The November, 2017, issue of The Writer contains a couple of articles about apps for writers that can (potentially, at least) make the physical act of writing easier. My first reaction when I saw the magazine was very much in the realm of Ebenezer Scrooge: “Bah”, I said, “I don’t need an app to do my writing. I do it myself.” Of course I do.
But now that I’ve read the articles and looked over the listings of products and tools that can make writing easier, I’m beginning to change my mind. Granted, the writer still has to do the actual writing—or at least the mental, imaginative, and creative part of the writing if not the physical act of putting one word after another, because now software is available that will write as you speak. I’m not sure I’m ready for that just yet, but I am leaning toward looking at, if not outright purchasing, one or two apps that might help me get the job done. File storage, social media management, e-book creation, all look like possibilities, if not now, at least in the future.
But I’m not leaning toward any of the large, word-processing apps or downloads. I’ve been using Microsoft Word for—well, let’s just say a long time now—and I’m satisfied with it. I’m very familiar with it, and I can’t see learning a new word processor that does largely the same thing, even though it may have other functions. Some people swear by word processing programs that can help them “organize” their work into, say chapters and scenes and convenient blocks of text. I can’t say I need anything like that. I keep most of that in my head anyway, or on paper. It works for me, and I’ve always felt that writing is best done by whatever works for the writer. Do it your own way.
In the end, of course, you have to do the writing yourself. No app will write a novel for you, though that may be in the not-too-far distant future. Artificial intelligence may make us writers obsolete, and such original material as reports, poetry, novels, biographies, whatnot, may be computer generated. Fortunately I won’t be around to see that, and I suspect that artificial intelligence will never fully replace the human mind. I’m sure AI will do more imaginative, creative thinking than it does now, for better or worse. But it will be a long time before a computer wins a Pulitzer.
So, whether you’re writing one haiku or an exhaustive history of all the dinosaurs that roamed the North American continent, you still have to sit down and write the damn thing. Apps can help, but it’s up to you to do the heavy lifting.