Motivational Cliches Aren’t Business Models
“If the people who make the decisions are the people who will also bear the consequences of those decisions, perhaps better decisions will result.” John Abrams, The Company We Keep: Reinventing Small Business for People, Community and Place I hate pundits. [ETA: Maybe I should have said I hate Twitter? Update at the end of
6Qs: Richard Eoin Nash, Social Publisher
“Basically, the best-selling five hundred books each year will likely be published much like Little Brown publishes James Patterson, on a TV production model, or like Scholastic did Harry Potter and Doubleday Dan Brown, on a big Hollywood blockbuster model. The rest will be published by niche social publishing communities.” —About Richard Eoin Nash Richard
On Branding, Tribes, and Seth Godin Goes Wild
“If you can just assemble these 30,000, 50,000, 100,000 people who love literary fiction, then you’ve earned the right to be the ringleader, the leader of that tribe—and you’ll never, ever again have trouble selling literary fiction.” –Seth Godin, How to Fix the Publishing Industry Seth Godin arguably did not have the Best Week Ever
Testing Smashwords with my Free eBook #wdc09
I had the pleasure of attending the first Writer’s Digest Conference last weekend and had a blast. Great presenters; great insights; a fun time at the least pretentious poetry slam I’ve ever been part of that didn’t involve teenagers. Work’s been crazy the past couple of weeks with some exciting transition happening, but I do intend to
Using My Powers for Good
GOOD poetry, GOOD times. GOOD cause. the louderAUCTION The louderAUCTION supports all of the good work of the louderARTS Project. Proceeds from the event will help our nationally acclaimed team go to the 2010 National Poetry Slam and support all of the good work we do year-round, offsetting the cost of providing workshops, our renowned
Will eBook Exuberance Kill Publishing?
“Originally, we weren’t exactly sure how to market the Touch. Was it an iPhone without the phone? Was it a pocket computer? What happened was, what customers told us was, they started to see it as a game machine. We started to market it that way, and it just took off.” –Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs
Freemium for writers is two debates
[This is a guest post by Dan Holloway. His info is at the end of the post.] The battle isn’t getting people to pay; it’s getting people to read. If they do read, they might not pay. If they don’t read, they’ll never pay. Writers who use the “freemium” model face two distinct challenges, and
Soda Pop Stop Lessons for Bookstores
“Thank you very much, Pepsi-Cola, for reminding me that I own my shelf space and I can do anything I want. So I immediately went out and found 25 little brands of soda that were still in glass bottles…” —John Nese, Galcos Soda Pop Stop John Nese, proprietor of Galcos Soda Pop Stop in Los Angeles, shows
I am Jack’s scattered priorities and conflicting desires
A growing community of writers is participating in an online experiment in crowdsourcing fiction. It’s called #fridayflash, and it can be found via Twitter, Facebook, or by directly visiting participating writer’s blogs. A new #fridayflash happens every Friday, as figured locally, though some folks do post soon after midnight New Zealand time. The idea behind
Grass is overrated; give me cacti
I’ve had a love/hate relationship with our yard this year; I love having one but hate the constant mowing and weeding required to keep it looking decent. I also hate that “decent” here still isn’t anything close to my ideal. When we moved in last summer, I noted our neighbor’s gravel and concrete backyard and