writing – Page 86 – Steven Savage

Introducing Informotron Press!

November 9, 2013 by Steven Savage

When I first started writing I didn’t know how much the writing bug would bite me – so I had several websites for my books. Over time I consolidated them because, well, it was hard to maintain, a bit useless, and didn’t let me really leverage what I was doing. So, finally, all my books are consolidated under my new imprint:

Informotron Press.

It’s all written in Bootstrap (which is what I rewrote Seventh Sanctum in), and in fact the Sanctum rewrite made this go much faster. Frankly, the whole Bootstrap thing is working for me – and the relatively standard, scaling layouts really do work. Bootstrap isn’t just a tool, it’s got good practices built into it.

So now, when you send your friends and family to my books (hey, Christmas is coming . . . ), they can find out about all the other books available. Best of all, when I post my various resources I can make sure more people get them!

So go check it out, let me know what you think – and remember more books are coming . . .

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach. He blogs on careers at http://www.musehack.com/, publishes books on career and culture at http://www.informotron.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

Link Roundup 10/1/2013

October 1, 2013 by Steven Savage

What’s up today?

Lucha Libro – A cross between writing and professional wrestling where the looser is unmasked. I cannot tell you how great this is, and how if you do any writing events at conventions you need to consider this.
Gaymer Connect 2014 announced! Sounds like they’re doing fantastic – and worth getting involved in.
How the Nerd community helped one person fight cancer. A reminder of the good we can do.
The more companies are covered by financial analysts, the worse they do. Sounds like the attention is actually bad – and suggests there may be a size/publicity critical level. Worth looking into.
Job-wise apparently there will be more Hardee’s. Yeah, I know. Work is work.

– Steven “The Masked Randomizer” Savage

Competence Porn In Fiction Versus Gaming

August 23, 2013 by Steven Savage

I loved the article io9 did about the loss of Competence Porn (watching competent people do competent things) in SF. It noted how many SF stories had lost that element, leaving us with assorted “average” guys, non-scientists, and the like facing SF situations. I had to agree, at least on an intuitive level.

I miss tales of scientists and engineers solving stuff. I grew up with Dick Seaton (real name) of the Skylark stories. I, like many, wanted to be Spock or Scotty. I loved the idea of Iron Man and engineers making cool stuff.

I wasn’t into the idea that someone someone who lacks knowledge and skill (and doesn’t acquire them) is going to solve things. Wasn’t believable. Wasn’t a good story really. Didn’t give me anything to aim for.

(I could go into this as part of anti-intellectualism or “My ignorance is the same of your knowledge” trend or whatever, but that’s for later).

This got me thinking about gaming, another form of storytelling.