The Subscription Age

You ever get a magazine subscription – and sometimes read it?  You still renew it you know . . . just in case.

Or maybe you get comics in a pull at a comic store.  You buy them, and might even read them.

Or a book club.

Or . . .

Well you get the idea.  We all have experience with subscriptions one way or another.  However in an age of eMedia, DLC games, and the iPad-ness, think about what kind of subscriptions you're going to see.

I think we're going to see a lot more subscriptions in the future.  Your business models, your publishing models, and your estimates on profitability are going to need to keep this in mind.  If you're writer, an ePublisher, a game developer, this will be a factor.

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The Wall Goes Up

When my IT career first got really going, way back in 1995-1996, I had applied the "modern" tools of job searching.  These were advanced things like online job ads, fax modems, and so forth.  Yes, there was a time when people not only used faxes a lot, doing it from your computer was impressive.

So as my career progressed in 1996, I was speculating on my career and noting the role of technology in the job search.  I met people who were keeping up with technology in their job searches, and I sensed something happening, a division among people in how they used technology in their careers.  Technology was an "enhancer" and people using it would get more and better connected, and it would produce a cultural shift.

I christened it "The Wall."  As technology advanced, some people would be more on the "inside", connected by technology and social understanding to career opportunities, some would not keep up on the technical changes to the job search and career building and loose out.

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Twilight Of The Book Covers – Originality And It’s Cycles

This should probably be a Frustration Friday, but it's fresh in my mind and probably not ranty enough.

So I try and write my weekly posts at a bookstore.  It's fun yet I stay focused, I get to get out, and in general, the change of pace helps me.  So as I take a break, something strikes me that I've seen before, but hadn't thought about viscerally.

A LOT of book covers look like ripoff's of Twilight's stark black-background covers.  I mean a lot.

Sure some have a bit more color or some variant, but it's usually dark-background and object and that's it.  I don't even know if some of these books have anything to do with vampires or even fiction.  With some of the titles, for all I know, I'm seeing a very pretentious cookbook.

So this got me thinking about originality in the age of geekonomics.

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