The poetry of content

"B2B writing,/ print, online or in email,/ would be prettier/ if more of us gave more thought/ to beauty than to word count."
You like that? It's my attempt at Tanka poetry, an ancient form of writing that has newfound popularity. In a lovely and unexpected development, young people in Japan have taken to sending Tanka text messages via cellphone. The Tanka craze is the latest example of consumers creating new forms of media from new types of technology. I'm always delighted by such things..and often amazed by the speed at which they arrive.
There are lessons here for B2B journalists and publishers. And at least one of them is something that I've written about before: the line between content producers and content audiences has disappeared.
But perhaps more important, we in B2B media should note that a new generation has emerged that has a true love of the written word. I'm old enough to remember when pundits bemoaned that young people had no interest in writing. When I was in college, it was common to complain that "no one writes letters anymore." But today, young people write...and read...letters at an extraordinary rate. Granted, those "letters" come in forms we couldn't have imagined just a few years ago -- email and instant messaging. And granted, these new forms have new rules that can confuse old-timers. But although the forms have changed, the center has held. Writing is still writing. And writing, when done well, is still poetry.

tags: journalism, b2b, media, trade press, magazines