What Do Writers REALLY Need?

Steve writes:

In an article in the Huffington Post, writer Philip Goldberg champions writers continuing need for publishers in the ebook and print-on-demand (POD) age, where self-publishing has become an attractive and available option.

His premise is based on two main points.  The first, that writers need advances.  The second is that writers need editing.  Here's the link so you can read the article yourself if you'd like

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/philip-goldberg/who-needs-publishers-we-a_b_689763.html

I don't totally disagree with what he has to say.  There are some valid points in the article, but I think they're used to support a very flawed conclusion. Traditional publishers offer many things in their deal with writers.  Some of those things we'd rather not have.  Some we might want, but don't really need.  And some we definitely need, but publishers may not be the only, or the best, way to get them.

I think it's important when thinking about publishing these days to deconstruct it and try and rebuild the system from scratch. Just because we need Thing-A and Institution-B does Thing-A in the current system does NOT mean we NEED Institution-B unless Institution-B is the BEST and most cost-efficient way of doing Thing-A. This applies strongly to both of his points.

Let's go to point two first, that writers need editing, since this is far-and-away his strongest argument.

And actually, I'm going to skip to the past part of the second point, just to get it out of the way...

The need for editing, fact-checking, etc. in general applies much more strongly to non-fiction books than to most novels. Sure, novels need editing and fact-checking as well, but if a novel trips over a fact it's usually just an embarrassment (and usually one that most readers will completely miss). If it happens in a non-fiction biography of a contemporary person, then you might just have a lawsuit on your hands, or at least something that necessitates (as has happened several times in recent years) a recall or cancellation of a book.

In fact, in general the requirements for a non-fiction book are so much different than the requirements for novel that I'd argue that the two are FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT PRODUCTS. In the physical-book world, the two share so much infrastructure and production commonality they they're usually done by the same companies in overlapping facilities. But other than that, there isn't any logical reason to cram them together than there is to combine a company that makes corn-flakes with one that makes soap-flakes, just because they both come in upright cardboard boxes of similar proportions.

Now, many of us, maybe most of us, will be writing non-fiction books at some time or another, but I'm assuming that MOST of the writers reading this blog consider themselves primarily novelists. In any case, I'd simply say that the lesson here is not automatically to think the same assumptions apply to a non-fiction project as one of your novels. They are different beasts, and as the market evolves towards ebooks and POD, those differences will become far more obvious and important. Consider their requirements on their own merits.

Now, getting back to the first part of the second point (confused yet?), I think he's made a very good case. But it isn't a case that we need a publisher, it's that we could almost always use some editing, and those two aren't the same at all. Books aren't edited by publishers (speaking of the company, and not the job-title here), they're edited by editors, and editors are just employees of publishers. Editors could be employed by anyone: themselves, the author, a temp agency, the Geek Squad at Best Buy. It doesn't matter. They're still editors, and if they're good ones, can still provide the same function. A publisher is NOT required.

And any of us who have been around the business for a while know plenty of good editors that we've enjoyed working with who are currently out of a job (or at least, an editing job).  If I want a good, experienced editor, and I'm willing to pay the right price, I'm certain I can get one.

But let's deconstruct this some more. What IS an editor? What is a GOOD editor? What element or elements separate a good editor from the average Joe/Jane on the street? Is it a matter of education or experience? Talent? Love of books? To be honest, I'm not sure, and I'd be interested to hear what people have to say about it.

The article describes a typical copy editor as "an underpaid English major who loves books." But that describes a lot of the baby editors most experienced writers have dealt with as well.  For those of us a of a certain age, it can be disconcerting meeting our editor and learning they're young enough to be our child (or grandchild!).

Yes, if they work for a New York publisher, they presumably have had the benefit of training and advice from more experienced editors. Maybe they're worked on many books in a support capacity before stepping up as a solo-editor. Presumably even a typical junior editor has had the experience of doing a good number of books (though SOMEBODY has to be their first book, and it might be you).

 Still, I keep thinking of that basic description. Underpaid (or underemployed) English Majors who love books aren't hard to find in most any town in the country. In fact, there's almost always an excessive supply. If you need an editor, how difficult would be be, really, to recruit and train your own?

For that matter, what level of editing is necessary for a given writer and project? Does a person who has written a dozen novels or a hundred need the same level of editing as one publishing their first book? (My thought is, usually not.) And if an experienced author needs less editing, do they need a full-fledged editor at all? Maybe what they need is that copy editing (I sure do!) and fact checking, plus an objective voice to spot weaknesses in the work. Maybe all they really need is a good first reader, or a couple of good readers. Is it even possible that, at some level, a strong and involved editor working with an experienced and confident writer becomes more of a hindrance than a help?

So, I agree that most all of us can benefit from editorial assistance. But I think it's quite open to debate what form that assistance should take for a given writer or project, or where it can (or should) be obtained.

Now, let's go to his first point: Advances.

As writers, we're used to advances, and who doesn't like getting big checks (commas!) in the mail? But do we NEED them? I'm not so sure, and in fact, I think we might just be far better off without them.

First of all, what IS an advance, anyway? It's a loan. It's a loan against presumed future earnings (or actually, royalties on future earnings) on a book that the publisher has purchased rights to. In general, the terms on this loan are pretty terrible. In general, the term where the bulk of the loan will be repaid (or not) is generally no more than a few years, often not much more than a year. But during that period, we can expect to pay no less than 90% of earnings on the book.

Okay, okay, that's not fair. The total income on the book isn't yours, and never would be. The publisher is taking their production expenses, retail mark-up, overhead, profit, etc., out of that 90+%, PLUS the usual interest and cost of a loan, so maybe it isn't as bad a deal as it seems. But actually, what kind of deal it is really depends on the book.

We presume that the publisher is smart enough, based on their long and vast experience, not to advance more than they expect to make on a given book, but that isn't always the case. We know that a lot of books don't (at least as far as our royalty statements are concerned, we really don't know about the publisher's internal P&L) ever make a profit. The loan isn't repaid.

Of course, that happens with conventional loans too. Some loaned money doesn't get repaid. There's risk, and presumably the cost of that risk is generally understood and built into the cost of the loan. (Not always, as the current financial crisis shows, but it SHOULD be that way, and most of the time, it is.) Some loans will not be repaid, but enough will, and with enough associated interest and fees to make the system profitable.

So, if your book earns back its advance, and not much more, than maybe it isn't a terrible deal. If your book doesn't come close to earning out, then quite possibly it's a GREAT deal. But the more successful the book, the more questionable the deal becomes in some ways. The more books you sell, the less significant the production costs and overhead become. Printing, warehousing and shipping costs should also benefit from scale. But you're still getting charged a relatively huge rate against the income you're generating.

Worse, while the advance money presumably shows up before the income stream starts, royalty income is often long-delayed. The nature of modern publishing is that the fate of most print books is decided within a few weeks, or at most a few months after it hits the shelves. But the byzantine nature of the publishing and bookselling business is such that the income may lag YEARS behind. The publisher loans you money on the front side, but on the back side, you're loaning money to THEM, and the writer is STILL paying a high interest rate on every bit of return!

That's probably part of the push amongst established best-sellers for huge advances. (Sure, there are a LOT of other factors, but...) I'm assuming that agents, and may authors, have decided that it's a far better deal to get the money up front, even if you know the publisher is going to lose out on the back-end of the deal. But that moves the problem around, because when the publisher loses money on a project, it comes from somewhere else, probably a worse deal for smaller writers who don't have as much clout.

But let's look at the other end of the spectrum. There are lots of reasons a book doesn't earn out, and as I said earlier, you'd presume that the publisher manages this risk and would never INTENTIONALLY buy a book they don't expect to pay its advance back. Unfortunately, I don't think that's always the case either. I think publishers buy a lot of "quality" books that they don't expect to earn out, books that feed someone's ego rather than the bottom-line. I think they sometimes buy vanity projects from successful authors that are far less commercial than their typical projects. I think they sometimes buy bonehead books that don't have a chance-in-hell of commercial success because somebody in the company had the clout and ego to push it through. Maybe I'm overestimating how often these things happen, or how significant the losses are, but I'm pretty confident they DO happen.

And when they do, the books have to be balanced somewhere. It won't be off the best-seller with the inflated advance. No, it will probably be in the big, gray, middle-area where most of us live.

Whatever is going on, publishers have the ability to slide risk (and profit, and loss) around a vast range of books, both in terms of volume, profitability, and type, and while I think it's safe they'll do this in a why to offer maximum benefit to themselves, there's no reason to assume that they'll do it in a way to benefit YOU, as an individual.

There's also the issue of how "advance" the advance is, anyway. If you're getting money for a book not yet written (either one you sold on proposal, or a follow-on book in a multi-book contract), that's good. At least some of the money may show up well in advance. But we know, publishers have always tried to minimize this, and they're squeezing it harder than ever. Smaller advances, broken up into more and smaller payments, coming later in the publication cycle. Even when the trigger for a payment occurs, we have to wait. Even assuming business-as-usual, the check may not be paid for weeks or months. It may have to clear through an agent. Our banks may sit on the checks for two weeks before releasing the money. If you see actual money within two months of "on signing" on "on delivery," or the dreaded and vague "on approval," then its a red-letter day.

If things AREN'T as usual, you may not see the money until months or even years later, if ever. We've all been there.

Okay, let's just assume I went too far up the crazy-tree on that rant and put it aside. Let's just agree that it's a loan, and that the terms are, at best, somewhat somewhat questionable. Now, in what business school do they tell you go borrow money for your business from the first loan provider that makes an offer, and not even INVESTIGATE other options? Yet, that's exactly what we do when we take an advance. At least we (or our agents) have a chance to negotiate the terms, but we all know that our ability to alter them is pretty limited. The basic assumption is fixed, even that we take the advance. From what I've heard, several successful authors have tried to negotiate away their advances in return for a larger and more immediate royalty payout, and I've never heard of a publisher welcoming those terms. They LIKE the way things work now. They WANT you to take an advance, so they can game the system the way they always have. They just want the amount of the advance to fall within a narrow range provided by their own P&L.

So: Loan required. Terms of loan only marginally negotiable. The only loan provider is the same guy who sets the terms for all other aspects of the agreement and reports all the costs and incomes to you. That describes a company-town setup to me, and company towns are rarely favorable to the workers.

For pretty much every writer I know, and I suspect even for people at the top of the field, publishing is a world of feast and famine. Even for people at the top of the game, it seems to be long stretches of nothing between large and unpredictable paydays.

That's just not a good way to do business. It makes it difficult to plan, and difficult to manage cash-flow. Failure to manage cash-flow can get VERY expensive, as you're often forced to borrow MORE money at outrageous fees (and yes, late fees on your utilities and overdraft charges at your bank are just a VERY expensive way of borrowing money). It makes it even harder to keep health insurance in place. It makes it hard to make cash-outlays (both personal and business) at the most advantageous times, under the most advantageous terms. And for all but the most disciplined of us, I think there's a natural tendency to go splurge-crazy when the big checks show up.

Currently, publishing is all about what my friend Kristine Rusch has quite-wisely called "the produce model." When we write something, it's produce. It's polished up, put on the shelf, and it either sells quickly, or not at all. After a few weeks or months, it stinks up the place. You sell what you can at huge discount, then dump the rest and move on to the next fresh thing. This is fine for publishers, who have no shortage of fresh things. Not so good for writers who usually would be content to ride the slow-boat of income as long as it continues to sail.

The more we move into ebooks and POD, the less we're forced to be tied to that model. We can write a book in the anticipation that it will earn money (a lot, or a little) over a long time. Write more books while still getting income from the first. Write sixth and tenth books while you still get a little income each from ALL your earlier projects. The more you write, the quicker you write, the smoother and more predictable your paydays become. If you need to borrow money, shop for a loan. Don't take whatever deal the company store will offer you.

Yes, we'll miss the big checks. Yes, it's wonderful after a long time as a starving writer to get your first advance check. But in the big picture, do we NEED that advance? Probably not. Would most of us, on most days, be far better off with a smaller, steadier flow of cash? I think we would.

This post originated as a message I posted on a private writer's message list, and has been revised slightly for blog use.  But in doing so, I've thought of several additional important functions for writers currently served by traditional editors, and which were not covered in Goldberg's post (including the one I think is most compelling of all as a reason to stay with traditional publishing).  After some thought, rather than appending discussion of them to this post and muddying the waters, I've decided to deal with them in a follow-up message.  Look for it soon.  - Steve

eBook Sales Level Off in April. Is the iPad to Blame?

Steve:

While eBook sales remain a modest percentage of the total dollar-book business, sales have been skyrocketing at triple-digit rates that pointed them towards gobbling a significant chunk of the business in the next few years.  The question has always been, would this growth rate increase, maintain, or at some point taper off.  Until now, there's been no sign of faltering.

But Publisher's Weekly has just released sales number for April, and growth as 127.9 percent.  Now, that sounds pretty big, but it's the lowest monthly rate of the year, and the first big stumble in eBook sales in a long time.  What happened?

Well, it's hard to be sure, but one really significant thing also happened in April: the iPad was released.

Yeah, the iPad, the mega-selling, wonder-eBook platform of the age.  The horse that major publishers decided to saddle-up in their effort to corral Amazon's Kindle.  The device with the color, the flash, and the technology (oh, sorry, but not the Flash) to take us roaring into the eBook age.

I've been warning since it was just a rumor that the iPad isn't as great an eBook reader as its made out to be, especially for novels and serious prose works.  In short, it's too heavy, battery life is too limited, the screen is difficult or impossible to read in bright light or direct sun, the LCD screen may not be as suited for long-term reading, and it's too large and expensive to drag around in the habitual and casual way you'd want for a reading device.

I've also warned that, even to the extent is is useful as an eBook reader, the wealth of entertainment distractions it offers (and for which is is much better suited) may actually discourage people from reading.

Now we've got another data point supporting my premise.

To be fair, the only evidence that the iPad caused the slump is proximity.  There's no firm connection yet, and other factors could be at work.  But it does make you go, "hmmm."

I should also point out that there could be one other explanation as to how the iPad could have created a slump that will only be temporary.  Anticipation of the iPad's release was so strong that many consumers would might otherwise have bought an Amazon Kindle or other dedicated eBook reader such as the Nook or Sony Reader, may have instead delayed their purchases to get an iPad.  Since Amazon doesn't release Kindle sales figures we have no way of knowing if reader sales were down in April or in the months preceding.

If that's the case, and these consumers have instead bought iPads, and if indeed they do begin using those iPads as book readers, than sales could rapidly surge back and even increase in the months that follow.  (It should also be mentioned that Apple's iPhone 4 has also just been released, with a vastly sharper screen that makes it potentially a much better eBook device than its predecessors).

I'll say what I've said before.  The real test of the iPad's influence on the eBook market will only come over the long-term.  Will iPad owners adapt to reading on their new devices, or will they use it for other functions and consciously or unconsciously cast its eBook functions aside?  And if the iPad doesn't entice people to read eBooks, will they continue to go to dedicated readers like the Kindle for that function, continue to read dead-tree books, or reduce their reading overall.

It's this last possibility that's most worrisome, though I consider less likely than the others.  It's going to be interesting to see what happens to eBook sales numbers in the coming months.

Although here's one more fact to consider: we're heading into Summer, the time of the "beach read," and this is the area where the iPad really falls down as an eBook reader.  That James Patterson book is going to be a complete wash-out as you sit there in the sun on your beach-towel.  But on the other hand, so are any of the other reading distractions that the iPad can offer up.

Maybe a lot of iPad owners are going to sitting in their deck chairs this summer, iPads stowed away in their beach-bags, reading good, old-fashioned, dead-tree books like always.  And that that would suit a lot of traditional publishers just fine.

Find this post useful or informative?  Your donation, large or small will encourage us to do more like it.  Click the button below.  Thanks!

Twitter 101 for Writers, Part 1

Steve:

Probably you've heard that for a writer to succeed these days, it's necessary to actively promote yourself on-line.  You've heard (and I'm pretty sure that, at least in some cases, this is true) that publishers will check a writers on-line presence -- their web page, number of Facebook friends and Twitter followers -- before taking on a new project.

It can be an overwhelming prospect, and it's far too big a subject for one blog post, but I'm going to try today to help you with one small part of it: establishing a presence on Twitter.

Why did I pick Twitter?  Well, of all the on-line options of potential PR value, I think it has the steepest learning curve.

Facebook is very easy to get into.  Yes, it gets complicated later, dealing with all the privacy options, filtering out all the noise, and navigating the ever changing user interface.  But in the beginning, it's a snap, part of why it's so popular.

Blogs or web pages?  These can both be complicated, but for getting started, there are a number of instant ways to set yourself up with a pre-fab blog or web page.  Anybody can get on-line in about five minutes, and most of that is just filling in your account information into forms.

Twitter is even easier to sign up for.  All you need is a name and an email address.  The process is very quick.    But when you're through, you find yourself looking at a bare bones page with not much on it.  Lots of stuff about messages and following people, but you have no messages, nobody to follow, and not much guidance as to what to do next.  (By the way, if you haven't signed up for a Twitter account yet, DON'T DO IT NOW!  I'll have some tips later you'll want to read before taking that step.)

Twitter can be confusing and overwhelming for new users.  Things seem poorly organized.  There are no easy menus or commands to help you along.  The messages are full of strange shorthand, and the users have strange customs among themselves.  Even if you do figure out how to follow others and find the messages, it can quickly bury you in information.  It's like trying to drink from a fire-hose.  So many message, so fast!  How to pull any meaning out of the noise?

But in my opinion, Twitter is worth the trouble.  It's much more a "broadcast" medium than Facebook, one that lets you potentially reach a lot of people you'd never talk to otherwise.  It's instant, immediate, and feels personal in a way that Facebook or a blog or web page don't.  It's potentially the best single promotional tool a writer can have.

Okay, let me say here that I don't claim to be a Twitter expert.  I've only been using it about a year.  As of this writing, I have just over 700 Twitter followers (and thanks to following my advice, my cat has about 400 followers!).  This is a fair number, but it doesn't make me a major Twitter personality by a long shot.

There are major Twitter marketing gurus everywhere (you can't avoid them, one drawback of Twitter) who will claim to get you 65-zillion followers instantly, and they might be right.  There are all sorts of fancy marketing programs and tools to help you get followers.  But near as I can tell, mainly what they do is funnel money to their creators and assist you in becoming annoying on a really massive scale.

What I'm talking about is a process of going for quality over quantity, of having followers (and following people) where you have some actual commonality and hope of a connection.  I'm talking about engaging people rather than impaling them on a meat-hook.

Okay, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here.  I'll start by assuming you know little or nothing about Twitter beyond the name.  First question, what is it?

AN INTRODUCTION TO TWITTER

Like Facebook, Twitter is a social networking service.  It's a way of connecting with and communicating with other people.  Potentially a lot of other people, though that doesn't seem to have been the original intent.

The thing to know about Twitter is that, unlike Facebook, it's very simple and bare-bones (though Twitter has been adding new layers of sophistication lately, it's still pretty Spartan).  The original idea, far as I can tell, was that it was intended intially for use by people texting on their cell phones.  That's the reason for one of the signature features/limitations of Twitter, the 140 character message limit.  140 characters is the length of a cell-phone text message.

Lots of people still use Twitter from their phones, but you don't have to use a phone all the time, or at all.  I don't text and don't own a smart-phone yet, so I've never used Twitter from a phone, only from computers (and occasionally from my Amazon Kindle, but that's another story).  I'm eager to add phone access to my twitter tools, but it just hasn't happened yet.

Okay, so you sign up for a Twitter account.  This gives you an empty Twitter page on the web, and a Twitter name.  If you go to someone's Twitter page on the web you'll see a little basic information about them if they've entered it (known as a "profile"), some statistics about their usage, and a list of their recent messages, known as "tweets."  Not "twits."  Not "posts."  "Tweets."  Sounds silly at first, but you'll get used to it.

TWITTER NAMES


A Twitter name or handle is the way by which you and your Tweets will be identified on Twitter.  As so, it's important.  As a writer, it's double-important, as it's also how people have to associate your Twitter presence back to your writing.  That can be trickier than it seems.  We'll go into that in a bit.

Basic fact here, when used in a message, Twitter names normally have an "@" in front of them.  The "@" serves many functions on Twitter, but most commonly it means "at" or "attention," often both at once.  Example:  My Twitter handle is "JStevenYork", but you'd normally you'd type that as "@JStevenYork".

Examples:

Just talked to @JStevenYork about some novel projects he has in the works.

In this example, the use tells people who you're talking about, that they're on Twitter, and that people can check them out or follow them using that handle, all without interrupting the message itself.

@JStevenYork Great talking with you about those novel projects.


Putting the name at the beginning this way says "Attention Steve, message follows!"  Be sure you're aware.  This isn't private email.  Anyone can read!  It's just to draw my attention to the message to be sure I'll see it.  It's more like a conversation at a cocktail party than an email.

Thanks for the comments! @JStevenYork @BadAgentSydney @SinkTrap


A lot of thanking and acknowledgments go on on Twitter.  More on that later.  But know that it's frequent to see lists like this.  Given the limited space in Tweets, it's customary do leave out the separating comma.  Every space counts!

PICKING A TWITTER NAME (AND AN INTRODUCTION TO RETWEETS)

The obvious thing is just to use your name or byline.  That's what I do.  But there are plenty of reasons not to do that, especially if your name is longer.  Why is the length significant?  After all, it doesn't come out of your 140 characters.

No, but it comes out of everyone else's 140 characters, and for PR purposes, you want your Twitter handle repeated as often and in as favorable a context as possible.  You want to not only be a person who talks, but one who is repeated and talked about.

Which brings us to another important (yet unofficial) convention of Twitter, the "Retweet."  Retweeting is simply repeating some else's Tweet, with attribution to the source, the source being the original sender as identified by their Twitter handle.  Example:

RT @JStevenYork I'm thinking it's time for a vigorous unmanned Moon program!

or with a comment added:

Good idea! RT @JStevenYork I'm thinking it's time for a vigorous unmanned Moon program!

As you can see, my 12 character handle comes out of the 140 characters anybody else has to Retweet my post and add (hopefully positive) comments.  If my initial post is longer than 127 characters (140 less my handle plus a space), then they're going to have to edit or truncate it to fit it into a Retweet, and they won't have ANY room for comment.

My handle is already fairly long, but what if I wrote under the name Alexander Colorado Okefenokee the III?

@AlexanderColoradoOkefenokeetheIII  drops a potential Retweeter down to 105 characters before they've even started.  That's definitely time to look for a shorter name.  @Okefenokee would be better and still recognizable.  But as are many, if not most, one-word or common-name handles, it's taken.  You could go more descriptive, @OkefenokeeWrites, but that's getting long again, or creative like @AOkieWriter (fictional TV mystery novelist Richard Castle posts on Twitter as @WriteRCastle).  You if you write series books or characters, you might also mine that for potential recognizable Twitter names.

In fact, you may well want more than one Twitter name.  For example, you might want one for yourself, one for each book series, or series character.  You might also want an account for your public writer persona, and a "secret identity" just to chat casually and anonymously with your close friends and family.  Be aware that you'll need a unique email address for each account, but with Hotmail, Gmail, and the many free and pay places you can get an email address, this isn't hard.

So, the three main things you want in a Twitter name:

1. Short, distinctive, and recognizable

2. If possible associates with your writing name and/or your work.

3. Disassociates you from well-known individuals with similar names, or from unintended meanings (so if you have an open pseudonym writing "as Sam Holeman," your Twitter handle should not be @assholeman).

Since we're talking about associating your Twitter activity with your work, let's talk about your Profile.

CUSTOMIZE YOUR PROFILE

Your profile is the mini-biography and picture that appear on your Twitter page.  When one of your Tweets (or Retweets) catches someones attention, or if you follow someone and they're looking to see if you're worth following back, this is what they'll see.  IT IS VERY IMPORTANT!


First thing is, put a picture up there, and any picture is probably better than none.  If you don't put a picture, the little default icon brands you as a newbie.  At best you'll get ignored, at worst you'll get targeted by scammers and abusers.  So get SOMETHING up there quick.

Probably what you want is a head or face shot of you, with as much background cropped out as possible.  Most of the time, people will be looking at a tiny icon version of the picture, so a full-length shot, a head-and-body portrait, or a picture with a lot of extraneous stuff around the edges isn't going be recognizable.  Don't upload a postage-stamp sized picture.  Twitter will shrink it down to an icon for you.  And don't upload a 12 mega-pixel shot straight from your new camera.  Go for something mid-sized, 600-800 pixels high is good.  The reason for the larger picture is that visitors to your Twitter page have the option of seeing the full-sized picture.  Let them get a good look at you (or, as we'll see, your book).

Yes, many writers also use a book cover or a cropped version of their cover art (often featuring a lead character) as a profile picture.  Nothing wrong with that, though it can cause some people to confuse the writer with the character they write about, which can be scary at times.

Some people use professionally done cartoons or caricatures of themselves.  Again, that's okay if they're well done and recognizable.

I've heard it said that you should change your profile picture often, and I don't think that's a bad idea, but I find it jarring if the new picture isn't recognizable as the same person as the last picture.  That little picture is your FACE on Twitter.  Putting on a new mask every 15 minutes is at best off-putting, and at worst, it causes people who like you to lose you in the noise.

You also get 160 (Why not 140?  I don't know.) characters for a brief profile.  Try to sound interesting.  Be sure to tell people that you write, that you're published (assuming you are), and what kind of things you write (genre, target-age, etc.).  You don't need to include a web address, as Twitter has a separate entry for that.

Be sure to enter a web address!  If you don't have a blog or web page, get one and at least put your basic information and publication history there.  Putting a web address on the profile page creates a clickable link on your Twitter page.  Anyone who clicks that link should IMMEDIATELY see that you are a writer, what you write, and easily be able to find what you've published and where to buy it.  Don't hide this information (or links to some) down the page. This is your primary sales tool once you've got people interested in your Tweets!  Don't waste it!


FOLLOWERS

You won't see anybody else's messages unless you do one of two things: visit their Twitter page, or "follow" them.  A "follow" is like a subscription.  Once you follow them, everything that person posts will show up in your twitter-stream.

And nobody will see your posts unless they visit your Twitter page or choose to follow you.  That's part of what makes Twitter intimidating to get into.  You start out cold and lonely.  The fun comes later.

Don't worry about getting followers yet.  Worry about finding good people to follow.  Where to start?  Well, start by seeing if you have friends and associates on Twitter.  Go to your Twitter page, use the search function, and start entering names.  But if you find someone, don't follow immediately, especially if the name isn't an unusual one.  There are so many people on Twitter than all the vaguely common names are duplicated many times.

I you think a search result may be a friend, go to their Twitter page.  Check their picture, bio, recent posts, and web-page link if any to be sure it's really your friend.  Then follow them.

Once you've followed some friends, presumably they'll follow you back, and you're up and running.  That's step one.

Step two is to follow some strangers, or at least casual acquaintances and associates.  As a writer, start with other writers doing work similar to yours or working in your genre.  Also look for editors, publishers, magazines and if you want, agents, working in your area too.

Follow them, and maybe they'll follow you back.  Don't read to much into it if they do.  Some people routinely  follow anyone who follows them.  It doesn't necessarily mean you're BFF's, or even that they'll ever read your posts.  Be nice if they contact you, and don't act like a creepy stalker.

But okay, here's the secret force-multiplier.  When you follow these folks, go to their Twitter page, look over on the right for the number of people following them, and click on the "followers" under it.  This will give a list of the people that they follow.  Since you already share some interests and commonality, some of the people they follow are certainly people you'll want to follow as well.

How to identify?  Jump on over to their Twitter page.  Check their bio and web page link.  Check their recent posts and see if they're talking enough business (or at least about some random thing you're interested in) to be worth the follow.

Once you've added a number of new followers, it's time to check their follow lists, and leapfrog yourself across the wonderful work of connections that is Twitter.

How many people to follow for starters?  Don't get carried away.  No more than 50-100 people to start.  Then get your virtual sea-legs before adding more than a few more.

Time to go back to your own Twitter page.  There it is, a scrolling list of every post by everyone you've followed!  Congratulations!  You've opened the fire hose!

Overwhelmed?  Too much to read?  Too much to process?  Don't worry, this post has gone on too long, but we're not through yet.

NEXT TIME:

Next post we'll show you how to find software that will help sort, organize, and filter the flow of message on Twitter, and how to use Twitter's own features to do more of the same.

We'll teach you the basic conventions of Twitter society, and how to use them to get followers and develop connections with your followers.

We'll also tell you how to deal with the people who follow you.  Should you follow them back?  Should you not?  When should you block them from access to your account completely?  We'll warn you about some of the bad-apples on Twitter that you should watch out for and avoid (or at least not encourage).

Finally, we'll deal with the thing that seems to most vex many of my writer friends on Twitter: posting.  What to post?  How to deal with "I don't have anything to say" syndrome.  When to post.  When not to post.  How to promote your work without driving followers away.  And why you should post, even if you don't feel like talking, and even if you aren't sure if anyone is listening.  We'll even show you how you can use your posts to pick up a little honest spare-change.

See you back here soon in part 2...

Writer's Horoscope #5 - It's Written in the Stars!

Steve:
Welcome back for another installment of Writer's Horoscope  When reading this feature, it's important to remember that as writers, we're all professionals at making sh*t up. But this is REAL. It must be true! You read it on the interwebs!

If, however, you don't find that your entry in this horoscope seems to apply to you, it's entirely possible that your parents lied to you about your birth-date. (They may also be aliens. Or robots. Or robot aliens. Just remember next time you visit home, it wasn't our idea to cut them open and see what's inside!) Try another sign and see if it makes more sense to you. If it still doesn't seem to apply, keep in mind that they may not only have fudged the date, but the year, and possibly our earlier installments will fit you better. Find them here and here and here, and here.

Note that we've adopted the new world universal writer's astrological symbols in place of the ones you may be more familiar with.

Arial (March 21 - April 19) - Your word count is down and you're disappointed in your output.  We all have our bad days, but there's no one-size-fits-all solution.  The question to ask yourself is, where does your energy come from?  Take the time now to figure out where that place is, then go there and recharge your batteries.  It's worth doing now, even if it costs you a little time, because next time you'll know to go there immediately.

Thesaurus (April 20 - May 20) - Feeling the networking blues?  You're better connected than you imagine.  Don't dismiss the value of casual acquaintances, of people you wouldn't think of as having publishing connections, and remember that friends of friends can be of value as well.  The key to finding these less-obvious connections is communication.  Talk candidly with your friends and associates about your work, interests, and goals.  They can't help you if they don't know what you need.

Galley (May 21 - June 20) - Publishing is changing too fast for you to fall comfortably back into your preconceived notions.  Assume nothing.  Keep your eyes and your mind open to changes and new developments.  Caution and forethought will be rewarded.

Copyright (June 21 - July 22) - You'll profit from a positive environment and that positivity starts close to home. If you're spreading negativity and ill-will you're poisoning the water you swim in.  Cast off the gloom and doom, break out the optimism, and give your positive support to those around you.  In time, it will return ten-fold.

Litho (July 23 - August 22) - If you're excited about a project, don't put it off.  If you write it down, the idea may still be there when you get back to it, but the energy may well be gone.  Ultimately, the energy may be more important than the idea.

Verso (Aug 23 - September 22) - Stop staring out the window.  That daydreaming is killing your productivity.  Pull the drapes and get back to work.  You can open them again when the job is done and the urge has passed.

Library (September 23 - Oct 22) - You're having doubts that your flavor of work fits in out there.  Relax.  Publishing is a big machine that needs parts it doesn't even know exist yet.  Your job is to keep doing what you do, and keep looking for the unfound empty spot where it goes.

Slush (Oct 23 - November 21) - Don't spend too much time obsessing about your mistakes, missed opportunities, and fumbles.  Nobody is perfect, and the best and most successful writer you can think of certainly has made their share of screw-ups.  Learn what you can from those mistakes, resolve not to make the same ones again, and move on.

Sans sarif (Nov 22 - Dec 21) - Perhaps you've heard of a new opportunity, a new book line, or an editor looking for the sort of writing that you like to do, and decided that it's way out of your league.  You might be wrong about that.  The only way to find out is to try.  You've nothing to lose, and something wonderful might just happen.

Caption (December 22 - January 19) - The only certain thing about publishing is uncertainty.  In times of plenty, it's tempting to think that things will go on that way forever.  Rarely is that true.  Plan accordingly.  Minimize your expenses, chose your luxuries carefully, and always, always, keep something in reserve.  Security is the best form of living well.

Apostrophe (January 20 - February 18) - They say you are what you eat, but it's more than that.  You're also the sum of your environment.  Maybe its time to live some of the trappings of what's in your head.  Change out how you dress, the music you listen to, the lighting in your office, anything to shore up the story developing in your head.

Pica (February 19 - March 20) - Be careful putting your heart into a project that isn't your own.  That project could break your heart, and you'll have nothing to show for it.  There are things worth risking heart and soul on, but they're the things that are yours to keep.  Use caution.  Choose wisely.

If this is your birth month: Writer's organizations can provide education, networking, and support.  But they can also be quagmires of politics, battling egos, and dueling time-sinks.  Maybe you've been thinking about becoming a joiner.  If you think the benefits are there, go for it, but beware the pitfalls, and keep your bearings.  It's too easy to slide into the traps gradually without knowing it.  If you see yourself slipping, get out, and give yourself some time and distance.  Don't worry that you're missing anything.  Time spent writing is never wasted...

Did you find this article useful? Your donation, big or small, will encourage us to do more like it. Every little bit helps and is appreciated. Thanks in advance: Chris and Steve.

Do iPad Buyers Read? There's Reason to Doubt

Steve:


The publishing industry has been looking to the iPad as some kind of savior to them in the eBook Wars.  I think that's a pretty dubious proposition for a lot of reasons, starting with Apple's poor track record of being a friend to anyone but Apple.  (Just look at what's happening to Adobe right now, and a huge part of the Mac's success, even its survival, can be attributed to Adobe products.)

But now there's reason to think otherwise, at least for that part of the industry that would just like to see eBooks go away, or at least, stop their rapid growth.  Many predicted that the iPad would immediately steal the eBook market from Amazon's Kindle and everyone else as well, and embracing the agency model of purchasing books, head off Amazon's $9.99-and-lower price-points.

But though the iPad is so far a success, outselling the iPhone in its early days, it's far too early for publishing to count their chickens.  Because, and I have to keep reminding people of this, the publishing industry is not in the business of selling iPads.  It's in the business of selling books, in whatever form, electronic or print.  And early numbers suggest the iPad isn't selling that many ebooks.  In fact, you could make the case that it's actually hurting ebook sales, and in a more speculative way, hurting print book sales as well.

Let's look at some of the numbers that have hit the press in the last few weeks.  First of all, we're told that iPads sold about a million units in its first month.  That's quite a few iPads, and since there's been no end of discussion about what a snazzy ebook reader the iPad, that should translate into a lot of ebook sales, right?

Well, not really.  About the same time we were told that the iPad app store had sold 1.5 million ebooks.  That sounds like a lot, but any idiot can do the math.  In that month, that exciting month, when a million people were trying out their new iPads, finding out what it can do, and showing those things off to their friends, the average iPad owner purchased 1.5 books.  Not so good.  Worse, this number apparently includes free books!  What owner who ever intended to ever use their iPad as an ebook wouldn't download at least a couple free books just to trying?

Even if every iPad owner downloaded at least one book, it means that no more than half of them ordered a second one.  If you assume that many avid readers ordered at least three or four or five or more books, and it you assume that the people that bothered to order a book at all probably ordered at least two or three then it starts to look like a lot of iPad readers may have little or no interest in using their iPads as ebooks at all.  Ever.

 Let's look at another set of numbers that just came out, a survey of iPad owners on the subject of market cannibalization.  (You can read the details at AppleInsider.)  According to the survey, 28% see the iPad as an eBook reader replacement.  More view it as a replacement for a netbook or an iPod Touch.

But let's assume that the 28% are the kind of serious readers who have apparently been buying the Kindle and Nook, the kind of people who order lots of books.  If we assume that only that 28% (let's call it a third, just for ease of math, and on the assumption that a few others were buying books as well) bought books on their iPad, then suddenly we're up to 4.5 books per iPad user that actually uses their iPad as an ebook.  Given my unscientific observation of myself and other Kindle owners, that doesn't seem hugely far off the mark.

But come on, don't you think a larger percentage than that at least tried the ebook function, at least with a free book?  So the numbers are probably lower.  It's all guesswork, but it could mean the average serious ebook customer who bought an iPad on average bought only 3 or so books.  Maybe less.  And some unknown number of those were freebies that didn't generate revenue for anyone (except Apple).

Why should that be happening?  Well, it could be that, despite the mostly glowing reviews, the iPad simply isn't that great a reading experience.  Remember that the problems don't have to be glaring or obvious.  They just have to cause people, consciously or not, to choose not to read (and therefore to buy more books).  It could be that the iPad is too heavy, that its LCD screen is causing eye-strain or (as some researchers have warned) insomnia, that the screen is washing out in the sunny locations where people want to read, or that its too large to haul around conveniently, or even that those animated page turns and 3D shadows are getting on people's nerves after the novelty wears off.

Honestly though, if those things are a factor, I'd expect them to shake out over more time.  You'd see them in the first quarter's numbers, maybe, but not so much the first month.

It's far more likely that iPad owners, even those who purchased it with the idea it would be used as an ebook,  are just distracted by all the other wonderful, flashy, animated, loud, cool, interactive things that it can do.  Publishing, already suffering (especially among male readers, as shown in this essay by Tom Dupree) from competition by our plugged-in modern lifestyles, has just signed-on with a big-ol'-slab-O-distractions.

So, what do we have?  The average iPad owner possibly isn't much interested in using their iPad as a book.  Even among those that do, they're getting distracted and not buying a lot of books.  Meanwhile, the iPad apparently has convinced somewhere between a quarter and a third of a million people not to buy a relatively-distraction-free Kindle or Nook or Sony Reader instead.  So they may have hurt ebook sales overall in a number of ways.  And you can bet, if those new iPad owners are too distracted to read books on their iPad, then for sure they're too distracted to put down the iPad and pick up one of those old-fashioned hardcovers that the publishers are so hot on moving.  So it's fail, and fail for the publishers.

Of course, there's a way that all my assumptions could be totally full of fluff.  That 1.5 million books apparently only includes books sold though the iPad app store.  It presumably doesn't include books sold through third-party eBook reader apps.  

And though the app-store may be the easiest and most obvious way to get books on your iPad, it isn't the only way.  There are lots of ways.  But the way people are most likely to go for, the way whose numbers I'm betting will dwarf all others, is the Amazon app for iPad.

Uh-oh.  Weren't we supposed to be freezing those people out?

And if most of the ebook sales for the iPad are going to Amazon anyway, the publishing industry has accomplished what exactly?  They've (probably temporarily) broken Amazon's $9.99 price point for new-releases and top-sellers (though it looks like a lot of those will end up being $9.99 in the iPad store anyway).  They've also alienated a lot of Kindle owners through those price increases and unavailability of books, and lost a lot of ebook sales as well.  (Penguin, who has published the great majority of the novels written by my wife and I, has yet to come to an agency agreement with Amazon, and all of their new titles remain unavailable on the Kindle.)  I'm not sure how any of this is greatly going to benefit the industry.

In any case, these numbers will change over the long haul, and that's what really counts.  Not how many iPads sell, or even how many sell to people who intend to use it (at least in part) as an ebook reader.  What counts for publishing is how many ebooks will iPad owners buy?  And not just today, or this month, but over the long haul.  Check back in six months or a year and we'll see where things stand.

Maybe it will turn out that early adopters read less.  Maybe seasoned users will get bored with the novelty of all that noise and color and finally settle down to read a book.  Maybe those low sales averages will improve.

Or maybe iPad users won't like reading on the iPad as much as they expected.  If so, they'll quietly vote with their credit cards, and they may not even realize why.  And if so, the biggest losers could be those of us who write, edit, and are in the business of selling, books.

If you found this post interesting or informative, a small (or huge, we're not picky!) 

donation will encourage us to do more like it!

Things Writers Need to Know

Steve:


Life of a Writer Department

One of the things that non-writers (and sometimes beginning writers as well) don't understand about writers is the sheer volume and randomness of things you need to know about.  I'm not talking about storytelling tricks here, or rules of grammar, or the etiquette of the publishing industry.  I'm talking about real-life things, the sort of things that will come up in your story, or that your characters will encounter in the course of a novel.

These are the sort of things you take for granted.

Some of these things can be pretty esoteric.  You may need to know what the view from the pilot seat of a US Marine hovercraft looks like,  what equipment an Oregon smoke-jumper might strap on before leaping out of a plane, or the shift pattern for an exotic Italian super-car, or what it's like to walk into the delegate's entrance at the United Nations, or six ways a martial-artist might respond when attacked with a folding chair.

Some of them are far more mundane.  I can recall multiple occasions (to the point where it's almost become a party game) when male and female writers sit around and compare notes about how people of their gender behave in public restrooms.  This is a far more complex and fascinating subject than you might imagine, and subject to endless variation.  For instance, how people behave in the bathroom of a posh night-club or a gay-bar might differ considerably from how they behave in the trucker's bathroom at a truck-stop or a subway station in a former Soviet-bloc country.  It's armchair sociology at its most entertaining, and of the sort that only writers would feel comfortable discussing in a public place.

Yes, these bits of information may seem trivial, but sure as you get even the smallest detail wrong, some reader out there is going to notice and get kicked out of the story.  Worse, they're going to let you know about it.  So you research odd stuff in the course of writing, and you keep your eyes open for useful bits you can weave into a story to increase the authenticity.  One of the tricks of writing is that if you get a few obscure things right, and the reader notices, they're much more willing to trust you on the details they're less certain about, sometimes to the point of believing what you've written even when it conflicts with their own experience or knowledge.

After a while of doing this thing, your brain become attuned to esoteric information that be useful in writing some day.  When you stumble upon them in your research, or in your day-to-day activities, they stick out like a shiny pebble on the beach.  You can't look away, and sometimes you just can't resist bending over to pick them up.

Here's the random example of this that prompted today's post.  I was looking at something entirely unrelated on YouTube (a romance book trailer I think) when something on the suggested video bar catches my eye.  I glance it it, think, "hmmm, that could be interesting, but probably not useful" then look away.

Then I look back.  When will I ever see something like this again?  What if I need it some day.  Will I be able to find it, or something like it?  But I can't imagine when I'd ever need it.  Look away.

But if there's very small odds that I'll ever need, it, there's a much greater chance that somebody I know is going to need it.  I know lots of people writing romance, fantasy, historicals.  Surely one of them will find it useful.  I should look just to see if it's informative enough to pass along...

What am I talking about?  A tutorial video (aimed at brides, or maybe wedding planners) on the mechanics of wearing a hoop-skirt.  Not the sort of thing guys are supposed to be interested in, but hey, I'm a writer...


So I click on it.  And I'm a little embarrassed, but then the introduction tells some of the issues that will be covered, and there, they have me.  How to deal with the hoop skirt in -- the bathroom!  It must be shared!  Trouble is, how?

My first instinct is to post it to Twitter, but that will never work.  Not everyone (or even most people) reading it will be fellow-writers who will understand.  How do you post this thing without looking like you're either insane or some kind of perv?  It needs context...  Thus this post.

So here, fellow writers, horrified non-writers, and the idle-curious, is Hoopskirt 101.  After all this, I hope to hell that somebody finds it useful!




If you found this site useful or informative, your donations and feedback encourage us to keep posting.  Click the button below to make a donation.  We appreciate it!

Decent Proposal

Steve:

Writers, if you haven't seen this yet:

Over on Chris' Christy Evans site, guest-blogger Jenn Mc Kinlay has posted in its (almost, spoiler-free!) entirety a proposal that sold a three-book deal for a new cozy mystery series, and did so in only five days! 

If you'd like to see the kind of proposal that actually sells books, this is an opportunity not to be missed.  Go read it HERE.