Digital writing is constantly in tension with the way that school recontextualizes forms of resistance and vernacular knowledge in order to sustain control and power relations across society. Yet the social practices of digital writing are diverse, wide-ranging and constantly challenge forms of authorized knowledge across a variety of different social domains. This article considers definitions of digital writing (what is counted as such, by whom and in whose interests?) with the aim of disentangling vernacular and formal "digital writing" literacies. The discourse of other art fields (film and photography especially) raises questions about the logocentrism of print. Such discussion of variation in forms of expressivity and communication challenges and redefines what counts as writing in a conventional sense. I argue that the balance between school control over what counts as writing is under constant stress and is central to the politics of literacy.