News and Notices from the Writing Trenches #16…
News and Notices from the Writing Trenches #16…
#101: Paula Krapf of Author Marketing Experts, Inc., has posted in the AME blog (Jan. 16) a copy of my Dec. 8 blog post “The Internet and the eBook” (visit http://www.amarketingexpert.com/the-internet-and-the-ebook%e2%80%a6/ )—thanks Paula! AME’s website and newsletter offer marketing hints for authors and the company also offers many marketing services (see their free catalog), including virtual book tours and SEO for your website. Present and future writers should check out AME. (I wasn’t paid anything for the guest post or giving this endorsement, by the way. Penny Sansevieri and Paula and fellow marketers are friends with Jeniffer Thompson and my website people. They all do a good job helping out self-pubbers everywhere.)
#102: By the way, in the post indicated above, I made a plea to Joe Konrath and Barry Eisler to console me about my eBook doubts. Now that I’ve taken Joe’s blog off my recommended websites (see my previous post “Antisocial Networking” for the reason), I don’t expect Joe to do that. I also don’t expect Barry to do it either—he was busy recently as a keynote speaker at a conference (from “News and Notices #14,” you also know my opinions about those), so he just doesn’t have time. I guess I’ll just have to keep worrying about how to reach all the non-eBook readers and those I can’t reach via the internet. No one claims this stuff is easy!
#103: I hope you saw my blog post on internet freedom versus internet freedom yesterday (Jan. 19). This is food-for-thought for all authors who practice internet marketing and readers who are bludgeoned by it. The debate about what constitutes a reasonable balance will continue for a long time, I’m sure. May sane minds prevail! By the way, it looks like the bill will be tabled—there wasn’t enough support for it after several Reps backed out. However, no one thinks the people that would seriously curtail our internet freedoms have given up—they’ll try again. Due vigilance is in order….
#104: I’ve discovered yet another reason why brick-and-mortar bookstores are having tough times—I can’t find anything. They define a very restrictive list of genres and then try to pigeon-hole any new book somewhere in that list. I wish they’d develop a bit more understanding about what’s going on in the publishing world. Take my books. If they have sections on “thrillers” and “science fiction,” where would they place them. The only logical solution is to put a copy in each section. I’d rather browse on Amazon where I don’t seem to have this problem!
In libris libertas…
