Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Writing Assistance: Dr.Wicked: Write or Die

http://lab.drwicked.com/writeordie.html

OK. It's 10:00 the night before your paper is due. You started to write, really, you did, but were distracted by sooooo many other things. Unlike other, more friendly forms of positive reinforcement, this site offers only negative reinforcement. If you stop...well, this is what the site promises will happen:

"Write or Die is a web application that encourages writing by punishing the tendency to avoid writing. Start typing in the box. As long as you keep typing, you're fine, but once you stop typing, you have a grace period of a certain number of seconds and then there are consequences.
Negative Reinforcement "strengthens a behavior because a negative condition is stopped or avoided as a consequence of the behavior."


Consequences:

Gentle Mode: A certain amount of time after you stop writing, a box will pop up, gently reminding you to continue writing.

Normal Mode: If you persistently avoid writing, you will be played a most unpleasant sound. The sound will stop if and only if you continue to write.

Kamikaze Mode: Keep Writing or Your Work Will Unwrite Itself

These consequences will persist until your preset conditions have been met (that is, your time is up or you've written you wordcount goal or both)
This text box is not a word processor, it is not for editing, the way to save is to select all of the text, copy and paste into your own text editor. The idea is to separate the writing process and the editing process as much as possible.
This is aimed at anyone who wants to get writing done. It requires only that you recognize your own tendency towards self-sabotage and be willing to do something about it. If you're sick of saccharine writing advice that no one could honestly follow and you want a real method to getting work done."

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