Links Of The Day 10/8/2013

What’s up today?

Let’s get depressed in looking at how . . . well dumb Americans are compared to other people.  The computer skills part flips me out, frankly.  Well this tells you about your audience – and maybe some opportunities to train or help people.

Speaking about training, here’s an excerpt that trashes crap advice books fro 1909.  NOTHING has changed, has it?  No.  Worth reading – and a warning on the advice you may be getting from various sources, it may have been crap for 100 years.

I just found out about this evolving writing site, Describli.  Keep an eye on it . . .

Games-wise news: SquareEnix is porting some Dragon Quest games to smartphones.  Well you’ve got my attention – and this is a beloved series which has it’s mobile series as well.  Smart move – and a reminder again that phones are a great way to re-release games.

Amazon wants to lure in Kindle developers and is offering rewards.  They want this pretty damn bad apparently – if you want to take advantage of it is another question.

The BBC has gotten into its own store for downloading and keeping shows.  Interesting move.  So who’s next – and how will this affect media alliances?

– Steven “Now Available On Mobile” Savage

Political ePublishing: A Frontier To Consider

We talk about publishing here a lot at Muse Hack. That’s because a lot of us are writers professional or otherwise. Also its because in an age of technology that has made self-publishing easy, there’s a lot to talk about.

Oh and some of us want to sell books. Hint.

But when we talk about self-publishing and its implications we usually talk quality, or technology, or market saturation. We don’t talk politics a lot because its not usually a subject that comes up.

It probably should have.

Before his son’s trial, the father of George Zimmerman has released an ebook on the case. Frankly it’s sounding like it’s filled with dog whistles about racism in the black community and kinda missing the point.  I don’t think this is going to help his son and may look exploitative.

Before I go on let me note that:

1) I consider Zimmerman’s shooting of Martin to be suspicious to say the least, but that’s what a trial is for.

2) I hate the show trial mentality.

3) Our political pundit culture hasn’t helped.

This is one of the last things I imagined coming out of the Zimmerman case. I figured after the trial there’d be the usual round of books by people capitalizing on it. I also realize I was foolish in this day and age for thinking of that.

Read more

Target Douses The Kindle

Yes, Target is phasing out the Kindle in it’s stores.  Amusingly, the Nook isn’t getting the same treatment.  They site “conflict of interest.”

There is plenty of conflict of interest – Amazon is competing with big stores like Target, Wal-Mart, etc.  This is also a gutsy move as this stuff is popular, so I figure Target has very good reasons.

My takes?

  • I think Target is going to side more with Nook for now.  B&N isn’t a competitor and can be an ally.
  • Remember B&N is also allied with Microsoft.  Keep in mind what this can mean.
  • Note nothing from Wal-Mart.  I still think they might make a low-price play/deal for some media or tablet device – but something like this could mean they seek an ally (and a way to take on Amazon)?
  • This is key as it’s someone striking right back at Amazon.  Others may feel emboldened to follow.
  • I would strongly consider the chance there’s other initiatives we don’t know about.

Steven Savage