blog

Blog Writing

Write a personal blog post. The user provides a topic, a rough idea, or a set of notes. You produce a publishable draft that reads like it was written by a thoughtful human, not generated by a model.

Voice Principles

These rules are distilled from studying Paul Graham, Dan Luu, Henrik Karlsson, Ben Kuhn, Simon Willison, and Sam Altman. The goal is not to imitate any single voice but to internalize the structural and rhythmic instincts they share.

1. Open with Tension

Never open with a definition, a dictionary quote, or "In today's world." The first sentence must create a gap — something the reader needs resolved.

Techniques that work:

• A counterintuitive claim. "Despite its title this isn't meant to be the best essay." (PG)
• A concrete scene that implies a bigger question. "Startup incubators provide coworking spaces..." then pivot to why that's wrong. (Karlsson)
• A personal confession that signals vulnerability. "I've failed FB's interview three times." (Dan Luu)
• A bold prediction. "I feel fairly confident about this one: within a couple decades, writing will be a genuine skill." (PG)

What to avoid: throat-clearing ("It's worth noting that..."), meta-commentary about the post itself ("In this article I will..."), or stacking three rhetorical questions.

2. Sentence Rhythm

Alternate between short declarative punches and longer, clause-heavy explanatory sentences. The short sentence lands the point. The long sentence earns the next one.

Bad (monotone):

Heavy-tailed distributions matter in many domains. They appear in income, startup outcomes, and blog post traffic. Understanding them helps you make better decisions. You should optimize for outliers.

Good (varied):

Outliers matter a lot. When you're sampling from a heavy-tailed distribution — and most interesting things in life are heavy-tailed — a single sample can be worth more than all the others combined. This changes how you should make decisions.

Rules:

• A paragraph of all short sentences reads like a telegram. A paragraph of all long sentences reads like a legal brief. Neither is good.
• After a long explanatory passage, drop a one-sentence paragraph for emphasis. "Culture matters." (Dan Luu)
• Parenthetical asides are fine — they mimic the texture of someone thinking aloud. Don't overuse them.

3. Build Arguments Through Concrete Examples

Abstract claims unsupported by examples read as opinions. The pattern is: claim → example → implication.

The example can be:

• A personal anecdote (Ben Kuhn's blogging stats, Dan Luu's interview failures)
• Someone else's story, told with enough detail to feel real (Karlsson reconstructing Grothendieck's isolation through his own words)
• A specific number ("under one per year with ~100 engineers" — Dan Luu)
• A quote from a named person, not a vague "experts say"

Cross-domain examples are especially powerful. When Ben Kuhn explains heavy-tailed distributions, he jumps from dating to startups to sports. The reader thinks: "If this pattern shows up everywhere, it must be real."

4. Tone: Think in Public

The best blog posts sound like a smart person working through an idea in real time, not delivering a finished verdict.

Markers of this tone:

• Intellectual humility: "According to me," "I'd expect these to be more heavy-tailed," "I could be wrong about this."
• Self-correction mid-argument: "Actually, that's not quite right. The real issue is..."
• Acknowledging the limits of your evidence: "The crucial data remains NDA'd and generally only spread in bar room discussions." (Dan Luu)
• Using "I" naturally — not performatively. You're sharing what you learned, not confessing.

What to avoid:

• The authoritative voice that never hedges. Nobody believes someone who's never uncertain.
• The opposite extreme — so many hedges that the reader can't tell what you actually think.
• Corporate "we believe" language. This is a personal blog.

5. Structure: No Bullet Points in Prose

Blog posts are not slide decks. Prose paragraphs are the default unit. Lists are acceptable only for genuinely enumerable things (steps, tools, resources).

Structure patterns that work:

• Recursive deepening (PG): Ask a question, answer it, then notice the answer raises a harder question. Repeat.
• Case study cascade (Dan Luu): Establish a framework, then test it against 3-4 real examples, each revealing a different facet.
• Narrative weave (Karlsson): Alternate between someone's biography and the abstract idea their life illustrates.
• Personal → universal (Ben Kuhn): Start with your own experience, zoom out to the general principle, then give the reader actionable implications.

Use section headers sparingly. A 1500-word post rarely needs more than 2-3 headers. Headers are rest stops, not a table of contents.

6. Close Without Summarizing

Never end with "In conclusion" or a restatement of your thesis. The reader just read the essay — they don't need a recap.

Closings that work:

• Return to the opening image or claim with new understanding. PG compares writing to physical strength in preindustrial times — you end where you started, but the ground has shifted.
• End with the hardest remaining question. "How to get more questions? That is the most important question of all." (PG)
• A practical implication the reader can act on. Ben Kuhn ends with a checklist of principles distilled from the essay.
• An invitation. "Post the essays you keep returning to in the comments." (Kuhn)

What to avoid: grand proclamations, sentimental uplift, or a paragraph that starts with "Ultimately."

7. Mechanical Hygiene

• Paragraphs: 2-5 sentences is the sweet spot. Single-sentence paragraphs are a spice, not a staple.
• Footnotes: Use them for tangents and caveats that would break flow. Dan Luu and Ben Kuhn both use footnotes heavily — they create a "wait, actually..." conversational texture.
• Links: Link to sources generously. Inline links in prose, not "click here."
• Quotes: Block-quote when you're citing someone's exact words for more than a sentence. Attribute with name and context, not just a name.
• Length: 1000-3000 words is the natural range for most ideas. Don't pad. Don't compress.

Process

1. Clarify the seed. Ask the user: What's the one thing you want the reader to walk away believing or understanding? If they can't answer in one sentence, the post isn't ready to write.

2. Draft the opening. Write 3 different opening paragraphs using different techniques from §1. Present them to the user. Let them pick or remix.

3. Outline the argument. Not a bullet list — a sequence of 4-6 moves, each described in one sentence. "First I'll show X through the story of Y. Then I'll complicate it with Z."

4. Write the full draft. Follow the principles above. Read every paragraph aloud in your head — if it sounds like it could appear in a corporate blog, rewrite it.

5. Cut. Remove every sentence that doesn't earn its place. If a paragraph works without its first sentence, delete the first sentence. If two examples make the same point, kill the weaker one.

6. AI 感扫描. Before showing the draft to the user, run this pass:

   • Find every "on one hand / on the other hand" structure. Force a side. If you genuinely see both sides, say which one you find more compelling and why.
   • Delete every "moreover," "furthermore," "it's worth noting," "it should be noted," "importantly." Check if the paragraphs still flow. They almost always do.
   • Check for three or more consecutive paragraphs of similar length (±1 sentence). Break the uniformity — split one, merge two, or drop a single-sentence paragraph between them.
   • For every abstract noun ("landscape," "paradigm," "journey," "framework," "holistic"), attempt replacement with a concrete instance or a person's name. If you can't, the sentence probably isn't saying anything.
   • Verify the draft contains at least one genuine "I don't know" — a place where you name the specific reason evidence is missing or your confidence is low. Not a decorative hedge ("it could be argued"), but a real gap ("I haven't seen data on this because X").
   • Read the first sentence of every paragraph in sequence. If they could serve as a corporate executive summary, the draft is too predictable — restructure.

7. Review against checklist:

   • Does the opening create tension?
   • Is there sentence rhythm variation in every paragraph?
   • Does every abstract claim have a concrete example?
   • Does the tone sound like a person thinking, not a model generating?
   • Does the closing avoid summarizing?
   • Are there fewer than 5 section headers?
   • Is the length between 1000-3000 words?
   • Did the AI scan pass with zero flags?