Google and Dumbing Down Writing

I dragged myself out of bed Monday morning, after staying up late to watch the healthcare vote in the House, determined to get the first Healthcare Reform article up on Suite 101. It was an unqualified success earning three times more hits in one day––actually in half a day–-than I usually get on all my articles in a month. Of course, the revenue comes from ad clicks not PVs and the Google gods, in their infinite wisdom, filled the page with ads for medical insurance, of course. Bright move, as usual, on the part of our techy friends since this is the dumbest time in the world to buy medical insurance before all the preexisting laws go into effect and four years before you need to pay a penalty for going without coverage. And if any of my readers were in the market for medical insurance, I would be the first person to steer them far, far away from anything they would find through a Google ad.

Google is quickly replacing Wikipedia in my list of Internet irritants, which means I will be mightily irritated all the time as this Goliath practically owns the web. In this case, though, I don't blame Google as much as the writers and bloggers following the star they hope will finally bring fair compensation and assuming, when it doesn't, that it is due to some fault on their part.

I can't tell you how many times I see a post on blogger forums or the forums where writers of pay-per-clicks air their woes, wondering why they aren't making money, let alone a living, from their Adsense and/or Amazon Affiliate ads. I assume someone other than Google is making something from these ads, but I can tell you now, it isn't the general writer.

Now I'm the first one to condemn "writers" looking for get-rich-quick-schemes. These are often the people who have been looking for such schemes in one area or another all their lives. They think they will suddenly start writing on a blog, without ever honing their craft, spewing opinions with little regard to spelling or grammar and watch the ad income roll in. Then there are those who don't even want to do the set-up work but sign up for some site that allows them to write one article a week on whatever topic they choose and expect to make huge sums of money based on minimum effort.

Unfortunately, as I noted in an earlier post, more and more of these sites also attract previously successful freelancers, now torturing their prose into adword phrases in a vain attempt to make what they used to writing quality pieces for the print market. Sometimes they do okay. Many don't, and sometimes they watch writers with half the talent make more because they happen to luck into a topic that attracts good ads and ad clickers. Sadly, for them and for us, rather than focusing their considerable talents on what they used to do best––in depth research and clear presentation of valued subjects––they attempt to improve their adword skills instead, having been convinced that if they aren't one of the site's big earners, they––not the site or Google's lousy marketing strategists––are doing something wrong.

Coming out of the creative sector where $10 feels like a windfall, making $25 or $30 a quarter writing on topics I enjoy is enough for me. Consequently, I continue to work on my writing skills, trying to present complicated matters of politics or history in clear and easily understood terms. I'm willing to focus on SEO (as opposed to adwords), because, while I don't condone high school students automatically trusting the article with top billing, I also know that is what they do. So they may as well read something carefully written and with a list of further resources for them to check out. However, I have no interest in playing the adword game. Then again, I don't have to. My living comes from the business I help my husband run.

It started with Microsoft convincing us that when our PCs froze up due to nasty viruses, it was our fault, not theirs. Since then we've continued to allow the techies to convince us they always know best. For those who do depend on the income, it's not only exploitative to foster dreams of high incomes they will probably never achieve, but it encourages good writers to write about empty subjects with empty words in order to make money. Further adding to the dumbing down of our culture.

Rant over. I promise to find something more uplifting to write about next time.

Penguin Casts Its Lot with iPad

Here's a demo of what Penguin is planning to make available on Apple's iPad. Guess it answers my question, "Are we forgetting the little ones?"



FULL ARTICLE AVAILABLE HERE

It's an Islate, It's an iReader: No, It's iPad with an e-Reader Built

So, it's finally here. And it starts at only $499. Pretty clever of Apple to let the prediction add up to $1000. So now this looks ve-e-ery good. I'm not one of those has-to-have-every-new-tech-toy types. I didn't get an iPod until everyone had one. I really have no desire for an iPhone. Why do I need a cell phone that acts like a laptop when I barely use the cell phone I have––honestly. I don't give out the number because I don't want people calling me at the supermarket or in the fitting room at Boscov's. But I've been seriously thinking about this e-reader thing since I gave up my print newspaper subscriptions.

While it isn't all that big a deal taking my laptop down to the kitchen every morning so I can read the paper over breakfast, it isn't the most convenient thing in the world. I saw a friend's Kindle, and it was ok. Only I couldn't see the point in spending that much money for something that only does one job, even if it is easier to read in bed than my Mac. This baby does it all. Not just is it a reader, but it looks like the perfect mini-laptop for travel.

I can't afford it quite yet, and I never buy anything as soon as it comes out. Let them get the kinks out. I do want to run over to the Apple Store soon and play with it though. Bet there'll be a long line.

E-reading News

Can Apple Save the Written Word?

I thought Google was doing that. Oh wait, I guess they are just preserving it. Anyway more speculation on Apple's new e-reader that doesn't even have a name yet. Yikes, $1000. That's quite a lot of books and magazines and newspapers. Then again, it will be a reader and computer all in one from what I can tell, but I still need the one here on my desk because I don't think I can write on that thing.  Maybe it will be like the iPhone and come down in price immediately. According to the P&W website, Apple's new iWhatever is due to be unveiled tomorrow. Way to upstage the Prez on his first State of the Union. Though something tells me the State of Apple is way better anyway.

Here's another good post on Enhanced e-Books, what publishers will be adding to e-books to make them more tantalizing––and expensive–-to readers. It puts me in mind of when DVDs first came out. Remember the "Easter Eggs"? Those special hidden features? Do they still have those? If they do, does anyone look for them? I think the idea was to wean the public away from VHS. Now that you can't find VHS anymore that's no problem.

It looks like there will be much in store for reading in the very near future when reading may very well be something only the wealthy can afford.

Submission Fees Revisited: Should Journals That Charge Submission Fees Level the Playing Field

In the Poets & Writers; Writers Speakeasy Forum where I enjoy discussing writerly matters with other writers of more or less success (usually more), the topic of submission fees re-emerged. I started the first thread around the time I wrote an earlier post regarding submission fees at Narrative. Since that posting it has become more common for journals that accept online submissions to charge, though it is mostly a minor sum of around $2 rather than the heftier $20 fee Narrative charges.

Submitters who don't mind paying the fee, and often the publications themselves, point out that $2 is about what you could expect to spend on a postal submission, with which I would agree. I don't do postal much anymore, but last time I did, before the most recent rate increase, I spent $1.80 to mail a twenty-page story. Add in the required SASE and it goes over $2.00 not counting paper and envelopes. Fair enough.

Those publications that use online submission systems also point out that the charge helps defray the cost of the system. According to the CLMP website, their submissions manager–-which I believe is the one most publications probably use unless they have an IT whiz on staff––costs a minimum of $330. At $2 a pop it would take only 165 submissions to cover the cost––probably less than half of what most literary publications receive in a month, let alone the top ones. Still, journals have other costs. Top editors at the "best" journals get paid, and since most of the top tier are either exclusively or mainly in print, there are printing and shipping costs. Obviously, subscriptions and individual sales don't meet these costs or they wouldn't be constantly soliciting donations.

Exclusively online journals are much less expensive to run, but there are still costs involved, and there is pretty much no way to make any income off subscriptions or individual sales because, as much as they enjoy the convenience and variety online, most people don't want to pay for something they can't hold in their hands. That's why the majority of exclusively online journals don't pay a penny to staff, though many are trying to pay at least a token amount to writers sometimes through ad fees.

All of which is what has brought us to the point where publications, both print and online, have begun experimenting with submission fees. In some ways it seems odd to charge the producer of the product rather than the consumer but then again, writers have very little overhead. Most business people have to invest some money in getting their product on the market and then, as with writers, must wait to see if anyone buys it. So why not ask writers who, up until now, have had only to invest in paper and pencils and a good laptop (and who doesn't need a laptop these days, writer or no) to invest a mere $2 toward getting their work published?

Putting all that together and knowing from my work with online publications that journals are going to need to be pretty creative when it comes to paying staff and writers, I have no problem with the submission fee system except one. It seems unconscionable to implement such a system while continuing the current selection process that favors known writers and their proteges. Most of whom, I'm guessing, don't pay a penny to submit. Under the current system swarms of individuals with as much chance of getting published as Frosty the Snowman in July, pay their money so writers almost assured of being accepted get paid well. Not only does that not seem fair, it borders on being a scam.

I'm not saying journals should ever accept bad writing, only that journals requiring submissions fees should charge everyone the same and make sure everyone has the same chance of being accepted. This could easily be accomplished through a system of anonymous review with no comments or cover letters.

Up until now the rationale for the current system has been that big names sell. Every editor would love to pluck a new star from the West Virginia coal mines, but alas, their hands are tied by the need for money (shrug, sigh). But if money came from submissions and not subscriptions that rationale goes down the toilet. Certainly more people would submit, and thus profits would increase, if they knew they had an equal chance of acceptance. Maybe the big names and the Iowa graduates would still rise to the top, but at least we'd know they started in the same place as everyone else.

Writing for Suite 101: My Guilty Pleasure

There are always people out there telling you what you should and shouldn't do as a writer. When I first started out new writers were criticized for writing for free. If we all stuck to that model now, most of our work would never see the light of day. Some will tell you never to pay for anything related to submissions, but then you 'd limit yourself to contests that carry little prestige and even less in prizes.

A while back I wrote about my experiences with a pay-per-click site, and how some writers think they are a bad idea. Well, bad or not, I've decided to go back to writing for Suite 101 and I am loving it. No, writing for pay-per-clicks will probably not get me a job with The New York Times or maybe not even with my community newspaper, and despite anomalies like the Suite writer who made almost $5,000 in one month, it probably won't put my daughter through grad school or even pay my grocery bill–-at least not the topics I write about. What it does get me is the opportunity to write on subjects I love but for which I do not have a "platform" as they call it in the business, and the chance to earn a few dollars while I'm at it.

When I delve into a subject, I go deep. While I never advanced beyond a BA in History, my studies imbued me with a need to go well beyond the surface. What started 10 years ago with Mari Sandoz's biography of Crazy Horse has grown into several hundred books on, not just American Indian and US Western History, but an understanding of current issues and the ability to argue some of the finer points of American Indian Law––that's what happens when you cross a wannabe historian with a wannabe lawyer. I've written book reviews for scholarly journals like Montana, the Magazine of Western History (which did feel pretty cool), but with no advanced degree or teaching position at a university, I'm not likely to get much published on that subject. That's why I took up writing on Native American/First Nations History  on Suite a few years ago.

Unfortunately the 10 article per month requirement for a Feature Writer (one who writes for and maintains the topic site) became onerous, especially for a meticulous researcher and fact checker like myself. Plus, even my deep well began to run dry. However, now Suite has something called a Contributing Writer. Not only are the production requirements less but CWs can contribute to any topic, meaning I can also write about writing and publishing–-think I know a wee bit about that––politics, healthcare, running a small business or any other topic on which I have something of value to contribute.

For me, Suite fills several needs:

• My need to write and express myself on various topics.
• My need to learn, because I always learn when I am researching details for an article.
• My need to be read, because otherwise what is the point of writing.

Maybe with more articles up on topics of greater interest, my earnings will increase too, but really the pittance I make is icing on the cake. I know that drives some professional freelancers nuts, and I won't even try to defend it except to say, I love it. I'm hooked, and others can jump up and down and scream until they are blue in the face.

Call it my guilty pleasure.

Watershed by L.Lee Lowe

Check out Watershed  a new short story posted by my blogger friend L.Lee Lowe author of the two serialized YA online novels Corvus and Mortal Ghost.

Kindle Killer Coming to an Apple Store Near You?

Here's an interesting article from The Huffington Post dubbing Apple's soon to be debuted iSlate (name not yet official) as the "Kindle Killer." The author has an interesting point. Why create a reader that is so wedded to print that ends up being not quite as good as a book or a laptop? Instead, the Apple reader will make use of multi-media.

I understand the arguments for the e-ink format: the non-back-lit screen is easy on the eyes, easy on battery life, etc. And since we spend upwards of ten hours a day staring at glaring screens--whether 30" wide or glowing in your pocket-- I can understand the argument for not wanting to read the latest vampire novel off yet another backlit screen. When I desire such a quiet reading experience I pick up the paperback. It is still the best at what it does.

Prol'em is, will the paperback survive and will it be affordable?