1) Decoding the Range: The Secret Language Of Cattle Branding.
2) If you’re going to deface a textbook, this is how to do it. (Although I’m dubious about the adverb “geniously”)
3) Funny, mean reviews of Dan Brown’s Inferno.
5) Girl makes jacket out of Ziploc bags, wears sandwich and snacks where ever she goes.
6) Why Manhattan’s Green Roofs Don’t Work–and How to Fix Them
7) Theres a Question Mark Hanging Over the Apostrophes Future. (I see what you did there.)
Chuck Wendig hosts a discussion on what gets people to buy a book and (this is one of those times when you should read the comments) the results are interesting. A lot more people rely on blurbs than I would have expected, and several people say that glance at the first page or paragraph to decide yay or nay.
I reminded me of kicking back with my son to watch movies from the 80’s. When ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK starts, there’s nothing but a black screen, synth music and the credits, because it was made for a time when you bought the ticket and sat down in a theater. Nobody was holding a remote in their hand, thumb over the FF button.
When I pointed this out to my son, he asked to skip the credits but I wouldn’t. “This is the movie,” I told him.
Anyway, I understand the value people place on first pages, but sometimes they can be misleading. I really enjoyed THE NAME OF THE WIND but I only persevered past the “three kinds of silence” opening because people assured me the style would change.
For myself, I buy books mainly because of the author, the book is a classic of a genre, or a recent(ish) book is so widely lauded that it seems likely to become a classic. I read very slowly, so I can’t just be grabbing stuff willy-nilly.
In the meantime, check out this post from last weekend by Toby Buckell on the evolution of book blogging. He makes a good argument for the way our tastes and responses change as we read more and more.
Also, there’s a Kickstarter I’m involved with: the second volume of the WALK THE FIRE anthology. If it gets funded, I will be writing a story for them (and getting paid, which would be nice, too) but if it doesn’t, then no. It hasn’t been doing great in the way of pledges and I hope that changes.
Premise: there are certain people (Ferrymen) who can travel to anywhere in time and space. The far future on distant planets. The ancient past. Anywhere. What’s more, they can bring people with them.
The table of contents for the first anthology was all dudes, but I spoke to co-editor John Mierau about that and he said a number of authors begged off at the last minute, including the women they’d invited. Things would be different for volume 2, so I signed on. A quote:
The second Walk The Fire anthology will feature stories by two-time Campbell nominee Mur Lafferty, Hugo nominee Paul Levinson, Philippa Ballantine, Harry Connolly, JRD Skinner, Steve Umstead, Matt Iden, WJ Davies and more.
The interesting thing is that several of the authors in the first volume were Kindle bestsellers–basically, successful self-published writers. Me, I hadn’t heard of them before. It’s weird how many social groups can be like a parallel world.
Anyway, check out the Buckell post and consider a pledge, if you will. I’m writing this the day before the fast starts, so I can’t say how well it’s going. Hopefully, it’s so great that I can take a second week and really finish things up.
1) Miyazaki talks about why his films go beyond good and evil, in comics form.
2) What happens if you mix Silly Putty with a generous amount of iron oxide and put it next to a magnet? Slo-mo blob attack. Video.
3) Eleven of the world’s most unusual elevators.
5) Cartoonist does 100 self-portraits, each in the style of another cartoonist.
6) Thirteen creepy things a child has said to a parent. Number 3 would be a great start to a story.
7) Why Iron Man 3 Director Shane Black Was Once Hollywood’s Hottest Screenwriter. Word-smithing can be a little different over on the screenplay side of things.
Really?
Okay. It’s right here.
It’s meant to draw a bit of attention to a Kickstarter anthology I’ll be in (assuming they reach their goal) but the interview itself is more wide-ranging, covering everything from my early influences to my WIP.
It’s also pretty short. Check it out.
1) The annual Shorty Awards have chosen the Best Quora Answer of the Year: “What does the first day of a 5+ year prison sentence feel like?” The answers that made the list of finalists are at that link as well.
2) If Facebook made a Facebook house.
3) “Tie” Chi: knotting a Windsor as a martial arts kata.
4) Chemical-free “natural” swimming pools that are cleaned by plants. This looks a) awesome b) a lot of work and c) inappropriate for Florida. Still, it’s green and gorgeous.
5) From College Humor, Batman vs. The Penguin (played by Patton Oswalt). Video.
6) 27 Science Fictions That Became Science Facts In 2012
7) Seattle’s King Street Train Station has finally received its finishing touches and is ready for a Grand Opening. And it’s gorgeous. I’m tempted to take a train trip just so I have an excuse to go down there.
Anyone who’s paid close attention to the way people laugh can tell you that most times people laugh, they are not laughing because something is funny. I mean, sure, we laugh because things are amusing or absurd, and sometimes we laugh to minimize things that scare us. But most of the time we laugh because we want to cement social connection to others.
So imagine my surprise when I read this interview with a troll. The guy admits that he’s sent insults to the guy writing the blog for years, that he’s claimed to have fucked the writer’s ex in incredibly degrading ways, and has even done things like claim that Native American genocide didn’t go far enough.
So what happens when the writer puts out a call for the troll to contact him for an interview, with the promise that his identity will never be outed?
The troll turns out to be a huge fan of the site, a fan of the writer himself, and a person who… actually, let me just put a little quote from the troll himself:
… but I felt like we had, you know, a sort of special communication going on.
He was just pinging the guy. He had an “immature sense of humor” and thought it was funny to say outrageous shit that made people angry. What’s more, he assumed no one else would ever be seriously bothered by what he did.
When asked why the troll agreed to the interview, he said:
I did it, I guess, in part because I feel like you and I have had this odd relationship over the last several years, so I guess I felt this would be sort of a good conclusion to that. But also, I kind of felt, I guess, that I owed you an explanation. Again, I never really thought you were offended by anything I wrote, but I would hate it if you told me that I had actually injured you in some way. And so I did feel the need to sort of explain myself to you.
PING! The guy wanted a human response, especially one he could control. He wanted to type awful things and make people angry while telling himself at the same time that he didn’t really mean to offend anyone.
In other words, he was lonely. He visited the site every day to keep up on the latest athletic uniform design news (which… really? Okay, I guess) but he had to treat it like shit for lulz, too.
And how broken is that?
In an embarrassment of riches, we have two different posts comparing the self-publishing ebook gold rush of today with the self-publishing webcomic gold rush of yesteryear. That first link is to Ursula Vernon, who is awesome, and the second is to KB Spangler, who I had not heard of before now.
Both make similar but not identical points and they’re both worth reading (the first post for the comments; the second post has some important links showing how little some incredibly talented comics creators earn). Important to note: people continue to point out the outlandish rare success stories and say “I want to be like that!” People continue to suggest “Hey, you could just do it for yourself” as though that route is equally attractive and equally beneficial (those aren’t the same things) to everyone. People still talk about it like it’s astrology: the success stories prove that it’s 100% viable while the failures are always failures of poorly applied process (wrong cover, not enough self-promotion, too much self-promotion, you should have bought ads on blah blah blah).
A big difference that neither poster touches on is the payment method. Webcomics are something people want to consume for free and creators have to make their money through merchandise, or selling collections of back issues, or ads. Personally, I read three or four different webcomics and I doubt I would pay for any of them. Maybe Order of the Stick, but even then I would watch for trade paperbacks and then put a purchase request through my library. That’s how I read corporate comics, too. I love comics, but comics are expensive.
People are used to paying for novels. In fact, there’s a general perception that free or $0.99 novels are not very good. When Del Rey set the ebook for Child of Fire at that price, I made a point of including the words “promotional” and “limited time.” I didn’t want people thinking they would get what they pay for.
As for the whole BUY MY BOOK thing… look, you can find out about my novels right on my front page. That one on the top is self-published, but do I want to push a “BUY MY BOOK” message? Nope. I want to push a “READ THE SAMPLE” message. Amazon/B&N/Apple/Etc all let you download the first 20-some percent so you can give it a taste test.
The difference being, you can’t get the whole book for free. If you like it, you have to pay to get the rest. If I like Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, I can just keep clicking the little arrow on the right until I run out of fun or accidentally click an Google ad and shove a couple of pennies at the creator.
The novel is something I can sell. A webcomic is something that draws in people who might someday click an ad, pledge in a Kickstarter, or buy a “Wookie Jesus” tshirt. The difference there is non-trivial and I realize how much that sucks. I am an ass who does not send money directly toward the people who make things I enjoy. Either I get it for free or I ask my library to pay. I have to do the same thing with books, mostly, so don’t hate me.
Anyway, if you’re curious where ebooks might end up, both links are worth reading. Check them out.
1) Homemade “Romance Pants”. Has to be seen to be believed.
2) Ten of the Most Beautiful Libraries Ever Built (in Minecraft).
3) The 12 Most Controversial Facts In Mathematics. I dunno how I feel about the title but the article is cool.
4) “Are you a ‘Single Interested in Michael Crichton?’ Meet the love raptors stalking OkCupid.”
5) 15 Mid-Century Modern Dream Homes that will Kill Your Children. Via James Nicoll
6) An anti-drone hoodie designed to hide your thermal signature from above.
7) Plewds, Hites, and Indotherms: Terms for the graphic language of cartooning. I’d heard of grawlixes before, but the others were names for things I didn’t even know had names. Very cool.
1) The obituary of England’s “King of the Cat Burglars.”
2) The major causes of death in the 20th century, visualized.
3) The Diagram Prize for the oddest book title of the year has been awarded.
4) The anatomy of Goofy, Mickey, Pikachu, and more. Warning: a little disturbing.
5) Paperback covers for Quentin Tarantino movies. Of course, no one does paperback covers like this any more, but they look great.
6) Japanese schoolgirls blast each other with the kamehameha wave, in still photos.