Writing a story on IM, or watching someone else write one, is fascinating.

Watching someone else write, you witness a story unfold itself out of their minds. You learn a lot about the author by watching where their story takes them, and the prose you read is raw, unedited, not thought out.

When you write, you cannot edit your words easily. As soon as you hit enter, your words are published. You don't plan what you say, the words just flow. Until you type them, you don't know what they will be.

And there's no pressure to write well, because after all, you're just making it up as you go along.

Removing the fetters of internal editing, high expectations, planning, and all the rest is liberating, and opens the imagination like nothing else.

This is how I'm doing next year's NaNo.