Post AsQ2Q4DpnmyUOPOS9I by adamrice@c.im
 (DIR) More posts by adamrice@c.im
 (DIR) Post #AsQ25CpgaqNd159PUm by cstross@wandering.shop
       2025-03-25T10:29:28Z
       
       2 likes, 1 repeats
       
       #WritersCoffeeClub March 25: Describe your workflow if it had to be 100% analog.Can't be done.I mean, the mechanics of using a typewriter … it's how I started writing? But my publishers insist on electronic workflow—Word tracked changes for copy edits, PDF for page proof checks—and my agent and primary publisher are in the USA anyway.  Postal turnaround given today's crappy services would add months to each book's production time. Plus, Scrivener makes me vastly more effective as an author.
       
 (DIR) Post #AsQ25JMAKzvTFYOQxE by cstross@wandering.shop
       2025-03-25T13:44:14Z
       
       0 likes, 0 repeats
       
       #WritersCoffeeClub Incidentally, I seem to recall that the original IBM Selectric golf-ball typewriter used internal mechanical binary coding and digital-to-analog converters to control the mechanism. So it fits the pre-digital and gives you what some folks have described as the best keyboard feel ever (at a price—the Selectric 3 cost about $1000 in 1981, or maybe $4000 today).
       
 (DIR) Post #AsQ25JYZarqns2CLIG by cstross@wandering.shop
       2025-03-25T10:41:59Z
       
       1 likes, 0 repeats
       
       #WritersCoffeeClub Incidentally, I couldn't go back to the pre-computer era for writing. I don't absolutely need internet or web browser (though I pause to look stuff up online CONTINUOUSLY while writing), but I *do* need at minimum a text editor and the ability to see two windows/documents simultaneously. So, circa-1985 Protext on CP/M or equivalent. A circa-1990 286 PC with a hard drive and 1Mb of RAM running Coherent OS (a UNIX v7 clone) would be ideal.
       
 (DIR) Post #AsQ2Q4DpnmyUOPOS9I by adamrice@c.im
       2025-03-25T15:40:56Z
       
       1 likes, 0 repeats
       
       @cstross Do you know any crotchety old writers who have stuck with an analog workflow, and who have enough clout that their publishers are willing to indulge it?I'm a translator and there's a member of my profession who dictated (maybe still does) all his translations and sent them off to a transcriber. He was phenomenally productive, and did the math to prove it worked in his favor. But that insulated the client from his method of production.