Writing

Editing, Editing, Editing . . .

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Well the next test print copy of Focused Fandom: Fanart, Fanartists, and Careers is queued up.  I found a few errors that I wanted to fix, but not many.  A few cover issues, a few internal formatting issues, and some diddly stuff.  My editor, Ellen, did a pretty damn good job I have to say.

I almost forgot what this is like, editing a print copy, and now I remember why it was such a pain.  When you’re down to asking yourself about 1/8 inch in a margin or how to space a line break for a bullet point, the fun somehow goes right out the window and falls to its death.

It’s a 346+ page MONSTER right now, and will probably retail for $24.95 or so.  This thing is freaking huge.

Oh, and really?  Good gift material, just sayin’ . . .

Next up, looking over the test print copy of Focused Fandom: Cosplay, Costuming, and Careers!

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

 

 

Editing Print Books

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Well I got the beta print copies of Focused Fandom: Cosplay, Costuming and Careers, and Focused Fandom: Fanart, Fanartists, and Careers.

One of the things I love about eBooks is what you see is what you get.  Print books, not so much.  Here’s just a few things I found:

  • The cover may not quite print as you expected – and any colors, graphics, etc. may not be what you expect in a solid version.
  • You can forget things on the cover period.  I’ll have to adjust one of the covers, in fact.
  • There’s breaks.  A paragraph you don’t have to break up in an eBook format may be damned hard to break properly in print.
  • Chapter formatting.  I love chapters that are on odd pages, so you have to get that right.
  • A lot of book elements like Table of Contents, Credits, etc. just seem “different” in print – and you have to make sure the breaking and formatting is right.
  • A re-scan of the print copy may help you find issues.

So I’ve got  . . .  about 600 print pages to scan.  I think I’m gonna be busy for a week or two on this.

Now as much as I complained here, I think you should consider print versions of your eBooks, if only for the sheer experience of doing one and discovering you don’t want to.  It’s pretty educational all around.

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

 

Dead Blogs, Sadness, and Concepts

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So I’ve been looking for information on estimating methods for SCRUM.  Yes, I’m sure that sounds unexciting to most people, but really this is something PM’s and SCRUM masters nearly get into fisticuff’s over.  Oh, you think hours are going to work, don’t bet on it . . .

So anyway, I dug up a blog that shall remain nameless, and it was filled with great stuff – and hadn’t been updated in 2 years, it’s creator’s twitter feed had posts every few months.  Yet it was filled with wisdom.

I guess I can consider it dead, but doesn’t that seem wrong?  I mean it has active, vital, useful information in it?

Somehow I think we need to rethink blogs.  Maybe they have to stop, and so be it, but is it really dead?  Is it dead if the information is good?  Is it dead if it has meaning?

Maybe we need to rethink blogs as part of something larger, of archiving, curating, creation.

Maybe we need to create metasites that archive old blog information for people.

Maybe we should “reincarnate content” as I mentioned earlier.

Blogs may be dead, but the information is alive.

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.