“I have been wondering why my life has been so manic lately?”
“Like duh!” says a school mum, as we watch our respective kids hanging upside down. “Look at what you’re doing...you are choosing to have a life...if you didn’t have a life..it would be a lot less stressful.“
I have to say she is right...oh well, putting up with the stress...Thursday blog day rolls around and I am feeling slightly more productive than usual. Tax done...Yippee. Church work done...Thank God.
Interview questions answered....Fellow blogger Johanna Knox wanted to interview the convenors of the Spinning Gold conference. (I wonder who they are....?)
I have been catching up on my scientific reading...
We even got away for a little holiday over the long weekend...It was a wrench leaving the computer, the phone, and all the requests for a little bit of our time...not .
But there are a pile of things to do here and this blog will never get written if I run around noticing them like the back yard which is still covered with debris from the last storm, the big tree in the back yard needs three broken branches removed but I’m not looking....not looking...and the husband doesn’t see them in the dark which is the only time he see’s the back yard....
So a couple of links for you today...It is nice to receive positive comments from friends who say my links are great and they pass them on to others...
Book Expo America is over for another year. The Writers Digest conference the day before had the usual accolades...
Janet Reid has written an extra ordinary post about a session where she received fifteen pitches in public on a stage in front of 500 people. And critiqued each one as a learning tool for the audience...Reading the comments of people in the audience witnessing fifteen people with the courage to put themselves out there to do it, is amazing...
And here is something to contemplate about e publishing from Mike Shatzkin of Idealog.
Complicating things further is an entirely different sort of offer coming up from Google. Everybody else, whatever the differences (and there are many!), is selling you a downloadable ebook file which you “own”. Google is selling you access to a file which they will stream to you. What’s the difference? Two big ones.
* When you close your web browser, you no longer have the book.
* Because of that, any concern about piracy goes away. If you can’t grab the file, you can’t “share” it.
This is game-changing in a very dramatic way. If you’re reading on a web browser, then there are no format issues. And if you don’t have the whole file, there are no piracy issues.
* When you close your web browser, you no longer have the book.
* Because of that, any concern about piracy goes away. If you can’t grab the file, you can’t “share” it.
This is game-changing in a very dramatic way. If you’re reading on a web browser, then there are no format issues. And if you don’t have the whole file, there are no piracy issues.
These ideas were discussed at Book Expo... a wake up call for the industry who thought book trailers on YouTube were the latest things in e publishing...
Of course the conference work keeps going and going...with two more blogs to manage as well as meeting agendas to prepare for...
I got a couple of rejections in the mail... life goes on...same old... same old...
I got a couple of rejections in the mail... life goes on...same old... same old...
That’s why I have a life....
maureen
Pic is from the website career realism...
6 comments:
It's really interesting to watch how the industry is changing. It's like we're right in the middle of things.
And I always like your links!
crikey - they can't add something new - i don't understand all the old stuff yet! I shall indeed be checking out the links in hopes of coming to grips with this.
And in an effort to broaden my own scientific reading, I'm more than half way through Marcus Chown's 'Quantam Theory Cannot Hurt You' but I have to say he's wrong because my brain hurts a lot when I'm reading it.
Hi Trish,
Yes I think you are right...The speed of change is gathering momentum.Look at the changes in the music industry in the last five years..largely driven by the ipod technology...I think the same thing is going to happen with e-readers driving the changes in the book industry.
maureen
Hi Melinda,
Marcus Chown's book is on my must read list for later...I have just finished the 3rd Discworld science book looking at Evolution and Darwin.
If you haven't come across these your brain doesn't hurt so much when you read them...but it stills gives it a workout. Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen have teamed up with Terry Pratchett to explore big ideas in science, loosely hanging it off a Discword plot....So just when your brain gets to melt down mode you slip sideways into Discworld and it starts to make sense....
re the google technology stuff...its a wee way off yet as they have to figure out battery life in devices that could read the books...nobody is going to take a streamed file if they have to read it all in one sitting....
so you have time to figure out quantum theory and the theory of everything....wouldn't Douglas Adams have the last laugh if the number 42 really was mixed up in there.
maureen
Having a life is really important, especially when the wee ones fly the coop. Mine are off to Germany for the next month, and I'm so glad I have work to turn to. Yes, I'm a workaholic right now, but it's better than wallowing in chocolate and Jane Austen all day (I only do that at night)
Ohhh Stacey....chocolate and Jane Austen....
Have a very productive summer without the kids...to keep your mind off the hole in the house....It's funny you wish for some peace and quiet and then when they go it's too quiet...
I had a three day writing weekend last year... and I found I couldn't write unless I had public radio on faintly in another room so it sounded like the family were there.....
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