About

Yiu-On turning and smiling and/or grimacing at the camera.

Most writing sucks. I do my best to unsuck them, but my writing also sucks—though to a lesser extent, I hope.

Hi, I’m Yiu-On Li. Pretend that the first i is an o and the pronunciation should make sense. My name roughly translates to “bright, peaceful plum,” and not even my parents know what they were thinking (I asked).

(That’s me on the right or up above—sometimes it’s hard to tell my smiles from my grimaces.)

I’ve worked with newspapers, magazines, philanthropic organizations, and government agencies—sometimes to unsuck writing, sometimes to do a bit of writing myself, and sometimes both.

If you’re a writer who’s struggling in this hellish economy and with the rise of the job-destroying machines who’s got stars in their eyes and looking to make their writing suck less, you’re in the right place. Or if you’re just looking for people to take you more seriously in the boardroom or in the bar, you’ll probably learn something too. I talk about how em dashes make you the life of the party, how meter makes you sexier, and how I have an awesomely dumb name.

I studied computer engineering for two years before I graduated with a major in English and a minor in copyediting, because I love telling stories. They don’t have to be my own, either: I just love seeing stories out in the world, and hopefully someone will find them useful, even after you and I are gone. (And even after the robots kill us all.)

Hit me up on LinkedIn if you’re looking for someone to forge or polish some lexical diamonds for you. My bank account isn’t gonna fill up by itself.

Let me know if you play chess or Magic: The Gathering (or if you just want to talk about anything). I recently got into them, and I’m looking for people to play with.

Head to my portfolio if you don’t place your trust in random Internet strangers and want to see what I’ve done before you commit. I swear I’m not just a bum with a diploma.

And if you’d like to keep up with my work, consider subscribing to this blog.

About the website

My favorite animal is the platypus. And “platypus” technically has three plural forms: the conventional “platypi,” the Merriam-Webster-approved “platypuses,” and the super-duper-formal Greek-derived “platypodes.” I thought I’d just smush all three of these plurals together to create a name as Simple™ as my own, prescriptivism be damned.

All ideas are welcome here as long as you respect the basic humanity and dignity of your fellow readers and commenters—exactly in the spirit of the fabled platypiduses.

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