Professional Geekery

Books As History: Your New Sales Tool?

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So as we all know eBooks are selling like crazy.  Right now as we can read ebooks on multiple formats, on multiple devices, and save money, it's not surprising.  These eBook sales also bring up the usual question of what happens to print media (you know the one that comes up every few months)

As much as I love my Kindle and eBooks, I admit part of me wonders about the role permanence of the printed word.  A book can last.  A book can be read without a battery charger or a when locked out of an account.  A book is a record without strings attached.

So I'd like to postulate something that both sells more physical books and helps people appreciate them – something that may help you authors out there get your hard copies into people's hands.

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Socializing Your Media

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The last two posts were pretty heavy ones on the nature of creativity.  So I'd like to go back to the idea that spawned them all – the idea that people use media to socialize and that's why originality is not always a factor in their choice of media.  With that conclusion, I want to close up this not-quite series with a look of ways people can make their media more "socializable."

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Keeping Originality In Perspective

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Last post I explored why people are obsessed with originality to dysfunctional degrees.  I noted that there were factors of individuality, a desire to be industrious, a sense of property, a desire for notoriety, and a focus on making a contribution.  All these factors lead to an emphasis on originality in media work in my opinion.  Let me also note that I think all too often originality gets over emphasized.

Yes, in short I am saying that people and groups and cultures can take an emphasis on originality too far.  That may sound strange, but an obsession with something good does not mean one puts it into practice properly.  I feel fear of unoriginality crushes people's creativity, destroying the very thing they're seeking.

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