There’s always something new to learn, but is it worth it?

I’m going to begin this week’s post with the software we here at Type M have to use in order to give our readers something to see. Since nothing says “we’re a happening website” like giving an application a new look, we’re dealing with a Blogger software update — or at least I am.

My main computer is now considered “vintage.” There is nothing wrong with it. In fact, it works rather well. As with all computers, having the latest and greatest software updates means that eventually the operating system won’t handle them. Part of this is because of advances in the heart of any computer: the processor.

I once put a question to a computer scientist, to wit: “Why are changes made to operating systems because of new processors that cause a lot of other programs to suddenly need updating too? Couldn’t it be engineered so that older programs would still work?”

He was silent for a moment and said, “Well, to be honest, then software developers wouldn’t sell nearly as many updates.”

I understand business, so I can see the sense in that, but it still left me very annoyed and feeling…sort of ripped off.

Getting back to my main computer, I can no longer use it to write my posts, and it’s a huge pain in the patootie. Fortunately, I bought a MacBook Air so I’d have something more portable, and that does have the latest and greatest software — at least for the browser app I use — but I’d rather be using my mainstay.

I got into the book-writing business back when computers still used floppy discs. There was not much internet and social messaging had not yet appeared. Things were more simple. Writers wrote book, publishers bought them, and promoted them, with the author chipping where helpful (interviews, appearances and the like).

Then applications like Facebook appeared. Twitter came along. All of a sudden publishers realized the didn’t need to do quite so much promotion. Heaven knows, everyone is happy to save money.

So a lot of the heavy promotional lifting fell on the shoulders of the poor author — and man, did we have a lot to learn! I’m certainly no Luddite when it comes to computers, but dealing with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, etc, etc, take up massive amounts of time — and most of the time, it’s not much fun. But all of us had to learn how to self-promote, so we learned how to use all these tools. It was clear that if we didn’t, our publishers would lose interest in a big hurry.

Progress is a good thing. I’m not disputing that, but sometimes it would be nice if progress wasn’t always tied to the almighty dollar. The “new look” blogger dashboard is no better than the old one, except that it looks different. Google (who owns Blogger) decided that, in order to save a bit of money, they would no longer support older browsers. To continue here, if I didn’t have my second computer, I would be forced to go out and buy a new one, or resign from Type M.

I’m fortunate, but how many others are not — and is that fair?

Guess I am a bit of a Luddite after all.

Floundering in the book promotion world

by Rick Blechta

I was buttonholed this past week by an author who has her first book coming up for release in June. She was thrilled to meet a real live “published author” and immediately began peppering me with questions, all of which were about promotion.

She’d gotten a one-page PDF from her publisher about what she could do to promote her book. It also included a questionnaire basically asking what she’d already done. Did she have a website? Was she on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc? Was she a member of a group that would buy her book? Could she think of alternative places to sell her book? Did she know any broadcasters or media people? And so on.

The poor thing was completely confused and stumped about how to do all these things. She’d first told her publicist this and was (nicely) told that with so many authors to promote, there wasn’t time to hold her hand. “Ask another author for help.”

And then I came along.

First of all, when I’d heard her tale of woe, I was annoyed at the publicist. So it’s expected that other authors will help out? Come on!

But I also felt very bad for this nice lady, and couldn’t bring myself to turn my back on her. She was pretty darned desperate.

She’s not too computer savvy, but her daughter and granddaughter are. She knew how to search for things on the Internet, so we talked about that. “There’s a lot of free help out there. You just have to find it. It will take time to get good at searches, but you’re smart. You’ll get the hang of it.” If we’d had a computer handy, I’d have done a bit of quick work to get her started.

For the website, I suggested one of the sites that offers good, ready-made templates and great customer support. “Maybe your granddaughter could help you design something simple. You don’t need a complicated site.”

She was on Facebook, but only sporadically used it to find former classmates, childhood friends and the like. You need an author page.

After nearly an hour-and-a-half, I felt as if I’d barely scratched the surface of author self-promotion. I did have to extricate myself from the situation because I could have spent a week showing her the ins and outs, but at least I’d given her a small box of “tools” with which she could start off.

Now, this is not an isolated case. There are lots of authors, new and old, who desperately need help in this regard. I’ve never heard of a publisher who gives much help, and honestly, they really don’t have the time to help authors through this quagmire. But they also should be able to point their authors in viable directions. After all, the publisher will benefit from the sale of every book, too.

The Internet is a good source of help, but there is a hell of a lot of information out there. It would take multiple hours to wade through — and in the end you wouldn’t know what is good advice and what is bad.

She could always hire professional book publicist to help, but there are a lot of sharks in those waters and I felt obliged to warn her away from that unless she got personal recommendations. Since she doesn’t know any other authors, that’s not likely to happen. I don’t know anyone and I got horribly burned in this regard several years ago.

Does anyone out there know a source of good, reliable information on the Internet or in a book to help my new friend out? Suggestions will be gratefully received and passed on immediately.

Thanks!