(To read Part Two, click here.)
The first person to speak to me post-conference was an intense, tiny woman who fired off a number of equally intense questions, “How does that work for you? Do you put your ebook on your site? People come and download it? How do you collect payment? How do you price your product? How do you get people to know about your book? And—”
I interrupted, reaching out my hand, “Hello. And you are…?”
She shook my hand briskly and told me she was an MEP, for the Greens, and her a rapid-fire name got shot out there too but I did not catch it (I rarely catch names in the best of times).
Since she wasn’t screaming nasty words at me I began explaining about that little known phenomenon called the Kindle .
And Amazon. Combined, an author needed no one or nothing else to publishing an ebook.
While hardly into the first steps of explaing these amazing Kindle-Amazon concepts, an older MEP guy with dyed yellow hair and a wobbly under-chin spoke from my left side. “But it is only famous writers who have success on the internet!”
I turned my attention to this, how can I put this gently, this rude creep, and began, equally gently, supplying some information he obviously had not encountered. “No, there are plenty of examples of unknowns attracting a large audience over time, such as….” But I could not get any further so click here for what he wasn’t interested in hearing.
Feeling his inner Alpha MEP, he raised his voice over mine and continued proclaiming his truth over my facts. It was fairly clear he hadn’t come for a conversation, let alone gathering information, but to hear himself say things he knew and not take on any information that might mean rethinking his thoughts. Quickly enough, he turned his face to that of the Green Party lady MEP, making his point to her, and she began nodding, and that circle slammed shut. I turned to the three other people had come up on my right. I smiled. Friend, or foe?
“I liked what you said.”
They were a literary agent, a trainee, and an assistant to another MEP from the Netherlands. Something refreshing happened. We exchanged ideas. One of them said, “They know nothing here.”
My attitude to most institutions is fraught with distrust, based on a lifetime of experience and observations. I had found that, after attaining a certain size over a period of time, an institutions primary activity was simply to conserve their existence after they ceased to be relevant. Sure, they had power but little influence on the street. For digital publishing, which was basically an online world with energetic communities, you needed to log on and stay logged on and dig around and dig in. The opposite of hanging with colleagues and lunching with lobbyists.
And the conference didn’t even touch on Social Media which powers all this vibrant online publishing.
We spoke of copyright, one of the subjects needing addressing in these circumstances, because what now is the meaning and purpose of copyright online? Right now anyone can upload their ebook to Kindle for free, and without an ISBN number that tracks and controls publications, or any copyright claim posted in the book. Online it’s all about good Metadata. Plus a title and your author’s name and a rather good book. Writers don’t need protection, they need distribution. And that’s where Social Media steps back in…. There’s circles within circles here, and hardly any of them are closed.
And, it seemed, perhaps, my dance card to these institutes and their conferences isn’t utterly blackened. The assistant to the Dutch MEP told me they were organizing another conference on the digital world at the end of this year, and would I be interested in speaking at it?
I said, “May I say what I want?”
“Of course.”
Then to be continued, sort of.
Before ending this Three Part Monster, here’s some For Further Reading bits.
The author Barry Eisler refused 500,000 dollars from a mainstream publisher and has gone ebook and Amazon instead.
Two Protests
Readers and writers said No to offline Power and Kindle and Nook readers staged an online ebook pricing protest with angry one-star reviews of Michael Connelly.
Something on VAT & and UK which the Big Guy was so adamant about.
And even Forbes weighs in on Publishing without publishers digitally
Last cliché: He who dares wins. And what I heard at this European Parliament conference on digital publishing was the exact opposite of daring.
Now, completed, worn-out from gabbing, I return happily to the stories I make up.
TO READ PART ONE, CLICK HERE.
Archive for September, 2011
Losing a Glove – Jeannette Cook reads her poem
Tuesday, September 20th, 2011
I a have poet friend. Of some years standing. She wrote a poem I liked, and she agreed to allow me to put together a video of it.
The poem is called “Losing a Glove.” The poet is Jeannette Cook.
I took a year to take the photos.
The incidental music is by Bjork, from the CD Volta (track “pneumonia”).
You can see and hear it by clicking right here.
I’ll be posting another version, with my reading the poem, shortly.
We did this before, with a poem called Button.
Thanks for coming by. – Vincent
Story – Dolly, et al.
Thursday, September 15th, 2011
Bernard took the car out of the garage and rolled it slowly backward, looking left and right and checking in his rear-view mirror, then sped up slightly and ran over four cats, two dogs, one puppy, three hamsters, a frog and fourteen confused snails.
This was a pain. Because it meant Bernard would have to get out of his car, get the hose, turn it up full blast and wash down his driveway. Aiming the water, he watched the dogs, puppy and cats turn limp somersaults moving toward the gutter.
Then, inevitably, the neighborhood kids came to gather round to look. Some pointed their phones to take photos and send them to their friends with remarks like, “Cooooool.”
Then one kid pointed and sobbed, “My dog Fido!” Another kid screamed, “Dolly! Dolly! Dolly!”
Soon parents gathered around to make caustic remarks.
“You can’t keep doing this,” one said to Bernard.
“I don’t mean to,” Bernard answered as two of the dead cats finally made it to the gutter and flopped over into it and out of his sight. “They all just rushed under my tires I backed out.”
“You said that yesterday,” said another parent, not believing a word.
“And the day before that,” reminded another.
“Dolly!” bellowed the kid again and again.
A damp, fur-matted dog disappeared over the curb.
“I check,” Bernard said. “Every day, I check. Is there another animal out there, is there something I don’t see? The driveway is always empty when I roll out. Then, all of a sudden, they are there, diving under my tires. It happens so fast I can’t stop in time.”
“Dolly!”
The frog fell on top of the dog.
The last dog fell into the street gutter, then a cat. Barnard was going to be late for work again.
Three parents crossed their arms tight over their chests.
“So you’re saying you think this is some sort of unexplained natural phenomenon where domestic animal life commits suicide under your car wheels?”
Bernard turned off the water, tossed the hose aside. “I didn’t say that.” The animals were gone from his property now, bodies resting floppy and over-flowing in the gutter. “But I wouldn’t rule that out.” Most traces of the animal blood was also gone from his driveway. “I don’t know, really. It just happens.” He got into his car.
“Dolly….” It was more a whimper now, the boy already half-wondering whether his mother would buy him another dog. Bigger. So it wouldn’t get run over so easily.
“You like to kill animals,” someone shouted.
Bernard rolled down his window. “Maybe they are not happy.”
“Who isn’t happy?”
“Your pets.”
“What are you talking about?”
“So they come over here and kamikaze themselves under the wheels of my car day after day.”
“You saying we’re lousy pet lovers?”
“I’m saying maybe you should try feeding them better food on a regular basis. Talk to them more often. Pet them. Be better humans.”
“Damn! He’s lecturing us and he’s the murderer.”
Bernard shouted as he drove off, “And how many pets do you people have, anyway? I’ve run over at least eighty this month!” He glanced at his watch. He was going to be twenty minutes late. Again. He rolled up the window, swerved around a cat that threw itself in front of his car, and started making good time as soon as he left his neighborhood behind.