Commonplace Cartography » Commonplace Book

2009, Wa[i]ved

Mike — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 22:06:11 +0000

Publishing’s suicide

Mike — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 17:27:46 +0000

Jesse Kornbluth from PW:

Book publishing has been trying to commit suicide for all the decades I’ve been writing, and now it’s finally getting some traction on that project. Its latest folly is ironic: one of our most antitechnology businesses now places unrealistic hopes on technology as a savior, a textbook case of an American industry’s unwillingness to make significant changes until one minute before doomsday. I don’t expect more from publishing than stabs of experimentation until business gets much, much worse.

via publishersweekly.com

Yay for impartiality in book reviewing!

Mike — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 16:51:42 +0000

Now where’s my free gift?

(cross-posted via Posterous)

I just wonder…

Mike — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 21:35:29 +0000

A. O. Scott, writing in the NYT:

“And just as the iPod has killed the album, so the Kindle might, in time, spur a revival of the short story. If you can buy a single song for a dollar, why wouldn’t you spend that much on a handy, compact package of character, incident and linguistic invention? Why wouldn’t you collect dozens, or hundreds, into a personal anthology, a playlist of humor, pathos, mystery and surprise?”

Vigorous, versatile, zestful

Mike — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 15:06:21 +0000

Alfred Bester:

Deliver science fiction from any necessity to have purpose and value. Science fiction is far above the utilitarian yardsticks of the technical minds, the agency minds, the teaching minds. Science fiction is not for Squares. It’s for the modern Renaissance Man…vigorous, versatile, zestful…full of romantic curiosity and impractical speculation.

(Via)

Driving readers away with advertising

Mike — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 14:53:56 +0000

A Working Library – On advertising:

So, let’s stop pretending, shall we? Any economy which charges ever less for ever more intrusive ads will eventually be successful not in creating wealth but in driving the readers away, until the only ones left to heed the ads are all the other ads, the cell phones searching in vain for a target market among the cellulite.

Sigh.

“Praise song for the day”

Mike — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:55:57 +0000

I couldn’t agree more with my old friend Valerie. I loved the inaugural poem.

Valerie’s Blog » Blog Archive » elizabeth alexander gratitude.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made, any sentence begun.

A Cultural Renaissance

Mike — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 18:55:14 +0000

The Undercurrent of a Cultural Renaissance:

The Web is sparking a cultural renaissance that is globally surging with free thought and insight. And, it’s changing how we think about life, how we go through life, and how we share experiences and stories…We’re going to see a fundamental shift in everything – especially our priorities.

(via Jesse Newhart)