we dialoguify sounds?

Quotation marks are for words that are actually spoken. Nothing else. If you must do this, use italics. But don't do this. Don't try to do sound effects. A novel is not a movie. You can describe ...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Pantsing a story?

There are a couple of meanings for "pantsing" in writing. One is the saying that in order to write one must begin by applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair. But by far the most c...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Questionable Promotions!

Pondering this, I wonder what the point is of improving questions/answers that no one is reading. Is writing new answers to those questions going to make then suddenly start turning up in searches?...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Is there a formula for creating stakes?

Raising the stakes is a gambling term. It refers to betting more and more on a game as time goes on, often in the hopes of redeeming past losses. It is not hard to understand why gamblers raise the...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A How to write an introverted main character with accidental charisma

The way you make a reader feel anything about a character is by how he acts. You can try telling the reader stuff about him that is contrary to how he acts, but it won't work. The reader will still...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Could a 13-year-old have morality to disagree with their family's unethical business practices, while those are the norm in their society?

Well, first, the scenario you posit is a bit unusual. During the Industrial Revolution (on which I did my MA many moons ago) many of the men who made their money in trade and industry at some point...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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Q&A Why does the second act 'reaction' and then 'action' need to be drawn out?

I'm all one for structure, and awareness of structure, but some of these paint by number descriptions of the three act structure strike me as going a bit far. Just as you say, one gets stuck trying...

posted 4y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  edited 4y ago by Mark Baker‭

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