edited by Richard Seltzer, seltzer@samizdat.com , www.samizdat.com
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Table of Contents
Curious Technology --
Users of palm devices often "beam" contact info to one another at trade shows and meetings, using the built-in infrared port. That's like exchanging business cards only the info goes straight to the Address Book on your palm. Now, thanks to Coola, we can produce the same effect with email.
If you want the folks who get your email messages to remember you, just go to www.coola.com, register, and download their free software. Then go to their "MyCoola area" and click on "Create Your Coola Signature". Fill in the form, and you'll get a simple one-line link that you can add to your standard email signature.
When you see such a "Coolet" link in an email signature, just click on it, and (if you are registered) the associated information will move to the Address Book on your palm the next time you HotSync. (If you aren't registered yet, you'll be prompted to register.)
By the way, since you create your Signature Coolet on the Web and use it in email and in newsgroups, you can do this even if you don't own a palm yourself -- making it easy for people who do have them to get save your contact info.
Use live text chat to help your Web visitors. HumanClick www.humanclick.com
HumanClick provides free software that lets visitors to your Web pages open up chat sessions with your support folks (in a Java popup window). The visitor doesn't need anything but a browser. If you have people with the time to respond, this could be an excellent way to interact with potential customers, answering their questions, and helping them make decisions. It's also a great way to get feedback -- learning what your potential customers are interested in and confused by. Added benefits -- the "Pro" version alerts you whenever a visitor is looking at one of the pages at your site where you have included a HumanClick link, so you can try to initiate a conversation; it also lets you "push" pages at the person you are talking to -- giving them URLs they can click on for further information.
As an experiment I just added HumanClick links to the page that describes my consulting business /consult.html
Get free voicemail. eVoice www.evoice.com
An alternative to the voicemail service that you may now pay for from your phone company, this new service lets you check voicemail from anywhere in the US by calling a toll-free number, or receive voicemail in your email account (as an alert that a message has arrived or as an audio file). You can also log in to your account at the evoice Web site, see a list of your messages, and play, save, or delete them. If the person who left the message is also an evoice user, you can reply directly without paying long-distance charges. You can also forward messsages to other evoice users. You can even get "virtual voicemail" if you don't own a phone.
If you now use an answering machine instead of voicemail, keep in mind that this service works both when you can't answer the phone and when your phone line is busy. This is particularly useful if you have only one phone line and it's usually busy with your dialup Internet connection.
I just signed up, and there will be a delay activating my account because of the Verizon strike. But from the online demo and what I've heard from a friend who uses it, this service looks very good.
Here I'm experimenting with the new editing capability at Coola (see above). Click on this Coolet,
Then the next time you sync your palm device, the first sentence of
a good novel will move to your palm -- as an event scheduled for 5 AM the
next day, so you'll see those inspiring words at the top of your schedule.
The link stays the same, but I change the content of the Coolet each night
by editing it at the Coolet site (one of the options in your MyCoola area).
So if you get a kick out of this, you can return here and click on this
link each day to get each day's new quote. Those who are curious or who
don't have palm devices can check the full log of the quotes I've used
so far at www.samizdat.com/start.html You could
do the same kind of thing for Joke of the Day, Inspiring Quote of the Day,
sports scores, weather forecasts etc., providing palm users who visit your
site with a reason to return each day (or whatever other interval you choose).
Folks with programming skills could probably write scripts to update their
Coolets. Please let me know about your experiments of that kind. Richard
Seltzer
seltzer@samizdat.com
We are used to thinking of a book as an artifact -- a physical object. Yes, an author might return to a project later and make revisions and additions, but each successive edition is fixed and permanent.
Now that books can exist in electronic form, not just on paper, and can be made available over the Internet, not just in physical stores and libraries, such assumptions are becoming obsolete.
The Internet, print-on-demand, and electronic book formats don't just change the physical form of books and the means for distributing them. They also change the nature of the content, the relationship of the audience to the content, and possibly the relationship of the audience to the author.
First, we need to begin thinking of books as living entities, that can grow over time, and that need not have a fixed form.
Creators of imaginative worlds and characters often return to them and add to them. What began as a single novel, gets expanded in a sequel, becomes a trilogy, and then just keeps growing and growing -- like Asimov's Foundation series, and Herbert's Dune. Sometimes the additions to the ongoing narrative are in the form of short stories or novellas, which get published in magazine rather than book form, and are hard to find, until finally assembled into anthologies and multi-volume sets. Sometimes, too, authors clarify their intent in articles and interviews; and critics and fans publish related articles and books, which may some day be collected. And editors assemble similar works by numerous authors into anthologies, which they issue again and again, adding to and subtracting from the content with each new edition. In other words, the creative effort grows and changes over time, but its published form has always been fixed -- like still photographs -- and reproduced thousands of times.
Making a virtue of necessity -- for there was no other way to "publish" -- we came to depend on the sameness of these literary artifacts as the basis for our common understanding and discussion of the content. In the days of Homer, when composition was oral, the content and the experience of the audience may have differed widely from one performance to the next. But for modern man, Moby Dick was the same every time, everywhere; and to be precise, scholars could specify the edition.
Now, thanks to the Internet and print-on-demand, books need no longer have a fixed form. Every electronic copy or print-on-demand copy might differ -- due to decisions of the author and also decisions of the reader/buyer. Authors could add chapters or paragraphs or sentences anywhere in their works, at any time. The work need never be "finished" so long as the author remains alive. Authors could also make everything they write available through the same online publishing/printing service, leaving it up to the reader/buyer to decide which pieces to take and how to assemble them.
For instance, Jeff Thomas has written numerous stories about the same fantasy realm, eight of which are available in Punktown, a paperback from Ministry of Whimsy Press. Say he makes those stories available online and writes half a dozen more Punktown stories over the next year and makes them available through the same service. Then a reader who had never read any of them could choose to buy the whole set of stories and have them printed and bound in a single volume. Or someone who already had the first Punktown could choose to, for a different price, just buy the new ones. And maybe Jeff makes the stories available as he writes them, rather than waiting to collect them; and adds ones he wrote earlier that have been gathering dust in his attic; and occasionally goes back and polishes one or more of these stories; and even makes available online works-in-progress that he knows aren't "finished", in hopes of getting useful feedback from enthusiastic readers.
And suppose articulate readers do send him feedback and reviews and Jeff decides to (with their permission) include their comments, articles, and even related books through that same publishing service. Then folks interested in his work could benefit from one another's insights, and he'd probably end up selling more books. Then, too, some readers might choose to include some of this criticism and fan commentary in the "book" that they choose to buy. And some readers will choose to purchase an "anthology", including not just Jeff's work, but also stories and articles that they perceive as related and would like to experience together -- like assembling your own "mix" of music, making your own music tape or CD. In fact, some readers may wish to include selected music and images along with the text they buy.
Meanwhile authors begin to recognize the value of feedback and strive to encourage it. In many cases, insightful comments are more valuable to authors than money -- both in helping them to improve their work and also in helping them reach a wider audience. So, in this environment, it makes sense for authors and publishers to offer credits and recognition in return for quality feedback and reviews. And with the resulting proliferation of reviews and reader commentary, new online services evolve that rate and aggregate the best of this writing about writing. And that, too, becomes content that readers could choose to include in the "books" that they buy.
In other words, the traditional sharp barriers between writers and readers fade. The act of writing becomes more explicitly a collaborative effort. The act of buying a book becomes more of a creative act, with the buyer choosing what belongs in the package. The "rules" of writing and publishing change radically; the concept of "book" changes radically; but the writing and appreciation of fiction flourishes.
Obviously you have thought about this quite a bit. And certainly there are advantages to the Internet in terms of storage/compilation/etc. of related stories/novellas/novels. In addition, it does make sense to allow readers to create their own selections of an author's work, much as listeners of music make their own tapes.
However, listeners of music don't really get to participate in the editing of a piece of music. Those who appreciate fine art don't get to email the creator of the painting and offer suggestions on how to revise it--maybe add a flower or two in the corner.
And they damn well shouldn't, either. Writing is a solitary profession in which the best works are created by people with a unique vision that they apply to universal themes and characters. Neither I nor any other writer would like to have commentary during the revision or creation of a piece (because you are talking about commentary during the revision process, which is also a kind of re-creation process)--except from those trusted friends or colleagues who we believe share in our personal vision.
There are other holes in your idea. Editors and/or publishers generally provide feedback to their authors during the process of buying a book--sometimes revisions are required in order to sell a book. Generally, these editors have specialized training in the craft of editing. Thus, their opinions tend to be more useful than those of the lay reader, who cannot necessarily dissect a book on the line-by-line level in any useful way.
What you propose seems to ignore the role of editors in the process. Furthermore, it seems to ignore the idea of completing a work of fiction. I don't know about anybody else, but I pretty much hone my work prior to anyone getting to see it and then make changes prior to publication that finalize the process. I think what you propose would have the negatively enabling effect of making writers sloppy--i.e., let's slap this up here and then make changes afterwards--and also create the illusion that no work of fiction is truly finished.
Again, would Picasso haul out a painting of his and change things here and there every once in awhile. I don't think so.
More generally, and getting back to this again, there's a certain lack of respect that I find especially troubling in your proposal. A writer IS very much like a fine musician or a fine painter--the good ones--and the work IS good/unique because of those solitary gifts the writer brings to it. Why should a writer even wish to have his work dissected in a public forum? I can think of no particular reason. If you're talking about workshop forums online for beginning or intermediate writers, that's something very different.
So, to sum up, where I differ from you is when you seem to want to use technology to shape fiction in a way that it should not be shaped. Where I agree is where you seem to be suggesting that we use technology as a supplement to or to replace archaic ways of thinking about storage, publishing, and dissemination of fiction.
Jeff
From: Richard Seltzer <seltzer@samizdat.com> Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 17:11:59 -0400 (EDT)
I don't think we differ quite as much as you imagine.
A writer should never be forced to collaborate with readers. Many might well only posted "finished" work. But fast and interactive communication with readers is an option that didn't exist before, and it is one that might well prove beneficial for many writers. And some writers who believed their work was "finished" may well choose to write more in the same vein (for instance, your series of Ambergris stories) in response to feedback.
Also, this model does not preclude the role of editors.
As for "writing" being a "solitary profession," I believe that that is an accident of technology, and a matter of habit, rather than a necessary condition for creativity. Before written language, stories and epics were composed and delivered orally, in a very social context. Shakespeare and his contemporaries often wrote in noisy pubs, and wrote and rewrote their scripts in response to audience reaction -- whether from patrons or the pit. Today, movie and television scripts are written and rewritten many times in a collaborative mode. Closer to home, I suspect that many writers of imaginative fiction benefit from interaction with their fans at all the various Cons, and that online interaction can be an extension and supplement to that.
I'm not making a value judgement here. I'm saying that the technology of the Internet, ebooks, and print-on-demand opens new opportunities. I'm saying that a book or an author's opus need not necessarily ever be completely "finished", that the reader will probably have are larger role in determining what goes into the new package that we call a "book", and that articulate readers will also probably play a larger role in the direction of authors' careers and the content of their work than they have in the last hundred years.
How comfortable will we feel in that brave new world? I don't know. I don't think any of us will until we experience it. It's a bit like the move from oral tradition to written word; or from handwritten word to printed word; or from expensive printed books to the penny press.
My point is that this technology does not just affect the publishing, storage, and dissemination of finished texts; it changes what constitutes the "text" and the relationship between readers and authors.
I'm not saying that this is good or bad. But I am saying that to some extent this direction is inevitable. And I suspect that it will be a lot more fun experimenting in these directions and creating new modes of work and new genres that take advantage of these opportunities, rather than fighting a rear-guard action, (like continuing to make silent films, based on principle, after the invention of talkies).
Personally, I find intelligent dialogue stimulating, leading me to look at a subject in ways I may not otherwise have considered.
Richard
From: Jeffrey Thomas <necropolitan@email.msn.com> Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 20:09:43 -0700
Again -- fascinating subject, Richard. You and Jeff [VanderMeer] both made some very valid and thought-provoking points. Personally, I don't seek the creative input of anyone else -- not even editors, generally -- in my writing. I've had editors mutilate my stories, substituting "it's" for "its", slaughtering grammar, altering my very style, imposing new titles. (By the same token, I've had very insightful editors help me shape my stories into something much better than they were.)
As for considering a creative work "finished": my father was a painter, and warned me that an artist could very well work on just one painting all his life -- he cautioned me to know when a painting must be left alone as finished, while the fire still burns in it so to speak, lest the artist be pushing around cold ash (lest the Rodin becomes rubble, to mix metaphors even further!). But still, as for the possibility that a book could be changed by the author as time went on...well, Thomas Hardy make frequent changes in various editions of his books. It wasn't until 1921 that his preferred version of JUDE THE OBSCURE was printed (and Jeff V. generously bought me a copy of that edition in England!). His novels had to be horrendously compromised, due to the collaboration of editors who are significantly NOT remembered like Thomas Hardy, so as to be serialized. But an author could use the technology you describe to change or restore his book much more easily than Hardy could. Hardy might well have approved. (He would rework his poetry as well.) One thing about the idea of assembling a book like one can choose the contents of a tape; Jeff and I balanced the contents of PUNKTOWN very carefully. Even to the sequence of stories. I tried to alternate the more surrealistic ones with the more straightforward ones. I tried to pick an opening story that would set the mood for the entire volume, and a final story that would end on a somewhat positive note. I actually tried not to group closely stories that had gun fights. Stories that had somewhat similar endings, like IMMOLATION and WAKIZASHI. I know music artists give much thought to the sequence of their songs as well.
Someone recently wrote an article suggesting that music "albums" will be a thing of the past...no more filler tracks. Just, presumably, the big top 40 type tracks, to be grouped on CDs with other big top 40 style tracks. Well, I usually prefer the "filler" type tracks! I'd rather let the artist assemble the song package. Generally, that is. There are artists I care less about, so I could see myself gathering a batch of songs from such performers onto one tape or CD. But I do think there is a value in the very composition of a collection. Still, at the same time, I certainly agree that this new approach could be very valuable and attractive! When I was reading H. P. Lovecraft (I've now read all his fiction), I would buy books that often had overlapping contents. But it might have been nice to assemble a book containing only those stories I hadn't yet read. As with anything, there is a yin and yang to the debate. Sure, though, it would be great to add into a Lovecraft book an article on him, a biography, related materials (such as one finds, now, on movie DVDs...though I would also suggest that a lot of that DVD material must be of negligible entertainment value). But yes, yes, a VERY intriguing discussion.
Jeff Thomas
From: Richard Seltzer <seltzer@samizdat.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 10:51:55 -0400 (EDT)
I believe that this topic is important for waking us up to the implications of what is happening to publishing -- Internet, ebooks, and print-on-demand -- in terms of the role of the author.
I agree that there are times when I really want full control over what I have created. Ironically, in the past, except in very unusual circumstances, like your working relationship with Jeff VanderMeer, the author had very little control. Editors would determine the final shape of the work, sometimes helping, but sometimes botching the intent.
Frustration from that experience drove some authors to self-publishing and small press. And to those who have fought hard for artistic freedom and control, the new possibilities could well look like a threat.
On the other hand, good editors are extremely valuable as allies, helping you to make your work as good as it can be. And those who have had good experiences of that kind might well feel the new direction is a threat to that kind of artistic relationship.
In general, we tend to define "art" based on the limitations and obstacles of the medium and the age. The "novel" as we know it arose, in part, because of the economics of printing and binding and display of printed works on bookstore shelves. A volume thick enough to have a spine is easier to display, with the spine out. Also, it was far less expensive per copy to print many copies at a time. Internet, ebooks, and print on demand are making those and other constraints obsolete.
Hence we can expect to see new kinds of works -- variable in length and organization -- as well as changing relationships among the players -- publisher, editor, author, audience.
We need to ask ourselves -- what of these changes suits my personality and style? how can I and should I take advantage of the new opportunities, without undermining my basic principles and the reasons why I write and publish? what new directions might I want to experiment in?
This is a time of exciting risky change for both publishers and authors.
Can we or should we try to affect the direction of things? And if we try to stay still in these shifting seas, where is the tide likely to take us?
Richard
From: Jeff VanderMeer <ministryofwhimsy@hotmail.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 16:39:21 EDT
To reply to your "rear guard action" comment--there's a lot about new technology that is used shallowly or stupidly or without thought for the consequences. (This is why we have situations in which poorly-socialized human beings hide behind the internet or email folks who live down the street rather than going to talk to them. This is why we think that just because we have a different method for disseminating information that it is somehow superior to less technology-oriented methods. For example--give me a teacher with 25 years of experience over a computer/computer program/internet site any day of the week--that person is going to make all kinds of connections that can't be made by a static site.)
That said, I mean to make use of every new technology as it comes along--so long as it does not prove detrimental to the creative process. I don't mean to imply that readers are stupid--what I mean to say is that readers do and should look at a piece of fiction holistically. And I certainly value feedback in terms of "I liked this story" or "That character wasn't well-drawn." However, as a *reader* as well as a writer, I dislike any blurring of the lines between the two: when I'm a reader I want the writer to share his imagination, his creativity, his story. I have no interest in being a critic or an editor of that person's work.
Where I find fault in your logic is simply that you seem to view every new technological development as unconditionally a good one and you also do not seem to understand what I mean by "solitary". When someone picks up a book, they're not looking to read something by some collective intelligence, something modified and changed by a democratic process. They're looking to read something unique that came out of one person's mind.
The oral tradition of storytelling is something quite different from modern fiction. At least it should be. The oral tradition can only get so sophisticated--and it generally strove to entertain or to illuminate the unknown in some way through myth. These are fine goals--but they're only a 10th of what fiction can be.
Jeff
From: Richard Seltzer <seltzer@samizdat.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 17:06:41 -0400 (EDT)
But that's a minor point.
I see many ways in which online communication, in making it easier for authors and readers to carry on a dialog, can influence the direction and improve the quality of writing. That dialog isn't part of the work itself, but rather takes place on the side (except in rare experiments, of the ezine nature). This exchange that we've had about the direction of publishing is an example of what I'm talking about. I will append this dialog to my original article. The article itself remains intact, but the followon discussion is there as well. And thoughts stimulated by this exchange may lead to more articles.
The point is that technology is making it possible not just to store and disseminate stories composed for print, but also to create new kinds of stories and new ways of telling them and new ways of reacting to them.
Thanks again.
Richard
From: Jeff VanderMeer <ministryofwhimsy@hotmail.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 22:00:23 EDT
In a world of lowest common denominators with a core of good readers and a sea of folks who think John Grisham is a good stylist, I refuse to buy in to the idea of the reader having any role other than what he/she has traditionally had. I value my readers and I am thankful to them for enjoying my work. I always consider any commentary I might receive about my work.
But you continue to confuse a delivery system with some kind of new way of writing. If you'd done your homework, you'd find that writers without even the concept of the Internet have made hypertextual type advances in the printed word--Nabokov, Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar, etc. Yes, the way we process information is affected by the Internet, and yes, this will affect writers. But why you insist on thinking that it will or should involve the readers in the creation/editing of the work itself is simply maddening.
The collaborations you speak of are beside the point. They are collaborations between fellow artists who already know the rules of the game. Dumas' running a writer's workshop is also irrelevant--so what? I never said a writer should not solicit commentary. What I object to is wholesale abdication of the writer's role, which is to complete singular pieces of work which do not cater to any reader other than the writer and therefore appeal to other readers for that very reason.
The challenge facing any writer is to find new ways to tell stories--yes, absolutely. The challenge is not made any easier by your call to, in effect, enslave fiction to the perceptions of the masses. I have to say that I find the notion personally repugnant and antithetical to the cause of innovation--which, I know, is the exact opposite of your intent.
What further makes the righteousness of your attitude revolting is that you have already written me off as simply anti-technology, anti-Internet when nothing could be further than the truth. What I object to are simplistic views of technology and of fiction--and this is what you have put forth in your theories.
Jeff
From: Richard Seltzer <seltzer@samizdat.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 22:43:29 -0400 (EDT)
You seem to misinterpret my message.
Keep in mind that the primary function of the Internet is connecting people to people. Some of those people happen to be authors and others happen to be readers. By using the medium of the Internet and using it well, authors will be in closer touch with their audience than they have been since the dawn of cheap printed books in the 18th century. That will by nature lead to changes to how books are composed, edited, and marketed.
There will also, undoubtedly, be some authors who choose to experiment in new Internet-based forms of expression, that might involve reader reactions in new ways. I'm not making value judgements about any of that. I was, however, reacting to your comment that the reading public is looking for "something unique that came out of one person's mind."
I don't think the reading public cares who or what created a work of art. That was one liberating principle of the New Criticism -- shifting the focus from the author and the author's life to the work itself. What matters is the art, created for the sake of art, and enjoyed as an artifact or a process -- something with its own life and existence.
In a sense, a work of art does continue to grow after publication and after the death of the author, through the after-literature that grows around it -- the criticism, the other works inspired and influenced by it, and the effects the experience of reading may have on the lives of the readers.The Internet speeds up that process considerably -- a work can have more effect, more quickly, on more people, and so quickly that authors become influenced strongly, while there is still time to make a difference in their subsequent work.
The fact that a Proust or Kafka or Joyce wrote largely in isolation, largely misunderstood by the general populace of their day was a by-product of the time they lived in, not a necessary condition for the production of art. In the age of the Internet, such isolation is unnecessary. Even if there are only half a dozen like-thinking people in the world, half a dozen people who can appreciate the greatness of your work, you can probably get in touch with some of them over the Internet, and benefit from interacting with them.
I believe that whatever can be done will be done -- every wild experiment that technology makes possible. But many of those experiments will remain marginal and gimmicky. What becomes widespread and lasts and makes a real difference will depend on the creativity and the marketing ability of people like yourself -- finding just the right balance that retains the author's integrity and the primacy of the work of art, while at the same time allowing greater dialogue between authors and readers, and providing intelligent, articulate readers with opportunities to voice their views and make a difference.
Richard
From: Jeffrey Thomas <necropolitan@email.msn.com> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 22:34:16 -0700
Ultimately, I'm in favor of the new technology. One doesn't have to change their approach to publishing or writing if they don't want to, but having more options, more freedom, should one wish to explore them, can only be a good thing. A very good thing! As long as people don't give up reading altogether (ala FAHRENEHIT 451), I'll be happy!
Jeff
From: Jeff VanderMeer <ministryofwhimsy@hotmail.com> Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2000 22:26:49 EDT
Richard:
I think I disagree with you in the most fundamental ways about what fiction is and the relationship of the author to a work of fiction. However, I can and do agree with many individual elements of what you say below--especially because I think much of what you say below is actually a revision of, and in some cases substantially different from, what you say in your online article.
With regard to the solitary issue--writers get bombarded from all sides with all manner of opinions. Some of them are useful, some of them are not. I cannot see, personally, for me, any value in escalating the possibilities for receiving white noise. Further, I think writers value being shielded from that.
When I use the word "writer" here, I don't mean a beginner. I mean someone who has already found their voice and has matured as a writer. I've been a published writer for almost 20 years now, Richard. I have published work all over the world. I've won a bunch of awards and I've received tons of reviews affirming that I know what I'm doing. Do I want to improve? Yes. Will putting my work out there for commentary on the Internet help? No. The only things that will help are (1) continuing to study great works of fiction, (2) setting my own personal agendas for improvement, and (3) showing my rough drafts to a small number of valued readers whose opinions I trust.
Also with regard to "something unique that came out of one person's mind"--well, as far as I can tell, this would define pretty much every great work of fiction that was published in the 20th century. Mediocrities are created by commitees.
With regard to print-on-demand: I mentioned in the interview before that we are investigating this option. I certainly appreciate advice, but I don't appreciate being lectured on what I already know about.
Other issues you don't address: the fluid state of copyright with regard to the Internet and the inability to be sure that you know exactly where commentary is coming from.
Jeff
Additional comments welcome. Please send to seltzer@samizdat.com
In High Stakes, No Prisoners , Charles Ferguson describes in detail his experiences as founder of Vermeer, the company that developed FrontPage, software that makes it easy to design Web pages and sites, which Microsoft made popular after buying the company. His account is candid and personal, providing useful insights into dealing with venture capital companies and problems that Internet startup companies, and particularly software companies, are likely to encounter. Along the way, he brutalizes the decisions that led to the fall of Netscape, and repeatedly criticizes the predatory business tactics of Microsoft.
I was deeply involved in Internet business during the era described, working as an Internet evangelist for Digital Equipment, then Compaq 1993-1998. I know some of the people mentioned along the way, and remember the industry events/developments described. But much of what I read here bears little resemblance to my memories. For me that was a plus for this book, helping me to take another look at those events from a different perspective. But, in general, readers should beware -- the author's viewpoint is very personal, emotional and idiosyncratic. That's the book's greatest strength as well as its weakness. Don't expect dispassionate history or unbiased business analysis. Do expect an entertaining inside look at board-room-level wheeling and dealing in the early days of business on the Internet.
Sometimes the author seems more interested in settling old scores than seeking truth. As part of the purchase agreement, Microsoft made Ferguson agree to say absolutely nothing to anybody about Microsoft for a couple years. He used that time to write this book, and published it after the gag order expired. While these pages deal with high tech business, there's personal emotion in every page, sometimes descending to mere gossip, rather then providing details about decisions and business techniques that you could adapt to your own business. But that approach helps make this book very readable, entertaining, dynamic.
On the other hand, He does an exceptionally good job of explaining to a non-technical audience the importance of architecture in software design, and the long-term consequences (illustrated by the case of Netscape) of failing to structure your company and your design efforts that way.
Along the way, Ferguson makes himself sound like a prophet for foreseeing trends that seemed obvious to many others in the industry at the time, but that, admittedly, seemed outrageously revolutionary and impossible to outsiders. But he is also brutally honest about his own failures. Apparently, he was extremely lucky to sell Vermeer to Microsoft when he did and for a very good price. At that time, Vermeer had generated trivial revenue, only selling about 200 copies of FrontPage. While they got lots of attention in the press and good visibility at trade shows, they apparently had mispriced the product and the end-user marketing effort was going nowhere.
Considering that outcome, you might think that one of the major lessons learned should have been the importance of marketing strategy to the business success of an Internet startup. But no -- he sees his mistakes more in terms of personalities, such as hiring the wrong person to run the company. His bias is still strongly in favor of making business decisions based on technology, and putting little emphasis on marketing and management.
He makes a few sneering references to the Internet Assistant -- Microsoft's first attempt at an easy-to-use Web authoring tool, which was later incorporated into Word for Office 98. Actually, that's an excellent, very efficient, very easy-to-use solution, which I've used for creating Web pages since 1995.
He also shows no awareness of the main weakness of FrontPage -- that it focuses narrowly on page design, with no appreciation for the marketing value of Web content, no built-in understanding of the search-engine-related consequences of page design decisions. Hence users often create sites and pages that search engines can't index or index poorly, and hence they wind up having to spend more in marketing and advertising to attract traffic. (Cf. my articles on this subject at www.samizdat.com/report.html and www.samizdat.com/belongs.html).
His analysis of the Internet software industry feels limited and flawed. It needs to be balanced by an appreciation for open software development efforts like Apache and Linux. (See the excellent book on that subject The Cathedral and the Bazaar by Eric Raymond, and my review of it at www.samizdat.com/bazaar.html). In Web server software, not Netscape, not Microsoft, but Apache appears to be the clear winner -- with no advertising, no fanfare.
If you are looking for venture capital for an Internet startup, this book is a "must-read." Ferguson's experience and advice might prove very useful. He names names (both individuals and companies) and blasts away with brutal, very personal candor. But you need to keep in mind that venture capital procedures and players change very quickly. In Internet terms Ferguson's 1994-96 experience is ancient history, valuable mainly as background.
This is another "Internet entrepreneur as modern-day hero" book. It emphasizes every thought and gesture and negotiating ploy of the folks at the top -- like the old-style history books that focused on the intrigues of royal families and the speeches of generals. It gives no clue of what happened in the trenches, what mattered to the folks who were doing the day-to-day design and marketing work or to the folks who needed and used software products of this kind.
Conclusion -- you have to read it; you'll enjoy reading it; but you'll wind up with an empty feeling in your gut and a bitter aftertaste in your mouth.
Adding dozens of new titles every month, Gutenberg has already made over 2800 etexts available for free over the Internet. These include classic works of literature and history, as well as out-of-print and little-known works by great authors. If you can, connect by ftp, rather than the Web, to get the most recent ones. Here's a list of those recently added, alphabetized by author. The file name is useful for fetching the text from the ftp site. Many of these are available now or will be soon on diskette from PLEASE COPY THIS DISK for those who cannot get them themselves. For the current catalog, check http://www.samizdat.com/catalog.html or send your email request to seltzer@samizdat.com)
Henry Adams -- Democracy An American Novel (demam10.txt)
Joseph Addison -- Essays and Tales (etadd10.txt)
Louisa May Alcott --
Arnold Bennett -- The Grand Babylon Hotel (grbah10.txt)
Clara Louise Burnham -- Jewel (jewel10.txt)
Tommaso Campanels -- The City of the Sun (tcots10.txt)
Abraham Cahan -- The Rise of David Levinsky (lvnsk10.txt)
Marcus Tullius Cicero --
Friedrich de la Motte Fouque --
Don Manoel Gonzalez -- London in 1731 (londn10.txt)
William Greenwood -- Confiscation, An Outline (cnfsc10.txt)
H. Rider Haggard --
Bret Harte --
Herman Hesse -- Siddhartha (in German, with accents = 8sidd10.txt, without accents = 7sidd10.txt)
Helen Hunt Jackson -- Ramona (rmona10.txt)
Jerome K. Jerome -- Fanny and the Servant Problem (fnysp10.txt)
Mary Johnston -- To Have and To Hold (thath10.txt)
James Joyce --
Alfred Ollivant -- Bob Son of Battle (bsonb10.txt)
Silvio Pellico -- My Ten Years' Imprisonment (myten10.txt)
Pliny the Younger -- Letters [Translated by William Melmoth, revised by F.C.T. Bosanquet] (ltpln10.txt)
Plunkitt and Riordan -- Plunkitt of Tammany Hall (plnth10.txt)
Saki (H.H. Munro) -- Reginald (rgnld10.txt)
Marshall Saunders -- Beautiful Joe (beajo10.txt)
William Makepeace Thackeray --
Baroness Emmuska Orczy -- The Elusive Pimpernel (lsvpm10.txt)
Rafael Sabatini -- The Trampling of the Lilies (ttotl10.txt)
Johann Friedrich von Schiller -- Wilhelm Tell (wtell10.txt)
Margaret Sidney -- Five Little Peppers And How They Grew (5lpep10.txt)
E. Phillips Oppenheim -- The Devil's Paw (dspaw10.txt)
John McElroy -- The Red Acorn (rdcrn10.txt)
Henrik Ibsen -- The Lady From The Sea (ldyse10.txt)
Charles Darwin -- More Letters of, Volume 1 (1mlcd10.txt) Volume 2 (2mlcd10.txt)
Meyer Moldeven -- A Grandpa's Notebook (grnpa10.txt)
From: Alfred C Thompson II <ThompsonA@bghs.org> Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 12:41:44 -0400
Response to: Off-the-wall ideas: Just can't weight? Trying to make sense of the relationship between exercise and weight loss (Internet-on-a-Disk #39)
I just read your article on exercise and weight loss. I started a diet some months ago. Along with the diet I started working out once a week which is what my schedule allowed. I lost 25 pounds. Once summer started I started working out more often. I work a much lighter schedule in the summer so I was able to get to the health club 5-6 times a week. I thought that the last 10 pounds I wanted to lose would come right off with this extra exercise.
Wrong. I've put several pounds on. I've been watching my diet and the volume of food has not seemed to go up. I'm not sure what has happened. My wife suggests that I am building muscle which is of course heavier then fat. I don't seem to be gaining inches, though that is very hard to tell as 3-4 pounds doesn't show up easily on a 195 (6,7) pound body. My wife could be right I suppose.
The body does adjust to various things. My reading suggests that eating less causes ones body to store more food. This is because your body thinks there is a shortage coming soon. Many diet books insist you eat 3-4 times a day to avoid this very problem. Exercise is supposed to increase your metabolism causing you to use the stores of food (fat) and to allow you to process more food faster. So I'm skeptical of your idea that the body is storing too much because you are working out.
On the other hand I have also read that the body gets used to one type or level of exercise. This causes it to have less weight loss benefit. These articles suggest switching what you do for exercise from time to time. I vary from weights to stationary bicycle to swimming in the course of a week.
But I am afraid I might need to find something new. Or be content to trying to hold on to the weight loss I've got now.
Alfred
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