Category: News: Arts & Entertainment (Page 19 of 25)

The good folks at Geist magazine are going to be at the Vancouver Word on the Street Festival on Sunday, Sept. 24.

The Geist booth is always fun: they have giveaways and super deals on mag subscriptions and, this year, the forthcoming Geist Atlas of Canada.

Get in the literary mood with the Geist-sponsored Haiku Night in Canada, on the Main Stage at 2:20 pm. Also Geist your way over to the Magazine Mews stage at 4 pm for a panel on getting published in magazines.

And if you don’t like sunlight, visit Geisters and comix phenoms Eve Corbel and Sarah Leavitt at Word Under the Street, in the basement of the library.

Eve Corbel and Sarah Leavitt have officially adopted the comix artist Joe Sacco for the day. They’ll be displaying their comix wares all day: Slug Noir, Small Dogs Haiku, Ex-Husbands from Hell, Why Editors Have No Friends, and more. There’s lots of fun, comics drawing contests and other cool stuff.

Not in Vancouver but need a Geist fix?

In Toronto at Word on the Street, Geist teams up with Maisonneuve (another great mag).

In Kitchener, Geist is part of the action in Victoria Park.

And Geist sightings will be recorded in Calgary and Halifax.

(BTW: If you’re interested in the Geist Atlas of Canada, you can order before September 30th and receive a 30% discount. Need more details?)

I’ve recently been part of a number of conversations with authors about how they can successfully promote their books. These aren’t self-published books, these are books published by traditional publishing companies, all of which have marketing departments.

Over at Buzz, Balls and Hype, M.J. Rose has a fantastic article about exactly how to do this.

Read: Get thee to a marketing/pr meeting!

Working in a publishing house and having an author as a partner has given me an interesting perspective on the industry. From the author’s point of view I see that there is usually little communication between editor or publicist and author about what to expect in terms of the process. From the publisher’s point of view I see that there is very little time to walk someone through the whole process–you’re busy actually getting the interviews and sending the books out for review. Both side are in need of help from each other.

What’ I like about the Buzz, Balls and Hype article is that it explains the process nicely and gives sound tips on ways an author can approach his/her publisher.

Here are the points that stand out for me:

1) 4-6 months before your book comes out ask for a marketing/PR meeting
The timing is going to be dependent on your particular publisher and the type of book you have coming out. But basically before it hits the stores, before it goes out for review, make sure you have a meeting about what’s going to happen.

2)Key talking points to cover in that meeting:
– Do you want to spend some of your own money promoting the book and if yes how much?
– How many ARCs (Advance Reading Copies) are going out (if any)?
– Is there a tour planned?
– Are there any online or off line advertising/promotional plans?
– What would the publisher like you (the author) to do for the book? What don’t they want you to do?
– Is there any incentive program that makes sense?
– If appropriate is there a reading group guide?
– Will you have/who is your publicist? What time frame will he/she be working on your book? What kind of reviews/press is the publisher going after?
– Do they have other authors with similar books coming out at the same time? Would they be interested in piggy backing efforts?
– Do they have a problem with you setting up your own speaking engagements, do they/how do they want to know about them?

The article offers excellent background information on why these are key questions to ask and the purpose behind asking them.

If you work in publishing or are an author or potential author, have a read through this article.

Article: Get thee to a marketing/pr meeting!

What do you think? Valuable info?

Yesterday I gave an hour-long presentation to Simon Fraser University students in the summer book publishing workshop. I had an hour to talk about online marketing. No sweat, right? I can’t remember who it was now, but I heard about a presenter who started by saying “oh my god, I don’t have enough time to tell you everything.” That was exactly how I felt. I’ll post my session notes later, but in the meantime here are some web resources I thought I should note somewhere for future reference.

Web Theory
————
Harness the power of the web. How business models need to change to adapt to online markets. If you read anything, read this. The full book is free online.
http://www.cluetrain.com/

What Is Web 2.0? Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html

Social Signal’s Tech Tips
http://www.socialsignal.com/techtips

Web Stats & Measuring Success
————————–
Google Analytics. Great web analytics software. Sign up for a free invitation code.
http://www.google.com/analytics/

Work Industries blog on web strategy. Post on How to Read Webstats
http://www.iworkindustries.com/index.php/site/comments/a-quick-guide-to-reading-webstats/

The four general questions that you should ask yourself to measure your online ad or websiteís return on investment.
http://chiefmarketer.com/crm_loop/online-success-040406/

Search Engine Advertising
———————-
Google Adwords. Run a search engine advertising campaign.
http://adwords.google.com/

Blogs
——
Search engine for blogs. See what people are searching for, talking about online.
http://www.technorati.com/

Free blog software & hosting:
http://www.blogger.com
http://www.livejournal.com/
http://www.myspace.com/
http://www.xanga.com/Default.aspx?

Paid blog software/hosting (most have a free option as well):
http://wordpress.com/
http://www.pmachine.com/ee/pricing/
http://www.sixapart.com/typepad/
http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/

This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but feel free to add your own links in the comment section. The more the merrier.

Yesterday I visited my favourite Canadian bookstore, McNally Robinson. First it is a beautiful store. We had lunch in the cafe then perused the selections. I noticed a table display for Cormorant Books, a small Canadian publisher, and another display for McClelland & Stewart’s 100 Year Celebration, and a Penguin Books display. Last year in London James and I saw the 70 years of Penguin book design display at the Victoria and Albert Museum. At the time I couldn’t carry around anything extra so I didn’t buy the book on the exhibit, but there it was yesterday in McNally so I’m now the owner of a copy of Penguin By Design: A Cover Story 1935-2005 by Phil Baines. It’s a history of the jacket design of Penguin paperbacks. The display also had a cool section of 70 titles in the Pocket Penguin series. I bought a copy of Otherwise Pandemonium by Nick Hornby. It’s a really cute little book. About 60 pages. $4.00.

What McNally did well was create an atmosphere for browsing. I didn’t intend to buy either of these books. I actually went in to buy Water for Elephants, which is a Harper Collins book I’ve been looking for. I didn’t end up buying it because I read the first page and wasn’t terribly impressed. The displays of the other books though and the face out selections let me rediscover one book I’d been interested in before and newly discover a series of books that I think is really cool.

Speaking of browsing I have some comments on Chris Anderson’s The Long Tail and what he’s missing about the in-store browsing experience, even if the selection is smaller than an online retailer. And, I have a side thought on why it’s important for book publishers to look not just at what types of books are being published and promoted in stores but where people are actually browsing in store. But, that will have to wait for another day.

Yesterday was an early day for me. I woke up at 6 am to be ready for a phone interview with Frank Barnako of MarketWatch.com.

It was exciting to have a tech/marketing conversation about this thing I’ve been working on since November.

So what’s that thing?
Raincoast and At Large Media are producing a literary podcast series, and over the month of July we’ve been releasing the 3 parts of a podcast with Anthony Bourdain (author of Kitchen Confidential and The Nasty Bits and host of the Travel Channel show No Reservations).

The podcasts caught Frank’s attention because he writes the Internet Daily column for MarketWatch and because he’s a fan of Anthony Bourdain. So I got to have my few minutes of fame talking about a famous chef and the not-yet-famous Raincoast podcasts.

Here’s the link to the MarketWatch.com article.

And here’s the link to the Raincoast podcasts page. I think Part 2: The Book Signing is my favourite but perhaps a listener survey is in order.

While I’m plugging Raincoast, there’s also a Raincoast blog that I write, http://blogs.raincoast.com

Enough said about the day job.

Find an article you like? Want to know what similar articles people have linked to on Del.icio.us? You need Similicio.us
http://similicio.us/

It’s kind of crazy, but an interesting addition to Technorati searches.

I just returned home from a meeting at the Shebeen Club. We had a great discussion about censorship, and then I stumbled across this clip of George W. Bush and Tony Blair discussing the Middle East crisis at the G8 Summit. It’s lunchtime, it’s candid, it’s oops you’re mic is on.

Link to Reuters video clip.

If you were interested in the SFU New Media workshop, which sadly has been cancelled this year. Let me recommend WebVisions 2006 “Explore the Future of the Web”, which is taking place July 20 to 21, 2006 at the Oregon Convention Center in Portland, OR.

Home

Here’s how the organizers describe the conference: “Join the rockstars of design, user experience and business strategy: Jared Spool, Hillman Curtis, Luke Williams, Kelly Goto and a cavalcade of their fellow visionaries for two days of mind-melding on what’s new in the digital world. Get a glimpse into the future, along with practical information that you can apply to your Web site, company and career.”

The schedule looks packed with goodness. View the schedule.

DL Byron is going to be there and he’s great. I met him at the Blog Business Summit (which I also highly recommend), and of course the other speakers are also noteworthy.

I’m a little behind announcing this, but in case you haven’t heard, HarperCollins Canada is working with Foursevens Podcast Network to produce a podcast series.

The podcasts will be released twice a month and feature author interviews.

Among the authors tentatively scheduled:

* Gautam Malkani ñ Londonstani
* Jon Evans ñ Invisible Armies
* Sara Gruen ñ Water for Elephants (This is on my summer reading list. Circus life during the Depression. Here’s the description from the Harpers website: “Orphaned and penniless at the height of the Depression, Jacob Jankowski escapes everything he knows by jumping on a passing train and inadvertantly runs away with a struggling, second-rate circus. But Jacob finds work in the menagerie, where he becomes a savior for the animals. He also comes to know Marlena, the star of the equestrian act — and wife of August, a charistmatic but cruel animal trainer.” I’m looking forward to reading the book and then listening to the podcast. I like that the circus is second rate.)
* Lydia Millet ñ Oh, Pure and Radiant Heart
* Dennis Bock ñ The Communistís Daughter
* Rebecca Godfrey ñ Under the Bridge

I think podcasts are a great way for readers to engage with authors. Sometimes I want to listen to an author before I read the book, sometimes I want to listen after I’ve read the book. It’s dependent on who the author is and what I already know about them. Regardless, I’m always searching online for more information about authors I love and books that I’ve read or want to read.

While we’re talking podcasts, if you’re a fan of celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain, part 1 of the 3-part podcast from Raincoast Books and At Large Media is available today. www.raincoast.com/podcast/. Have a listen: direct link to MP3. Bourdain talks about the crazy questions he gets about himself and his books. There’s some life philosophy, reader questions and little insider tidbits about Bourdain’s life.

UPDATE: My mistake, HarperCollins started podcasting in January with Jay Ingram. Steve Osgoode wrote me a note saying they did 21 episodes. Thanks for the correction Steve. You can hear the first podcast by visiting:
http://www.jayingram.ca/archive/2006_01_01_jayingram_archive.html

I am a sucker for the artwork in old books. By old I mean pre-1900.

Look at the images on this site.
www.fromoldbooks.org

Peter Morgan notified me of it. The site is maintained by a Canadian and includes over 1,140 images scanned from more than 90 different old books.

There’s an RSS feed and an ATOM feed. Happy days.