Experience 1
Arlington Starbucks. Friday night, August 5. Two women. Jeff eavesdropping. Topic – writing, copyright and the world or publishing.

The conversation went something like this – and I missed a little because I was loudly slurping my Trenta iced tea lemonade to keep from figuratively slapping both women with real information.

W1 – I want to send my article off to a magazine, but I’m worried they might steal it.

W2 – Then use the poor person’s copyright and send a copy to yourself.

W1 – That’s a great idea. I’ll do that!

JEFF (in his head) – Go ahead and do that, but you’re only wasting $.44 and paper and the environment. If you were not aware – and you’re not – any creative work, once put in a fixed format (like these electrons on this blog post or a sentence on a piece of paper) is immediately copyrighted. You own it. Done. Finished. No need to send money to the US Copyright Office unless you have serious concerns that you will make a fortune off the article or that someone else will deprive you of massive payments by stealing it. FYI – the BEST paying magazines dish out $2 per word to the BEST writers in the world. Unless you’ve written a 10,000-word article for one of these magazines, you’re likely closer to being out $.30 or less a word for your 2000-word article. That is about $600 and would put you in the fairly well paid writer realm. Freelance newspaper scribes get about $30 to $50 per story for weeklies and $150 per story for features in a daily. If you put barriers in the process, an editor is going with someone else. Just send the story in and hope they call you.

The Lessons – Publishing professionals are busy. Writing doesn’t pay well. Copyright is misunderstood.

Experience 2
Boston Media Makers. Sunday August 7. Doyle’s in Jamaica Plain. John Cass and Jeff Cutler talking. Topic – what is going on with publishers these days…we have great ideas and would like acquisitions editors to take note.

The conversation went something like this…

John – I didn’t know you wrote a book. How many is that for you?

Jeff – It’s my first published, but I’ve written others. I just haven’t worked hard enough to get editors or publishers to take note of my other stuff.

John – What have you done? Do you have names? We know a bunch of people who have written books in Social Media. Have you asked them?

Jeff – I have. I’ve emailed folks and hear nothing back. It’s a buyer’s market. Everyone wants to have a book. And everyone thinks their idea is great – even though mine is genius.

John – I’m sure it is. Maybe if we do some agile marketing and content strategy we can get these publishing folks to take note of our plight and make first contact.

Jeff – That’s a great idea. I’m on it. Let’s both write posts, link to everyone and then sit back and count our riches.

Around that point John made a sign like I was insane and walked away. But he was kind enough to write the post we agreed on. Here’s his link and below is an excerpt.

I’d like to use this post, and Jeff is going to write one on his blog on the same topic, to query social media authors about their recommendations for book publishers. Quotes can be anonymous or credited. Tell me what you found to be positive about your publisher, and please give insights on the three areas I’ve discussed above; 1) advance, 2) support, and 3) marketing.

So, how ’bout it Wiley or Inc. or whoever is helping with David Meerman Scott’s next book…do you want my proposal? I’ve got the book fleshed out and can finish it by Thanksgiving (maybe by Halloween). It’s applicable to a large audience (about 260Million people), and I’m already doing speaking gigs using information that would appear in the book. Doesn’t that sound like a pretty good, if upside-down, outreach and marketing campaign for the book?

Let’s talk. And by the way, if you have recently written a book and love your agent and/or editor, send their information along. I was serious when I said publishing folks are busy. There’s no guarantee that anyone will have alerts set up on their company name and will take the initiative to reach out to me.

If this works, I’ll use it as a case study in the book AFTER the one I’m currently pitching. How’s that for social?

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Post tags: boston media makers, john cass, publishing, starbucks, wiley

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For about 45 minutes, JC Hutchins and I chatted about writing and science and social media. It was invigorating – especially a few days away from Nanowrimo (National Novel Writing Month which begins on Nov. 1) – to speak with a writer who has done it. And by done it I mean reached a publisher with a novel.

A Life of Play – JC Hutchins

Sure, in social media everyone has an ebook or a business theory book – I’ve been to more signings this year than I went to the entire time I had my own book out in the early 200′s. But writing and getting a novel published is different. That’s the dream

Write your novel. Move to France and write a novel. Maybe I’ll take a sabbatical and write a novel.

These sentiments aren’t actually from me…or originally from me…they’re repeated all the time by anyone who wields a pen or whacks a keyboard. AND JC Hutchins has done it.

In 2002 he tried Nanowrimo and it spurred him to write a 1200 page novel. He then released it in podcast form and kept working toward getting over the threshold of a publisher’s office door. It worked.

Better still, he’s maintained the belief that social media and traditional writing worlds are still dissimilar enough that he can give the book away and still sell copies in book form. So there’s a copy here for you to have.

7th Son – PDF from JC Hutchins

Take it, read it, share it. If you want, go buy it in book form too. Or listen to the podcasts.

This day…a few days removed from Monday…I’ve got my weekly hero. A guy who did what he wanted and had fun at the same time. It’s a good way to live.

Keep reading!

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Post tags: 7th Son, Hutchins, nanowrimo, publishing, writing

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Shut up already.

Hasn’t the proliferation of news online made it clear that we’re moving ever-faster to an environment – if not a world – where our information might remain the same but the delivery mechanism has become more portable?

I think so. And I’m not saying that as a guy with a vested interest in having you devour my words. I’m just as happy to have you read my slogan for Gulf Oil on a billboard as I am to have you snicker at my Worries blog posts.

For those of us with messages to share – or even longer pieces like books and manifestos – we’re just crafting the story or the article, not creating the medium.

Now that my little soapboxing is complete, let me tell you the real reason for this post. A friend of mine asked me about online publishing as a viable option for her mother’s book. I went off on a tangent about trying out Lulu or other services and about how fantastic it was that she was moving forward with her plan.

“STOP,” said my friend.

Her mother had already used an online publisher and my friend was asking about promoting and selling the book. There were already cases in the trunks of all her family members and they were struggling to get recognized by the box stores as a ‘real’ book.

Aha! That’s really the trouble. When you have an idea for a book, if you don’t go through the traditional channels you’re out in the cold. For now.

Doing things yourself isn’t all it’s cracked up to be…in most cases.

It’s different with news, opinion and shorter pieces, but books still maintain a special place in the publishing world and in our consciousness. The battle against the Kindle shows that people still want a book they can leave on an airplane and not freak out about. Once you’ve left two or three Kindles on planes you might start to rethink the device at $400 a pop.

Essentially, I told my friend that she could use some social media tools to spread the word, she could set up a fan page on Facebook and get her mother on LinkedIn to share some expertise about being an author and about her topic matter.

I added that there was no guarantee and that the books might remain unsold. But if you’re doing it alone, the best you can hope for is to get people talking and reading about the book. Then someone in a publishing house might notice. Then you might get a break. Then you might sell some books.

It’s a tough business. But for those who have a story to tell, a message that must be shared, the hurdles are worth it.

What do you think of self-publishing and our slow transition to reading everything online?

Keep reading! Please.

© Jeff Cutler for Jeff Cutler - columns, essays and opinions, 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: books, kindle, Leo Laporte, lulu, publishing, self-publishing

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