Too much 'content', less 'ment'?

Why is it so important to make sense?

To know who you are, what you want to be, where you want to go?

And for that matter why do I need to have an outline of a story before I can start writing anything?

Sometimes, this consistent need to define everything feels like such a boxed up way to live life. Many times this is the reason I don't write as much as I used to before. 

If any of you know me since my 'Better half' blog days, you will remember, I wrote so much random stuff. I never had a structure to my blog. My blog did not represent anything except perhaps a talkative mind. Often this was in the shape of verses which did not even rhyme (but had a rhythm - I was always very particular about the rhythm somehow). 

Back then I wrote poems because I was too lazy to write paragraphs - such as this one I am currently writing, where I have to write whole sentences to make any sense. Poetry on the other hand gave me the license to be experimental, suggestive, minimal with words, cryptic when I wanted to be, and most importantly, tell a story without having it all laid out in front of me. My readers filled in the gaps, and created their own stories and interpretations, and so did I, whenever I re-read any of my piece.

Not everything I wrote were great pieces on an artistic scale, however I never had to limit myself to writing about something that made full sense to me before I could start. There was a strange sense of freedom in this.

But today, in the day and age of content/data/(over)information/noise you cannot possibly ramble randomly without representing a central theme. Not if you want to be heard or understood. Especially not if you want to 'make it' in this big(data) world.

The need for classifying yourself and creating a single style has become crucial. You need to create a brand, a name, an image, a single catchphrase or a word that will define your content that will stick in that one second attention span that people of a certain demography may give you. You can run stats on it to analyse your audience, and yes you can grow your audience by tweaking your content. 

Now I highly value data and analytics in my day job as an engineer, but when it comes to creativity and art, somehow it makes me feel a bit stifled. Like I am betraying my absolute naked need to create, by shoving it down a branded pipe so that it conforms to a pre-decided image.

I am sure there is another side to this coin, and I know I have taken an extremist view and over-simplified this whole content vs art (box office vs art-house?)argument - but to me creativity is born out of the desire to express and not sell. 

And that does not mean art does not need attention or the audience. We all need that little pat on our backs from time to time, and it is always an amazing feeling when someone else relates to you - but should it be at the cost of losing our instinct? Also, if an artist always produced content of mass-appeal, who would raise the bar, break the barriers and truly gift their audience with a brand new experience?

So, while we are all jumping onto this analytics bandwagon (me included, I can't help checking which country has my highest number of readers :), and being all practical and efficient, I just hope real creativity does not somehow get compromised, and that we can always take the risk and have the courage to go against the numbers or simply ramble - if we feel like.