I Was Told to Shorten My Titles and Subtitles But I’m Not Even Sure Where To Start With This Recommendation Because Sometimes I Just Want to Write a Very Long Title and Subtitle and Don’t Want to Have to Always Conform to Conventional Rules, Is That Okay?
I don’t know if my title and subtitle will be too long for this story but it’ll definitely be a story of interest to those who want to figure out how they should proceed forward with their own work and can help many people understand the basic conventions of Medium itself
I just didn’t want to have to follow the convention, sue me!! Damn, I mean, don’t really sue me, I don’t need that kind of unwanted litigation. I don’t have much to give.
Am I bad for wanting to do something different every once in a while? Ah, don’t answer that. I can do what I damn well please. I just want to write as authentically as humanly possible and if that means that I’m going to have a title and subtitle as long as my story, so be it.
I don’t want to have to conform to conventional rules ALL THE TIME. Every once in a while, it feels good to break the rules and subvert expectations. I think that I normally do a pretty good job of staying within the established parameters of what people will want to read and what I want to write given that.
I do tend to find topics that not many people would dare touch, though, and I think that that makes my writing at the very least interesting at times. If I wanted to be like everyone else, after all, I’d write a listicle for every story and talk about how to make easy money on Medium or try to tell people how to succeed even if I have no fucking clue.
I do hope that the long title and subtitle don’t throw my people off, but wait, maybe that’s exactly what I’m trying to do here. Why do all of my stories have to please everyone? You don’t want to read this? Well, then, don’t finish it…
I hope that a long title and subtitle are understandable to my regular followers, engagers, and commenters. I’m literally just trying to tell people what my story is about in about as much detail as humanly possible so they understand what they’re about to read.
Does that make it overly long-winded and hard to read? I don’t think so. I think that if I were a reader and I read someone’s story and they had decided to buck convention, I’d be fascinated with it at the very least. It’s not common to have someone test these waters so playfully and find out what the results are.
It’s not like I have anything to lose from this experiment anyway since I gain no financial advantage one way or the other. I’m just a free-spirited, freeform, freelance writer who earns the FREEdom to write what his free self wants to.
Do you hear that, guys? It’s the sound of freedom and it’s blowing this guy’s way.
I mean this is a cool concept so far, right? Damn it, Gerry, why are you seeking everyone’s approval, just keep writing. This freedom and freeform are liberating…
Did you ever just want to do something on Medium that thousands of other writers said was a bad idea but you thought would be a cool concept? Why don’t you just go do that…right now, yeah, right now.
What’s stopping you? Are you afraid that you’ll lose credibility? Do you think it won’t make any money? Well, who gives a rat’s ass about either one of those things except for those who are trying to repeatedly game the system. There’s no way that’s you. If you’re reading my story right now, it’s because you follow me, know me, and you’re probably a lot more authentic than many of these hacks. You know the deal.
Well, anyway, I think that I’ve accomplished in this story what I set out to do. I broke the rules. I don’t try to do that so often.
Don’t you just want to punch that smug, goody-two-shoes nerd in the face? I certainly do. I wonder if I’d feel it or if the time gap would be far enough to where I wouldn’t even have a scar.
When I was a child, I was such a rule-follower and a goody-two-shoes. Boy, do I want to go back in time and smack the living crap out of that douchebag know-it-all. Anyway, if you’ve made it this far, you’re also a rule breaker because you weren’t supposed to like this.
Apparently, titles only show up for about 10 words and 10–14 is optimal for the subtitle. I didn’t count mine, well, okay, I lied, I have 48 words in the title and 50 words in the subtitle.
A total of 98 words just to tell you what you might expect in this story. That’s almost an entire Shortform or The Daily Cuppa story in the whole of the title. I’m a real rebel now, aren’t I? Well, thank you for sticking around, and as always…
UNRELATED LESSON: Did you know that ants can lift up to 5,000 times their body weight? That means that if you could train thousands of them to help you in your house, you could easily rearrange your furniture and they could help you move stuff all the time. Ooh, army of ants, wouldn’t that be fascinating?
