My first professional writing commission was for Cre@te Online, a magazine for web designers. I’d for months been feeding pithy quotes to an editor, but got made redundant from the web bit of a marketing department during a boom-and-bust cycle.

The editor sweetly immediately offered me the back page (which was typically a fun op-ed), before presumably coming to his senses and hastily asking: “You can write, can’t you?” Fortunately, I’d been penning a monthly column for a now-defunct Mac website, and so had at least a little proof I wasn’t going to file something incomprehensible, in all-caps. And in crayon.

When the issue with my column arrived, I was thrilled to see my words in print, and this kickstarted a big change in my life that has lasted to the present day. Now, the vast majority of my income comes from smashing words into shape. But the difference today is the shape is rather more malleable.

Once, I made a point of owning a copy of everything I wrote. It felt important to me to have in my hands the words I’d created. But eventually stacks of magazines built to the point there was a good chance someone would one day remark: “Yes, it’s all very sad. They found him under a pile of Internet Advisors and MacUsers.”

I switched to only keeping covers and the pages I’d written, but sooner or later even gave that up. The reasons were twofold. First, magazines were getting too expensive and I was writing for a wider range. I had no hope of getting hold of everything, and publishers became increasingly reluctant to send contributors free copies of magazines. Secondly, I more often ended up writing for the internet.

I estimate that over half of my current writing is online-first. Many pieces are written, edited, and rewritten. They become ‘word Lego’ building blocks editors use for other features. Website copy is recycled for magazines, and magazine work finds itself online. It’s sometimes hard to know what you wrote; there’s little record of changes and no sense of permanence.

In a sense, I quite like this modern fluid nature of words. That something written for a time (such as a review, or round-up of products) can be updated is like an injection of new life — a temporary reprieve before the inevitable obsolescence that eventually comes to the vast majority of writing, tech-oriented or otherwise. But a part of me does miss that set-in-stone quality of finely crafted words, and the knowledge that they would remain in that configuration forever.

I recently read with interest Thrillist’s tech article Why you should ditch Google Maps for Apple Maps. Mostly, I read with interest because the New York-based writer’s experience — and his reasons for ditching Google Maps — didn’t remotely tally with my own.

Among other things, he argued Apple’s public transport directions are “infinitely better than Google Maps”, search is faster and more specific than Google’s, you get a 3D satellite view of your city, and you can access up-to-the-minute train arrival times.

All of this might be true in New York. Elsewhere, it’s often a different story. Here in the UK, I’ve found Apple Maps has fairly poor intelligence when it comes to points of interest (or, indeed, often even searching for cities and towns), and little knowledge of public transport that doesn’t include London. Also, 3D satellite views of capital cities are a fun toy, but Street View (which Apple Maps currently lacks a direct equivalent of) has for me proven practical when checking out an upcoming journey and looking out for landmarks.

The point isn’t that Thrillist got it wrong. For some people, I’m sure Apple Maps is an excellent product, and one that enables you to avoid Google’s app if having anything to do with Google on your iPhone irks. But the article showcases a problem that’s especially prevalent in tech: forgetting that the rest of the world won’t necessarily have the same experience as you.

I’m sure I’ve been guilty of doing the same at times. I’ve certainly written enough tech articles over the past 15 years to practically guarantee that at some point I’ve written more from my own standpoint than empathising with a wider audience. But these stories when they arrive showcase a need for writers (and their writing) to be better, and to recognise their experience isn’t ubiquitous.

Late last week, I received this cheery email:

Nook is dead in the UK, and customers who bought books thinking they might actually own them are now being told they might be able to still access some of them once the Nook store implodes, due to a partnership with “award-winning Sainsbury’s Entertainment on Demand”.

First, which awards? The Sainsbury’s On-Demand Digital Entertainment Brands Run by Sainsbury’s Awards? I was only vaguely aware Sainsbury’s did this sort of thing at all, let alone had won awards for it.

Secondly, this again goes to show that when you’re buying an awful lot of digital content, you should consider doing so nothing more than a temporary rental, even if (and this is the bad bit) you’re not flinging money at streaming. That is, frankly, not good enough.

Thirdly, this again showcases how DRM merrily punches in the face consumers who try to do the right thing. If you spent money on Nook books, chances are you’ll lose at least some of them now. Had you torrented those books, you’d still have copies. And in the UK, you can’t just legally strip the DRM and make your own copies; it’s illegal to breach DRM, with only (minor) exceptions being made for people with disabilities who have no other way to access the content in question.

You should not get a worse user experience on paying for something, but that’s increasingly the case. Music, at least, has been freed up somewhat, with purchases now typically being DRM-free across the industry. Some comics companies (such as 2000 AD) make a point of being DRM-free across platforms. But this is still rare. More often than not, any digital movie, TV show, comic or book you buy is wrapped in DRM, blocking portability and permanence.

Purchasing digital shouldn’t be a glorified extended rental. It’s no wonder many people now opt out of paying for media at all.

If you’re not from the UK, you might be unaware the Conservative Party is currently fighting a reckless proxy war for the leadership, with the UK’s membership of the EU being the battlefield. We can look forward to four months of campaigning, outright falsehoods, and attempts by both sides to skew and spin stories to their advantage. One today, however, was eye-opening in attempts at ‘balance’, both by campaigners and news outlets.

On the BBC’s report, EU exit would risk jobs, says group of business bosses, the following is stated:

Leaving the European Union would threaten jobs and put the UK’s economy at risk, leaders of some of Britain’s biggest companies have said. […] In a move described by No 10 as “unprecedented”, chairmen or chief executives of 36 FTSE 100 companies signed the letter, organised by Stronger in Europe and Downing Street, backing the campaign to stay in the EU, including Burberry, BAE Systems and EasyJet.

So 36 FTSE 100 companies are arguing already that the UK quitting the EU would deter investment in an already shaky UK economy. That should be terrifying to most people. Perhaps predictably, ‘balance’ was found:

Leave campaigners point out two-thirds of FTSE 100 firms, including Tesco and Sainsbury, did not back the letter.

This is true, but the inference here by those who want out is clearly that the majority is somehow not in favour. However, that’s not the case. What we currently have is 36 per cent saying “don’t leave, you idiots” and 64 per cent saying nothing at all. If even half of those companies sign a letter saying “leave the EU”, fair enough. But until then, the ‘score’ for those keeping count in this particular match is 36-nil, not 36-64.

On February 15, 2016, Stephen Fry left Twitter. It’s not the first time he’s done so, but it may well be the last. This time, the trigger was largely a joke he made at the BAFTAs about a friend, which resulted in the usual stream of bile being hosed in his direction from righteous keyboard warriors.

I don’t doubt some of them had a point. But I also don’t doubt many of them — probably the vast majority — didn’t think before they typed. Perhaps their comment was a knee-jerk reaction. Maybe they thought it was funny to have a go at a celebrity. In all likelihood, though, distance from another human emboldened them, and with the pile-on continuing, Fry decided enough was enough.

Later, Fry outlined on his blog his reasoning for quitting. He likened early Twitter to a kind of idyllic glade of sunshine and roses, which has now become a stagnant cesspool. Neither description is entirely accurate, of course. Early Twitter had its fair share of nastiness, and current Twitter in many ways remains amazing.

But even I as a niche tech journo, reasonably well known only in certain very specific fields, have felt the way in which online communications have changed. The ferocity of negative online comments on articles I’ve written has increased, as has hand-waving “I don’t believe you” idiocy, not least when I write about accessibility. I am, somehow, both an Apple zealot and an Apple hater. On Twitter, I occasionally get random horrible comments, which markedly increase in number whenever I dare to reply to one of the feminist writers and developers I occasionally converse with. Now and again, I even find horrible comments lurking in the approval queue on this blog, which has literally several regular readers.

For celebrities and other far more followed commentators who dare to allow the public some measure of access to them, it’s hard to imagine what they go through on a daily basis. I’ve assisted some over the years, when they openly asked for tech help. Their feeds were immediately packed full of dumb comments along the lines of: “APPLE IS RUBISH YOU IDIOT ISHEEP YOU SHOUD BUY ANDROID LOL”. Literally hundreds of tweets almost instantaneously appearing with the same ‘joke’. It’s astonishing anyone in such a situation manages to sort genuine communications from the noise. And it made me wonder why anyone would put up with this kind of thing for any length of time.

Clearly, for many, the positives outweigh the negatives. I see people with varying degrees and kinds of fame generously offering a little more of themselves, even as they’re in a spotlight that results in them being followed by a mob that can turn on a dime. I used to be slightly envious of such numbers. Not so much now. I’m grateful for the people who read my words, but in no hurry to end up in a position where I’m deluged by angry responses to everything I might share online.

But if I may, I would like to make one suggestion: that we all pause a little, far more often. As that great xkcd cartoon noted, there’s that sense people are all too keen to spend their time righting perceived wrongs online. The screen is little more than a shield, and anonymity too often a weapon. So whether you’re about to respond to someone online with millions of Twitter followers or just ten, or someone on Facebook you’ve never heard of, ask yourself whether you really need to. And if you do, ask yourself if what you’re typing is something you’d be willing to say face-to-face. And even if that’s the case, ask yourself if you’re being spiteful, cruel or unfriendly and whether it’s really necessary that we have any more of that kind of thing in the world.