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Open-source .epub vs. Adobe .pdf

February 16, 2010 By Mark 10 Comments

Over the past few days I’ve been reading up on e-book file formats. I have a collection of short stories I want to publish, and I have a working understanding of the technology that readers will use to embrace that content, but until recently I haven’t worried too much about delivering content to that technology. (The main reason for my delay is simply the pace of change. Time spent trying to understand or master e-content technology six months ago would have put me at buggy-whip risk.)

As luck would have it, Mark Coker just released data about the file formats most in use on Smashwords, his e-publishing site. At the same time, Joel Friedlander pointed me to a useful video tutorial about formatting content using Adobe’s InDesign software, which seems to be the tool of choice for many people. From these two sources of information I was able to understand and easily navigate the first fork in the road on my own publishing journey.  [ Read more ]

Filed Under: Publishing Tagged With: ePub, Joel Friedlander, mark coker

Because I Can

December 30, 2009 By Mark 3 Comments

Maria Schneider at Editor Unleashed and Mark Coker at Smashwords are offering $500 for the best essay on Why I Write. The following is my entry. (Note: due to technical problems with the EU Forum, the contest deadline has been extended.)

I write because I can.

I can because I got lucky. I was born in a family that values the written word, in a town that values writing, in a state that values literacy, in a country that was founded on a document. Every cultural break a writer can get, I got, save being born rich. I didn’t choose where I was born and I didn’t value these things when I was young, but they stood as open doors and affected me greatly. I got lucky and I never forget it.

I write because I can.

I can because I live in a free country. I have the right to say what I think, even if you disagree. Even if everyone disagrees. I know all people do not have this right. I know there are countries where writers cannot be true to their reality and imagination. I do not take my freedom for granted.

I write because I can.

I can because I protected the writer in me from every teacher who tried to kill it. I loved writing when I was young, as long as I was allowed to write the way I wanted to write. I hated writing when someone told me how to write. I flunked a class in junior high rather than turn in a five-page science paper. You laugh, but it’s the truth. I never got over the idea that a thesis statement was redundant. I never got past the certainty that the lede in a newspaper article belonged at the end. I knew these things were wrong, instinctively. You don’t start a murder mystery by announcing that the butler did it.

I write because I can.

I can because I tried everything else first. I looked at every job, every career — anything to avoid writing, because I knew I loved it and I knew how hard it would be to care. I tried the blue-collar life. I tried nine to five. I went to college and pretended I was a psychology major. I took a long look at philosophy, even though I knew there was more to life than logic and reason. I took a lot of classes, but I never clicked with any subject the way I clicked with the ideas and words patiently waiting to get out of my head. I was those words.

I write because I can.

I can because every time I look at a blank page I’m seduced by the possibilities. I have never feared a blank page in my life. I can’t wait to gather small strands of nothing until they begin to talk to each other and fuse and give off heat. I see such connections the way other people see contrails in the sky and skid marks on the street.. They are as plain to me. I write them down because I think others would like to see them, too.

I write because I can.

I can because I trust myself. I don’t do things that undermine my own confidence. I try to eat well. I exercise. I am conscious of how fragile writing is, and I try to protect my writing by taking care of the writer I am. Life intrudes, yes. But I’m not sabotaging myself. I know I will meet my deadlines. I may pound my head on my desk from time to time, but that’s the way some stories are. Some births are easy, some are hell.

I write because I can.

I can because there is nothing else. I don’t have questions about what I should have done with my life. I don’t have regrets. I don’t ever wonder if I made the right choice. I know I made the right choice. Long before my peers settled on a career I knew there was nothing for me but writing. I knew there would be no road-not-taken. Frustrations, sure, I’ve got plenty. But I wouldn’t trade the gifts I was born with for the crosses I bear.

I write because I can.

I can because I am still alive. Whatever your beliefs about an afterlife, you only get so many years to write. If you want to write and you don’t write then you blew it. I’m trying not to blow it. I don’t want to die thinking I missed my chance. Existentialism is a big word for taking advantage of the life you have. Take advantage of the life you have.

Write. Because you can.

— Mark Barrett

Filed Under: ~ Tangents Tagged With: Contest, mark coker, smashwords

Finding Common Ground

October 10, 2009 By Mark 10 Comments

This post is in response to a recent series of Huffington Post editorials about the future of publishing. Each voice in these editorials, like each voice in the larger ongoing conversation, has a valid point of view. Ignoring how we got where we are, however, or the realities of this moment, fails to address the future that is hurtling toward us.

On Thursday, October 7, Mark Coker, CEO of Smashwords, posted an editorial titled, Why We Need $4.00 Books. As the head of a company devoted to servicing the e-book market, it’s not surprising that Coker touted the functional and distribution advantages of e-books over published texts, or that he focused on the crushing costs associated with maintaining the traditional publishing model while ignoring e-book costs and the threat of digital piracy. Coker also took notice of the publishing industry’s recent decision to withhold e-book versions of frontlist titles as a defense against cannibalizing book sales:

Many publishers view ebooks with a skeptical eye. After all, won’t cheap ebooks cannibalize expensive print books?

This is the wrong way to examine the situation. Lower cost ebooks help publishers retain customers who might otherwise abandon books altogether in favor of lower cost alternative media options.

Ebooks also hold the promise to expand the worldwide market for books. Hundreds of millions of new middle class and literate consumers have come online outside the US, especially in developing countries.

In Coker’s view e-books equal a larger market share for an industry facing intense competition for eyeballs. This larger market share would in turn compensate authors and publishers for a lower per-copy price.  [ Read more ]

Filed Under: Publishing Tagged With: HarperCollins, Kindle, mark coker, smashwords

Parallel Publishing

September 29, 2009 By Mark 1 Comment

There is word today that e-book publisher Smashwords is partnering with Sony to make Smashwords-published titles available on Sony’s e-book portal (and, by obvious extension, to Sony’s line of e-book readers). With Smashwords’ earlier announcement of a distribution deal making e-book titles available through Barnes & Nobles’ retail stores, it’s clear that the barriers to entry for independent authors in every market are falling by the wayside.

As a writer who wants to reach as many readers as I possibly can, and do so on their terms by supporting the format and technology that each individual is most comfortable with, it seems to me that I am very close to being able to do just that. I understand that there are a lot of issues to be worked out including compatibility problems, standards issues, proprietary attempts to own markets, etc., etc., etc., but from my point of view as a writer I don’t think I need to worry about these issues except to the extent that I need to understand the current offerings in order to exploit them.  [ Read more ]

Filed Under: Publishing Tagged With: distribution, mark coker, Publishing, self-publishing, smashwords

Site Seeing: Smashwords

September 7, 2009 By Mark 2 Comments

Visiting well-established e-book sites like Smashwords.com makes it clear that the possibilities inherent in the digital revolution are already being fully investigated. Here and on other sites I’m seeing every logical web-enabled expression of the middleman/publisher role in delivering content from creator to consumer. And in Smashwords I have to say that the clarity of this expression seems particularly good.

As someone who is interested in creating content that can be directly consumed by an audience, it’s still an open question whether I want to involve anyone else. If I was thinking about going that route, however, I would take a serious look at Smashwords because I think it gets a lot of things right. But you don’t have to take my word for it.  [ Read more ]

Filed Under: Publishing Tagged With: mark coker, site seeing, smashwords