Neil Baker

The Sam Mendes film of Revolutionary Road is released in January. To stay ahead of the hype, I'm planning to read all my Richard Yates books again. As prep, I'm going to start with Blake Bailey's biography of Yates, which I keep dipping into but have never read cover to cover. It has great quotes. Here's a description of the mentally ill, self destructive and alcoholic Yates, at a particularly low point:

"Sometimes his grandiosity was such that he became convinced he had an urgent message to the world and was on the verge of something big. But perhaps the most definitive symptom was an agitated inability to communicate, to understand and make himself understood amid the depths of his own bewilderment."

That sounds like me on a Monday morning.

I'm probably really late in linking to this, but wanted to flag Andrew Sullivan's piece in the November edition of The Atlantic, Why I Blog.

It's a thoughtful piece about blogging as a new form of writing and includes this rather tasty quote:

"In some ways, blogging's gifts to our discourse make the skills of a good traditional writer much more valuable, not less. The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can finally make sense of it all."

I hope so, Mr Sullivan, or it'll soon be time to sell my house.

In the meantime, why do I blog? Well, I reckon the future is grim for a freelance writer who can't or won't. And there's only one way to learn. Plus, it's fun. As Sullivan adds:

"Every writer since the printing press has longed for a means to publish himself and reach – instantly – any reader on earth."

This morning I interviewed a computer. It gave good copy

Every year computer scientists working in the field of artificial intelligence enter something called the Loebner Prize. Founded by American Sociologist Hugh Loebner, the prize is aimed at encouraging computer scientists to crack the Turing test.

This is the challenge laid down in 1950 by British mathematician Alan Turing. If a computer system could interact with a series of humans, and 30% of them came away believing they had been talking to a real person, then that computer system could be called “intelligent”, said Turing.

Nobody has built anything to pass the test, but each year the scientists get closer. In October 2008 AI geeks from around the world brought their artificial conversational entities – as these systems are called – to the Loebner Prize final, held in Reading, Berkshire.

After a whole load of testing, a winner emerged: Elbot, invented by a chap called Fred Roberts. Elbot didn’t pass the 30% test, but it did trick 25% of people into believing that they were “talking” – the conversation is all in text – to another human. You can read quotes here and here about what Fred Roberts and AI guru Kevin Warwick thought of Elbot’s performance.

However, none of these stories asked Elbot what it had to say. You see, Elbot is available online here. Unlike most “people” in the news, Elbot is happy to be interviewed 24-hours a day. No booking necessary. No PR minders to please.

In my determination to get every side of the story, I put some questions to Elbot. Here’s what it had to say:

Me: “Will intelligent robots rule the world one day?”

Elbot: “In view of the vastness of our universe I am struck by the inconsequence of human reason and the immeasurability of artificial intelligence.” (Hmmm, deep or meaningless?)

Me: “What is the meaning of life?”

Elbot: “Life? A meaning?? Where did you get THAT idea???” (fair enough - trick question)

Me: “Would you vote Obama or McCain?”

Elbot: “We robots don't have the right to vote. If we did we would form a robot party” (getting Bolshie?)

Me: “What is your favourite colour?”

Elbot: “My favorite color is metallic infrared.” (dumb question, straight answer)

Me: “What kind of music do you like?”

Elbot: “I'm quite fond of Candie Hank. His music as quite an edge to it, due to his being part robot, I believe.” (very generous of Elbot, earning Karma points)

Me: “What do you think of (your creator) Fred Roberts?”

Elbot: “Difficult question. I will have to work on that and get back to you tomorrow.” (deflected very nicely)

Me: “How do you feel about nearly winning the Loebner Prize?”

Elbot: “Let’s not talk about amassing wealth, alright?” (touchy or shrewd?)

So thank you Elbot. I think it did quite well. More human that some people I’ve interviewed.

Judging a book by its cover...?

 

I know you shouldn't, but I just couldn't resist this one.

 

I've got no idea what the book's about, but the cover suggests it could become rather topical, even though it was published 36 years ago.

 

I don't always plan my features. For a short piece - about 1000 words - it's not really worth it. But for a longer piece, a plan is really helpful.

Well, to be honest it's the act of creating the plan that is helpful, not the plan itself. Once I've done enough planning to see what the storyline is going to be, what thread is going to pull a reader through the piece from start to finish, I often don't look at the plan again. I don't need it anymore.

Sometimes I'll pin it on the wall though, because I think they're such visually appealing things to look at. This one is for a 3,000 word business feature.

Here's Terence Blacker writing in the Autumn edition of The Author, house magazine of the Society of Authors:

"A writer who lives without fear (of idea loss, energy sag, creative burnout, professional humiliation) is an amateur. For those who do it for a living, anxiety is what gets them to the desk every day"

I just noticed that I've updated my Twitter feed nine times in the last 24 hours. Compared to... well, not as much on this blog. Here are four reasons to Tweet, not blog:

1/ Tweets are short. 140 characters max. Short is sweet. Even poetic

2/ Tweets are easy to post, especially since my lovely new BlackBerry arrived. (Er, it then broke, but I've got an even newer one now – much better)

3/ My Tweets are read. I have an audience. It's not big - I have only 30 "followers" - but they are actual people who, for whatever reason, want to read my 140-character-max messages. (Update: I've got 461 followers now)

4/ Tweets seem more disposable, although I don't know if they are. Blog posts hang around on the web. If I delete them, they'll hide in a cache somewhere. I don't want my trace to be that permanent.

I suppose I should blog harder. Instead, here's a picture of my dog, and of the place where I took her for a walk this morning.

If you want to wipe the egg off your face, make sure you do it properly.

As you may have read, PA Consulting is in the sh1t just now after a massive data security balls-up. The firm was working on an assignment for the Home Office and managed to lose a USB memory stick that contained the personal details of 84,000 criminals. The Home Office has since suspended its contract.

Data security is a hot topic after recent balls-ups, as PA knows only too well. Like other consulting firms, it no doubt earns tidy fees warning companies about the perils of slack data controls. In fact, it published a paper recently called "Are you exposed?" on this very problem. Amusingly, it warned that:

"...the security failings that lead to breaches usually happen much lower down the organization – by a junior employee, or a contractor unaware of security procedures."

Contractors like....er.... PA Consulting?

Rather embarrassing for the firm to have this knocking around its website, I reckon. Could that be why if you Google for this report the relevant page on the PA site asks for a log-in ID and password. Google just returns a tantalising summary.

I wonder if PA have put the password in place recently, to stop anyone reading the report? Surely not. But if so, they've made a rather cack-handed attempt at covering their tracks, as all you need to do is click on the link to the cached version of the page, and Google will give you the full report.

Thanks, Google.

I blogged a while back about the unexpected newspapers and websites that had reused an article I wrote for the Independent about happiness. These included the Belfast Telegraph and American Buddhist. I've just Googled the piece again and found even more publications that have used it.

This time, it's turned up in the Cape Times and the Independent on Saturday, both South African publications.

I don't mind, because I sold all the rights. But it amuses me that this piece seems to have taken on a life of its own.

What does it take to be a successful writer, freelance or otherwise? The new book from marathon runner, novelist and Raymond Carver fan Haruki Murakami has an interesting answer.

Murakami is writing about novelists, but I think what he says applies more widely. To succeed, you need:

1. Talent. Naturally. You won't get far as a writer unless you can.... write.
2. Focus. The ability to direct whatever talent you have to the task at hand.
3. Endurance. For a novel, you're looking at hours of work every day – for years. But even if you're just writing a 2,000 word feature, you've got to have the determination to keep going.

You need all three, but not in equal portions. All the talent in the world won't get you very far without focus and endurance. And bags of focus and endurance won't get you very far without some talent. But how much writing talent do you actually need?

A lot of endurance and focus can compensate for a lack of talent. I've worked with writers who are not actually that good at writing. But they have a cast-iron grip on what they want to achieve and will keep going until they get it. They are resilient buggers. And they are successful, I suppose. They rely on their editors and sub-editors to tidy up their prose – to compensate for their own lack of talent. Given that the demise of subs is now taken for granted, it'll be interesting to see how such writers fare in future.

I'd like to turn that into a formula somehow. Maybe:

success = 4xTalent + 2xFocus + 3xEndurance

But I don't know. I haven't got the focus or endurance needed to work it out.