While many book publishers and academy types might argue otherwise, poetry has always been an oral form, first and foremost. A poem on the page is theoretical, incomplete; like a promising idea not yet vetted. Reading your work out loud is also one of the best forms of editing, and not just for poetry, but straight fiction and non-fiction, too.
Three Valuable Lessons from Forbes’ Digital Shift
“Editorial control” is a four-letter word in my book. It’s a legacy of the pre-participatory era, and journalists, editors, authors, etc. who fight to maintain it, or the illusion of it, are spitting into the wind that should be filling their sails. Credibility is more important than control, and that comes from your community.
It’s the CONTENT, Stupid! (And the Community.)
While Wall Street and technology pundits continue to devalue those who create and curate content professionally in favor of dumb pipes, content aggregators, and social media pyramid schemes, the fact is, at the end of the day, it all starts with good content. Without it, the digital business is a cork floating on the publishing stream, and the new shiny devices are little more than electronic bricks sinking to the bottom at varying rates of speed.
Social Media Overload! What to Unplug?
Google+ is an intriguing mash-up of Facebook and Twitter, but its use of “circles” does a better job of reflecting and managing the variety of solid and permeable walls that exist in real-life networks, and when it comes to privacy, I trust our robot overlords a slight bit more than the new kids on the virtual block.
Dumb Pipes, Devaluing Content: It’s All About Context
On the publishing side, the devaluation of content isn’t anything new, with publishers themselves as guilty of it as the technology vendors they often rush into bed with without thinking through the ramifications.
The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media
The Influencing Machine is an insightful graphic manifesto that offers a broad, contextual overview of the history of media, recounted with a healthy sense of humor, and a refreshing undertone of optimism.
Where’s My Penguin Football Jersey?
The reality is, once the eBook market shakes out in the next year or two and becomes more efficient, the publishing industry will still be the dominant supplier of books people actually pay for. Will the players change? Maybe, maybe not. Will the business model have to change? (drink!) Sure, for some publishers. Same for agents and authors, too.