Technology changes how authors write, but the big impact isn’t on their style

“Our writing instruments are also working on our thoughts.” Nietzsche wrote, or more precisely typed, this sentence on a Malling-Hansen Writing Ball, a wondrous strange contraption that looks a little like a koosh ball cast in brass and studded with typewriter keys.

Anne Fadiman once claimed she could detect the “spoor” of word processing in other writers’ prose.

This article is about tech and its impact on style, perhaps voice, too. If I wrote three posts–one by hand and wordprocessed verbatim, one via WordPress and one via mobile device– could Fadiman be right? An interesting experiment. Should I try it? You tell me in the comments or the margins with Hypothes.is.