# I (allegedly) Write Like... **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 15, 2010, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828 "2010-07-15T20:18:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![MarkF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@MarkF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarkF)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/101 "2010-07-20T15:40:55Z")
Well, I feel special (or they have just added new authors to their random asskiss generator), I got Cory Doctorow and Vladimir Nabukov… ---
**Author:** ![MarkF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@MarkF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarkF)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/102 "2010-07-20T15:44:22Z")
Well, I felt special right up until I saw there was a page 2… ---
**Author:** ![umop\_ap\_sdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/dbc845/32.png) [@umop\_ap\_sdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/umop_ap_sdn)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/103 "2010-07-20T17:38:28Z")
Another Cory Doctorow here. ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/104 "2010-07-20T17:54:30Z")
The prologue of my doctoral dissertation returned David Foster Wallace as a match. But the abstract, which is exactly the same concept but a little more detailed, returned James Joyce. And the fifth chapter returned a match of H. G. Wells. I’m thinking “random choice.” The fifth chapter is 13,565 words long. “I Write Like” sent back a match in under a second. Yeah, I doubt that was a serious analysis. It was barely enough time to count the words and sentences. ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/105 "2010-07-20T18:00:23Z")
> [@Duke](#): > > I’m thinking “random choice.” The fifth chapter is 13,565 words long. “I Write Like” sent back a match in under a second. Yeah, I doubt that was a serious analysis. It was barely enough time to count the words and sentences. I doubt that it’s random, but I also think that it’s not a very in-depth analysis. Counting up the occurences of one thousand common words and a hundred common phrases in your entry and comparing the frequencies against profiles of 30-50 writers in their database could be done quite quickly, I would think. It explains some of the dramatic shifts that many of us have been noticing. It’s a legitimate comparison of similarity between works of writing on some level, but I doubt that it’s any real indication of ‘style.’ ---
**Author:** ![tr0psn4j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@tr0psn4j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tr0psn4j)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2010, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/106 "2010-07-20T18:41:21Z")
I’ll paste a few from the classic [“If LOTR Had Been Written By Someone Else” thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=138905) [Fingolfin](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2502488&postcount=1)’s Hemingway = J.K. Rowling [Fingolfin](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2502488&postcount=1)’s Mark Twain = Mark Twain [Fingolfin](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2503178&postcount=10)’s Ray Bradbury = Ray Bradbury [Fingolfin](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2515605&postcount=63)’s Tom Wolfe = J.R.R Tolkien (never heard of this Tolkien guy) [Gonzoron](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2502946&postcount=8)’s Dr Suess = Stephan King That’s hilarious by the way. Stephan King has said children’s stories are actually quite horrifying. [Sebhal](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2505128&postcount=22)’s John Milton = Stephan King [Hoops](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2542347&postcount=113)’ Stephan King = Stephan King [Vindy-Poo’s](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=2676725&postcount=175) Shakespeare = Stephan King **WTF?** ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/107 "2010-07-23T12:55:52Z")
[Here’s an interview with the man behind “I Write Like…”](http://www.theawl.com/2010/07/a-qa-with-the-creator-of-i-write-like-the-algorithm-is-not-a-rocket-science) ---
**Author:** ![Cinebar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Cinebar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cinebar)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/108 "2010-07-23T14:49:39Z")
I write short articles for a site called Textbroker. I submitted three paragraphs from an article I wrote about Border collies and it said I write like Bram Stroker. I then submitted three paragraphs from an article I wrote about floor waxing and buffing and it said I write like Vladimir Nabukov. ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2010, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828/109 "2010-07-23T17:31:51Z")
Evidently Charles Bukowski writes like Cory Doctorow. As if [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-allegedly-write-like/546828.md?page=5)