Data Differences

This week, around the blogosphere, the comments were on the awesomeness of IndieReCon and the news that Amazon has dropped the royalty payments for ACX, their audio publishing arm. 

ACX is not available to writers outside the US but it is helpful to keep an eye on these developments with one of the biggest publishers. 
Chuck has a few pithy comments to say on the general argggh coming from authors around ACX. (Wise up people.)

 One of the great things about Online Conferences is that information stays online so you can refer to it...or in the case of writers in another hemisphere, get to it at a time that suits you. IndieReCon stuff is still available. I dropped back in to read Angela Ackerman’s post on collaboration that was really informative. Of course I then scrolled down... So much good stuff in there. Take some time to delve into the chats and posts. 

Joe Konrath has been a vocal member of the writing community for a long time. He recently took issue with comments from literary agent David Gernert. He raises some good points about gate keepers...the changing nature of the agent and who they are working for and contracts… 

If you are interested in contracts check out this post – Don’t Get Screwed- Contract Provisions Every Creative Should Know. 

Porter Anderson gave Hugh Howey the floor (his space in Writer Unboxed) to answer a comment from a reader about what Hugh considers the ideal print publishing deal he would go with. It is very interesting as Hugh describes the deal he has with Random House UK over the US part of the operation...and why he went with UK... (he tangata, he tangata, he tangata! people, people, people!) 

Hugh also has his 3rd report up... a look at Barnes and Nobel, a bricks and mortar chain bookstore and a snapshot of sales...surprise surprise or perhaps not as the figures are still hitting the same marks. 

Data and the need for it, exercises the Harvard Book Review this week. This is a call out to the publishers to maybe start providing some. 

Forbes takes a look at Brands... and finds out some very interesting information. Would you rather be a Grisham or a Jack Reacher. Which earns you more? 

In the Craft Section 
Jami Gold has an excellent post on How To Be A Good Editor. 

6 Ways To Survive Rewrite Hell. 

The Write Practice- How To Finish Projects 

Create Inspirational Workspaces 

Jody Hedlund on Developing Characters 

In the Marketing Section 
A big article on Discoverability and Marketing- they are essentially the same thing. 

Tim Ferris On How to make a viral book trailer 

10 Book Marketing Mistakes Self Publishers Make 

Website of the Week: K M Weiland. 
I know I reference her a lot but have you actually trawled around her website... check out this post. How Not To Be A Writer -15 Signs You Are Doing It Wrong 

To Finish, 
Neil Gaiman has a different take on piracy.... data food for thought…

maureen

Pic from Flickr/Creative Commons/Mezdeathhead
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mezdeathhead

In The CON Zone.

I’m just popping up from the world of virtual conferences to write this blog post.

Conferences have been the main topic of the week for me. It started earlier in the week when I had a book association meeting and on the agenda (officially) was conference 2015. Yes I know that is next year...yes I know that it is probably last third of next year... Yes I know that is 18 months away. But when we planned the last National Conference of Children’s Writer’s and Illustrators we started 18 months out. You have to if you want a good Keynote speaker... and other great faculty presenters. You have to if you want a good venue... You also have to find out from your potential attendee’s what they want to learn about. **

Twitter was full of NY2014 SCBWI chat about how awesome it is and was. The great thing about the NY and LA Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators is the live blogging that goes on at these events (great for us writers on the other side of the world.) So instead of feeling envious of Kyle (pres of NZSA) getting to go (his choice, he paid for it, he deserved it) you can live vicariously and go visit the blog and scroll down on the right, dropping into those presentations that interest you. (Alternatively you can buy Kyle a couple of beers and pick his brains next time you see him.)

IndieReCon is happening now. 3 days of awesome virtual conference which is free. There are quite a few kids writers on the faculty of this conference which is Genre Writing orientated and very practical for writers looking into Indie publishing. There is lots of info on marketing, book production, agents etc. I started, yesterday, listening to a webinar on Fear and Writing with the Awesome Susan Kaye Quinn. I had already bookmarked her Marketing Indie Mid Grade books post to share here...(Read It!)

In the story that doesn’t die...more commentary on the Author Earnings site and the talking/hand wringing that is going on.

Brian O’Leary on The Empire Strikes Back – if Trad publishers would get past the handwringing and realize the game has irrevocably changed and what they can do about it.

Eoin Purcell on understanding the technology shift where writers have moved quicker than publishers.

Passive Guy (who is also presenting at Indie ReCon) on Mark Coker’s, guest column in Publishers Weekly (subscribers only) this week, reaction to the Author Earnings reports...yes I know that was long winded... (badly worded, it’s late..) just read the link...Passive Guy quotes extensively from the article.

In the Website of the Week

I want to highlight two.

Writer Unboxed is a website that has a large list of contributors. It is like a classy magazine with long form essays exploring some aspect of writing or publishing. The contributors are publishing and writing veterans. Jane Friedman contributed a long form essay from her new magazine Scratch on serial or episodic writing which is fast becoming a reader favourite. This is an examination of what it is and how to do it and who is doing it and why.

Today was #MSWL day on Twitter. Manuscript Wish List. If you type #MSWL into the search bar all the tweets from editors and agents come up of what they want to see. If you have a story that fits that criteria...when you query, following their individual website guidelines, you must put #MSWL in the query. It makes for interesting reading.

In the Craft section,

What is magic realism?

Jody Hedlund on writing scenes- a quick 5 point checklist.

Jami Gold on How to skip the boring parts

Screenwriting – the 3 act structure and how to break it.

Susan Kaye Quinn on tools for helping you write faster.

Larry Brooks on The Bermuda Triangle of Storytelling (Bookmark this!)

In the Marketing section

Bibliocrunch has a list of book sites that do bookpromotion.

Check out IndieReCon....

To Finish,

The Daily Dot has an article looking at the restarting of an authors career in Kindle Worlds...The Kindle Fan Fiction site...ho hum you might think until you find out that the author is L J Smith who was the original writer of Vampire Diaries who found her rights to her own work cut out from under her when she was fired from the TV show of her own creation...

**If you have any ideas for topics to learn about or conference wants... either comment here, on Facebook, or through email. We are preparing a short survey which is coming soon.

To finally finish....Hank Green, Brother of John (half of the Vlog brothers) posted a great Video today on books...its a rant really but entertaining...as only the vlog brothers can be...

maureen