YouTube's support for Black creators is FAKE.

 By now many of you have seen the banner ads that scream, "we're celebrating Black voices!"

I encourage you to click on those ads.

Not because then you'll have the opportunity to support struggling Black creators. You should do that.

But because you'll have the opportunity to see YouTube trying to take credit for Black work.

Every single creator in that highlight is HUGE. These are creators who have created their own kingdoms DESPITE a racist-designed algorithm that only shows people things that are similar to what they have seen in the past. 

You have to understand that the algorithm, while not racist itself because it is a machine, creates racist results with this "only show you stuff I think is similar to what you've seen before." See, because of financial access to filming, because of technology access, because of historical inequality, what people have seen in the past, the strongest accounts on YouTube, are white creators for the most part (with the exceptions of Asians like Ryan Higa, the once-king of the platform before the Pewdiepie era). 

The algorithm is changing. But the fact is that most of those creators on that YouTube voices showcase succeeded despite, not because of, YouTube's "help."

So it's kind of gross for YouTube to use their faces as a "hey, look, we're not racist!" 

I hate YouTube's CEO, too, by the way. 

Yo, YouTube, if you really want to support and showcase Black creators, find SMALL creators who haven't had their big break. African Xhosa ASMR does an amazing job showcasing her culture, by the way...would you ever showcase an ASMRtist, or are you too afraid to admit how much money we bring in?

There are other smaller Black creators who don't necessarily agree with your ideology but deserve the spotlight, too. I'm well aware of what you did to Machosauceproductions, that while you allow white conservatives to get a break, for most part, you demonetized him, a Black conservative, because Black people aren't "allowed" to have various diverse opinions. Look, he's no friend of mine--he kind of ghosted my team and wasn't very polite to my Black female producer. But he made content he believed in, had a lot of fans, and you silenced him. 

YouTube, do a search for smaller creators. You have the option. Showcase them, and give them their big break. If you have the balls, instead of hiding behind numbers Black creators drummed up on their own. 

Egh fake allies drive me nuts.

How to build a huge Twitter presence: A Case Study with Scifi Author Doug Wallace

Every now and then when you're browsing Twitter, you'll find that social media done right. You know: tens of thousands of followers, a fun, snappy bio, and engaging, colorful tweets that aren't trying to sell a thing.

That's Doug. By day he's a native Texan computer security expert residing in Salt Lake City with his four children, but by other times of day, he's an "inkslinger licensed to quill" with a solid bio and a really fun, engaging Twitter feed. He's actually gotten so many followers that editors began to take notice, so I thought we could ask him for a little advice.

Cost-effective and Encouraging: Review of Bill Taub's "Automatic Pilot" Screenwriting Text

Second year of medical school is taking up my blogging time! But I thought I'd share with you writers and fiction fans a resource I recently discovered. It's called Automatic Pilot, and it's about how to write the first episode of a TV show.

Next to Syd Field's Screenplay textbook, I'd say Bill Taub's Automatic Pilot ranks as one of the best beginning screenwriting resources I've yet encountered.

“Well, stranger, what have you encountered? What does that even mean?”

Good question. I'm not an expert screenwriter, but I am an expert “screenwriter-resources” purveyor, if such a pitiful occupation exists. From college classes to online classes to online resources to books to at least three or four different “screenwriting resource companies”--eh, I've actually spent a few hundred bucks studying screenwriting. (Shivers in shame)

A number of those resources tend to repeat the same basics over again, so I really liked that while Automatic Pilot included the most important fundamentals of screenwriting for beginners, it also delved into TV-industry-niche specifics, a wide variety of structure techniques and suggestions, and Taub's own positive writing philosophy. The strong motivational tone of the book makes you feel like you've got people on your side—because when you're writing for yourself you've got you on your side, Taub might say—and as someone who used to write for a living I found that incredibly empowering. In med school you don't get a lot of time to read, so I bought the audiobook to play while I ate or whatever. Taub's encouragement was, for me, the writerly equivalent of blasting rap music on the highway, or rocking out when you're pumping iron: I got pumped up! There's something to be said for that.

For those of you who prefer more concrete definitions of value, we should probably talk about $$$. Automatic Pilot is actually a compilation of all the resources and reading material from a University class Taub taught/teaches on writing good pilot episodes for television. As you may know, it usually costs more than twenty bucks to access a University-level screenwriting class. Even cheap professional classes online bill as much as $90—I got a discount on a decent “Third Act” class for $45 once, but generally comparable screenwriting classes enter the ring weighing in nearer the hundreds mark.

To give you a more detailed cost-analysis, Hal Croasmun from ScreenwritingU charges $90 for a class that involves about thirty pages of reading material and no feedback from the professor. I'm not downing on Croasmun—apparently he's pumping out writers who make deals left and right—but pointing out, to you, that for $20 or less I can get nearly 200 pages from Taub, all new and unique information pertaining specifically to the TV industry. That's pretty good math.

Automatic Pilot is heavy with repetition, though. That's probably less of an issue in the hardcopy (which I also bought to keep as a skim-able resource), and for some folks repetition's essential to enhance learning, so it's not necessarily a drawback. I found it a bit much sometimes, but on the other hand a lot of the repetition was also a lot of the motivational cheerleading I enjoyed. If you're looking for new plotting tricks and tools to amp up your game; if you're unfamiliar with a lot of TV-writing terminology and structural customs; and if you'd like to tap the brains of multiple TV-writing experts before you start writing yourself into a crash-and-burn, a little repetition and two Red Robin meals is a fair price to pay.

I think, anyway.

What do you guys think? Any other screenwriting resources you've run into lately that you like?

When is it right to kill off a character?

I think about this a lot. So now I'm going to talk too much. 

So, Unqualified Death Philosophy 101. 

Obi-Wan's death is a good example of "death via natural character arc."

Just after WWII a lot of "realist" writers began to really promote the Classical Greek idea of a "needless death," and that's a trend that's continued into a lot of writing today (George R.R. Martin is super-fond of this). But I really believe "needless death" is not actually realistic. All deaths have reasons and arcs behind them. We die because of a logical series of events, either through a natural progression of a disease we picked up, or through choices we and others make--not necessarily bad choices, either. Death is a natural progression in a story, and shouldn't be shoved in just for the sake of death's impact (eg, hopelessness, emotional pull, loss, all the stuff that comes with death). We never "randomly" die, and we don't die just for the sake of death. Even if I walk under a book shelf and a vase randomly falls on my head to kill me, in real life there was a progression before the vase, a story, a series of "butterfly wing flaps" that put the vase exactly where it was, a cause and effect: even if in my limited experience I don't KNOW the cause and effect, it's still there.

"Okay, duh, a death needs cause/effect plot and all that." But I'm actually not talking about plot. That's just the surface. I'm actually talking about character development. Maybe I'm full of it and this is bullpoop, but I'm a firm believer that a character dies in a story when he's thematically "ready." That doesn't mean that he necessarily feels ready, or even expects death, but either he's finished his emotional journey, or he's embarking on a new emotional journey in the memory of another character impacted by the death. I say it that way on purpose, instead of saying he's triggering someone else's emotional journey: a dead character is still a character, and remembering that helps us avoid turning our characters into plot points and killing them off just for the sake of moving other characters along (eg., Woman in a Refrigerator Trope). I'd almost ask: "is it in this character's best interest, not as a person but as a character, to die?"

That's a weird question, 'cause we think it's never in someone's best interest to die, but for a character arc it really can be. Putting a villain to rest is often in his best interest as a character arc, to finalize his emotional story and personal tragedy; a sacrificial death is often in a character's best interest to solve the struggles he's worked through and to highlight his triumph above his own self-interest; the tragic death of an innocent can be in a character's best interest to give him immortality in the other characters' minds, and to give him a strength he never had in life.

So, perhaps look at what's in the character's best interest emotionally, and don't just look at what the death will do to other characters. Forget your big story as a whole for a moment, perhaps. Each character, even minor characters, are protagonists in their side stories, even if the reader doesn't see it, so death should be a major point in THAT CHARACTER's story, not just because of what it does to the MC or the overall plot, but because it individually advances the minor character's theme. Does your character's emotional arc wrap up well with death? How will he, as a dead character, continue to work in the story (absence is a way to work in a story!), and is that future post-death existence a natural and logical answer to his pre-death existence?

That may make no sense whatsoever, but that's how I decide character deaths. Death is punctuation--it's the period after a fully-realized life sentence, or it's the dash that drives a character's impact into the next scene.

Okay, Imma shut up now. As always, ignore me if that's useless information for you, and thanks for letting me share!

Short and Sweet: Why YA is a Realistic Category and Teens who will Save the World

I've heard a few people say that inherently, YA is kind of an unrealistic book category--I mean, if a teenager had to save the world, we'd all be SCREWED. And covered in those stupid Ke$ha posters.

Hold up, are you kidding me? Teenagers have saved the world over and over again throughout history. Back in the day teenagers used to be the captains of ships, the fodder for armies, even the rulers of nations. It only takes a quick look through European, Chinese, or American history to find examples: Alexander the Great, Joan of Arc, King Tut, they were all influential teenagers. Most pirate captains started out as teens, and the historical mother of Jesus was most likely only 14 when she did her thing and challenged all known religion with her belief she'd been impregnated by YHWH.

Historically, "teenager" is a 50s phenomenon that was invented to describe a new transitional phase in a rapidly gentrifying and comfort-based society. It's not a real thing, it's a construct.

Teenagers can still save the world, if they stop believing that they have to wait until they "grow up" to fulfill their dreams. These teenagers are doing it right now: http://archive.causes.msn.com/kids_save_the_world/?section=gallerylong

Never ask a kid what he wants to be when he grows up. Ask him what he wants to be, and show him how he can take steps towards that NOW.

Why you DON'T want to make your living writing

I know, weird, right? Usually writers dream of making money writing; we drool over all those great e-mails telling you how you can quit your day job and spend forever doing what you want.

But I'm here to tell you maybe you don't want that.

I totally lived that dream, and I'm glad I did—quitting my day-job pushing pills probably did more for my business-sense, faith, and guts than any other experience in my life. Definitely my first choice for a full-time job, if I don't make it in medicine. I didn't get rich, and I didn't get famous, but for almost a year my frantic typing and lots of grace from above provided just fine for my tiny family (me, in-college husband, and hedgehog!). I ghosted four books, tons of articles, and even got my name out there a little bit. One of my ghosted books made it to Amazon best seller's list in its category for a week. (Because it was ghosted you have to ask me privately for my client's permission to prove that, but I totally can if you're curious) Yeah, it was awesome. 

But you know what? I'm a much happier writer now that it's not keeping the air conditioning running. Because--

When writing isn't your bacon and cheese, your rice and kimchee, your bread and butter, you can write:

1. What you want

Sorry, but if you blog for a living, or ghost, or even write news, at some point someone's going to tell you, “I want it like this.” And at some point, unless you have magical mind-control powers, you are going to have to obey. It's the client's blog, it's the client's voice in the book, and it's the client's money. Fortunately, I've worked with some really good clients and editors who listened to me and played a pretty decent back and forth, but I've also worked with folks you can never please, folks who lose your work, and folks who make grammatically-destructive edits (cringe). And even the best clients in the world won't pay you to write your dream novel. They want you to write theirs. That's fine, but if you've got a story to tell, it's frustrating spending all your time telling other people's stories.

It's not much different in fiction-writing, from what I hear. I mean, think about it, if writing brings home the tofurkey, not all the publishing people living off your established werewolf-driven urban fantasy will let you just up and start writing historical fiction. They know people in the new genre might not take you as seriously, and they don't want to risk their incomes because you got some Roman classics on the brain. So you either jeopardize your income stream because your established crew won't publish you, or you keep writing the same lycanthropes until you vomit silver bullets.

Or, if writing's not your main source of sizzling, greasy, life-sustaining bacon, you go ahead and write that historical fiction anyway. You've got time for rejections.

See how much easier that is?

2. When you want

Sure, if you're a writer for a living, you can write all day long. And sometimes all night long. And then you have to spend the next day catching up on networking. And then you realize “networking” became wasting time on twitter and you have to start all over again with five energy shots to pump out 15,000 more words in the next eight hours. And then you have writer's block for a week, and your husband comes back from class in his clothes and you're still dead exhausted in your pjs with drool in your hair, and you know he's wondering if you're all going to starve.

People often underestimate the physical pressure of having to write all the time—and I think people really underestimate how that affects the quality of your work. You get tired. You need to experience life. Living creates new ideas and scenes and expressions for your writing, and without brain stimulation from science and problem-solving and people and struggle, your writing can stagnate fast. Your life is outside your writing. Writing is what you do about it.

So, it's definitely pretty great to set your own schedule for work and everything, but it's also pretty great not to have to. Stealing an hour a day, or half an hour a day, into your own little sanctuary without worrying about deadlines—that's lovely. Freedom from yourself, really, is kind of nice.

3. How you want

The junction between art and writing might get you into museums, but unless you can prove your avant-garde Arizona-tea-labels-glued-to-the-wall will make $$$ it's a no-go for a paid writer. You wanna add a comic strip to your novel? Make a digital hyperlink chase all over the internet? What's new and unique to you looks weird to other people. Not to me—I love it—but it's tough to get money put down on stuff that's not proven itself before, especially during an economic down-turn. 

That's not to discourage you from trying crazy new techniques. Absolutely not. There's Kickstarter, Indiegogo, Youtube—tons of ways to pull in money for your crazy new mind-meld. It's just easier to run that crazy new idea when you know it's not going to put you out on the street.

So.

I am not saying all this to tell you to keep your soul-munching office job. No. Please quit that. A veteran newspaper editor I respect once took the time to tell me a secret: “They want all of you kids to finish college and work for a corporation or the government where you're neatly controlled, like in a commune. But that's not what you're supposed to do. You're all supposed to be graduating to start your own small businesses.” It sounded kind of intense at the time, but you know what? We were meant to be masters of our own lives. Running a farm, or your own little market stall, or hunting and gathering your own food may not sound glamorous to most modern people, but our souls stagnate without risk and opportunity, just like our immune systems attack us without parasites to fight (that's where autoimmune disease and allergies come from). We should be creating and fighting for products and services we believe in and coming up with new ideas, not just taking what's there. Please quit your job and write instead of melting.

But you know what? Maybe writing full-time isn't the risk you're meant to take. Maybe you're meant to be an astronaut or ITC gal or brilliant home-maker or that pizza-guy who arranges peperoni into hearts for people in long-distance relationships. (True story) Maybe you've got something else to add to the world besides the words on your page.

And maybe then you'll always have something to write about.

Sneak Previews: Interview with Star Thief Author Jamie Grey

Barnes and Noble
Amazon
Smashwords

Today, we've got Jamie Grey, the author of the new NA Science Fiction novel, Star Thief. And when I say new, I mean, hot-and-piping-so-new-you-couldn't-get-this-three-days-ago-new. You can check out the blurb and cover copy by clicking below that snazzeh picture over there.

<<<< Go ahead, we'll wait. Do come back though. We're going to explore some author/character relationships and get you some exclusive content insight into this new book!

Okay, Jamie, I think they're back. That looks like them, anyway--aren't they beautiful? 

So, why did you write Star Thief?

Jamie: I think it was because I was a huge fan of sci-fi romance books and just didn’t find very many out there. So, basically I was trying to write the type of book I wanted to read! And I love space, so there’s that too   

Jen: Oh, I love that! Besides the contribution to the genre, what, to you, is the most important aspect of the book? By that I mean, what do you want most to leave with your readers when they've shut the back cover?

Jamie: I want them to be in love with the characters and world, and breathless from the ride. I also want them to be desperate to read the next book!

Jen: Cool. So--what is a Star Thief?

Jamie: LOL Good question. I can’t give away *too* much, but let’s just say a Star Thief is someone who can steal the most heavily guarded artifact in the galaxy and not get caught.

Jen: What's the biggest problem for your protag throughout the book? To deepen the question, what does Renna consider worse: the fate of the universe in her hands, or the relationship issues?
 

Jamie: I think Renna’s biggest problem is trying to balance the fact that she’s spent all of her life trying to look out for herself and do what’s best for her, and now suddenly she’s in a situation where she has to look out for other people and she has no idea how to react.

She’s been careful to keep her relationships superficial to protect herself, but somehow she’s gotten sucked into this complicated situation where she has to face her feelings and be responsible for other people and all sorts of things she doesn’t like. So yes, she’s fine with the action of saving the galaxy, not so much with having to figure out her emotions and feelings.

Jen: Do you think you and Renna would get along?

Jamie: Great question. To be honest? Probably not. I think I’d be really intimidated by her! The girls is pretty much bigger than life. She’s smart and abrasive and demanding and very self-confident. I think she’s the kind of person we all wish we could be, but don’t really like in person LOL.

Jen: Haha, well let's flip the question then! If Renna met you, what would she like most about you? Have you written anything that would make her mad?
 

Jamie: I think she’d like that I’m smart, a computer geek, and that I can blend in in most situations --always key for a good thief. As far as I know I haven’t written anything that would make her mad, but sometimes you just don’t know with Renna!

Jen: Speaking of content--just as a helpful guide for readers, what would you rate your book (G, PG-13, R) and why? (e.g., "super-steamy," "a scene of really dark violence and decapitation," "just some light kissing" or "nothing like that what's wrong with you")

Jamie: Since The Star Thief is a NA sci-fi romance, there are some definitely steamy scenes! Romance isn’t the only focus of the book, but it’s there. So, I guess if I had to rate it, between the sex and some mild violence, I’d probably have to rate it PG-13 or R.

Jen: Thanks for that, the honesty's super-helpful. Do you have a pet peeve in writing? This could range from a deep literary need or philosophical gap you want filled in science fiction right now, to something small like affect vs. effect. Whatever frustrates you a bit.

Jamie: I think right now in some old-school circles there’s a feeling that women can’t write good science fiction or don’t belong writing in the genre. That frustrates me on so many levels. I think we all bring different perspectives and experiences to the genre and excluding women lessens everyone’s enjoyment. Not to mention excluding a whole group’s ideas, characters and stories actually hurts sci-fi as a whole.

Jen: I see. Alright, now to the good! What's your favorite aspect of science fiction as a story-telling medium?
 

Jamie: The freedom to create a new world or play with our current world and explore different themes and ideas you can’t do in contemporary books. Seeing how someone reacts to a completely alien culture or world, or putting them in a situation no one has ever had to deal with before is really satisfying. But there’s also the ability to show that people are the same no matter when/where they live. Plus it’s just fun!

Jen: Right? I love new cultures, I love science, and I love space; it's the best genre. Anyway, finally, what's the most important sound in the world to you?
 

Jamie: I spent all of my summers with my grandmother at her lake house. We’d spend hours at night just staring up at the stars and watching for shooting stars with the sound of the waves lapping at the shore as a background, so I’d have to say the sound of water, specifically waves on a beach, is the most important sound to me!

Jen: I like that one. Water's probably the most common emotional response I get to that question--and everyone's bond to it is so very different. I love yours, that's a lovely image. 

Hey, thanks for indulging us with a visit to this little corner of the internet.

Jamie: Thanks so much for the fun interview and having me on your blog! I appreciate it! 

No, thank-you! 

So, my peeps, if you liked what you saw here, and you want to hear more from Jamie, feel free to check her out all these places:

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/jamiegreybooks?ref=hl

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/Jamie_Grey

BLOG: http://www.jamiegreybooks.com/

GOODREADS: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19146092-the-star-thief 

 And, if you'd like to read more author interviews, click on the little "author interviews" tag there, below this post. Right there.

I've also got a new batch of character interviews coming up, and a little free fiction, so stay posted! 

Remember--you're loved. 

Inbound Marketing: Which Software Platform Works for You?

In a world where all your customers, your grandmother, and you, yourself have grown weary to death of interruption marketing, world-over entrepreneurs have begun embracing a little thing called inbound marketing. The principle is quite simple: rather than interrupting customers with ads, commercials, and pop-ups, become accessible. Become search-able. Become so great, delicious, effective, or whatever that your customers market your product for you.

This is especially important for writers--especially self-publishers--to understand: we don't want book commercials or twitter spam promoting your work every ten seconds, we want you to provide useful web content that makes us interested in promoting your work ourselves!

Delightful marketing begins with an organized internet campaign. Many business owners manage inbound marketing via a conglomeration of different programs--one outlet for a blog, another for e-mailings, a separate twitter account--but several integrated software platforms exist to accomplish all this in one package.

Hubspot

By far the easiest inbound marketing platform to find online--which says something of their own marketing--Hubspot offers

• Keyword research/SEO optimization tool
• A blogging platform
• Twitter and Facebook account management with keyword tracking and auto-publish features
• URL tracking
• Landing page customization, with optimization features to promote better conversion (turning traffic into leads)
• List management to allow targeted marketing to different aspects of your consumer base
• A thinner, prettier version of Google Analytics
• An app marketplace
• Web design management and more.

--all for $200 a month.

The biggest inherent concern with Hubspot other reviewers have? You get what you see: the websites, blog, and even analytics tools aren't as nitty-gritty, customizable, and "computer-programmy" as doing it all yourself--good news for small business owners without any tech experience, bad news for experienced SEO geeks or anyone who enjoys Wordpress functionality. By far the most focused on pure inbound marketing, and the most friendly, this software suite may be best for beginners. This is something your self-published author might use.

Marketo

This "grown-up" platform puts less emphasis on social media and blogging, and more emphasis on slightly more traditional marketing techniques, with features included for off-line events, phone calls, and mailings. It includes:

• E-mail marketing with deep CRM
• Smart-lists that allow customizable e-mails to target the right consumer base
• Polls, etc, and other customizable content on landing pages
• Events organization coordinating on-line and off-line events--with landing pages, e-mails, etc.
• Sales insight for when-ready leads and phone calls
• Track-able snail mail
• Tracking of marketing "efficiency"--which leads come from where
• Contests and sweepstakes to engage social media users
• Intense keyword research/SEO optimization
• Activity log that tracks each customer's engagement all along the way, allowing for strong relationship-building

--all for $1,195 a month.

Reviewers have complained that using the program really requires technical knowledge, even when it comes to designing simple e-mails--otherwise results simply don't look as professional. Marketo support takes a while to respond, forcing most users to rely on the fortunately blossoming social community around Marketo for advice. The social media platform boils down to share buttons and Facebook content, with nothing to populate twitter and little information for blogging. This all adds up to make Marketo a bit less friendly that Hubspot. Nevertheless, the power to see which marketing techniques generate leads, the extremely sophisticated analytics, and the ability to manage off-line marketing provide huge draws for Marketo. This is something your publishing company might use.

Infusionsoft

Infusionsoft advertises itself as software built for "Joe and Janette"--for small business owners. Features include:

• Web activity monitoring, tracking financial return on investments by lead source
• Drag-and-drop landing page and web form generator
• Automated follow-up campaigns triggered by very visual, easy to plan marketing maps
• Automatic page submission--their ad page calls this "search engine optimization," but it's really only submission to search engines and meta tag inclusion using user-supplied keywords
• Pre-built campaign templates include ideas like remembering customer's birthdays and automating certain contact requests
• Drag-and-drop e-mail marketing that includes spam scoring
• Contact management and prioritization, to allow targeting of most-interested customers first
• Integration with Wordpress, Customer Hub, Kajabi to create paid-access-only website areas

--all for $219 a month, plus the required training package fee around $1,999.

The e-mail software doesn't work well with Mac, and of course, as with many drag-and-drop programs, the customizability for web forms, e-mail, etc, is limited. The software's greatest benefit lies in its deep integration--with campaign ideas and automation provided, small business owners can run a marketing plan that works from start to finish rather than checking every stop. Social media integration really isn't included, and some have said the sales reports are difficult to navigate. Reviewers suggest that if you have less than 20 employees, this software might work for you. This is something your big-time self-published author or small publisher might use.

Eloqua

At $2,000 a month minimum, this is Marketo's scarier big brother, the most expensive and largest marketing platform here. Experienced marketers--and marketers with deeper pockets--often go for this major market shareholder right away. Features include:

• Campaign designer with precise controls--includes campaign automation from start to finish
• Intensely targeted marketing with contact profiling and standardized data management
• Social data management with apps and reports on social media activity--includes integration with Youtube, LinkedIn, twitter, FB, etc, and the ability for consumers to sign into your website using social media so you can collect data on them
• Revenue performance software to track marketing efficiency
• Event management
• Incredibly detailed, sophisticated, multi-optioned web and e-mail builder
• Personalized tech support
• Various other features updated regularly

This is the giant everything-beast, although it does not allow automated tweeting or Facebook posting from within the Eloqua software. That's not much of a loss for a social suite whose social media integration is so intense, you can know almost everything about your consumers as soon as they sign in to your web page. Users recommend Eloqua because of its full tech support, detailed data management systems, and the ability to follow customers from start to finish.

Eloqua allows for large companies to integrate their strategies across brands and websites. There isn't much focus on blogging or quality content generation, though--this suite is more about e-mail campaigns, website optimization, and social media data collection. Businesses that use Eloqua usually assign many marketing professionals to all its different aspects, and for that reason Eloqua allows for multiple security groups. Not every user has access to everything--that minimizes human error. This is something your giant publishing group might use.


Each inbound marketing tool works for different professionals, with Eloqua and Marketo targeting larger companies while InfusionSoft and Hubspot target smaller businesses. In the end, your decision to utilize an inbound marketing platform like these will depend not only on your technical knowledge, business size, or the features of the software, but upon whether or not you want to "do it yourself"--and to what extent. Many authors, who'd rather spend their time writing, may find an integrated package provides peace of mind and boosts sales, but for now I think I'll stick to doing-it-myself! Do you use any marketing software? How's your inbound technique? 

Writing with Love

In a little tidbit from the book "How to Win Friends and Influence People," by Dale Carnegie (short version of the book here), Carnegie tells a story about a writer who failed because no matter how well he wrote, his readers could tell he disdained them.

Do you love your readers?

Are you furious, writing satirically because you're pissed off at society and you want change? Good. But does that bitterness begin to target your readers, or does it, in true Mark Twain style, invite them into your side, your sarcasm, your vengeful inside joke with you?

Are you telling a story for the sake of art? To make something beautiful for you, for its own sake, and "who cares what they think"? Good. But does that art exclude your reader, or does it invite her down a path she's never taken? When you stand alone, unique against the onslaught of conformity, is your reader allowed to stand with you?

There's always a debate, a tension, between writing something publishable and writing something true to you. The thread that ties these together--the equation that collapses the paradoxical wave function, if you like quantum things--is love. Love of your subject drives you to uniqueness, to your story, to your art, to your fire, your satirical stand alone; love of the people drives you to motivate them, to revision and more, to the adaptation of art so that it's accessible to someone who isn't you. Love forces you to look inside yourself, and yet step outside yourself. Love makes you listen to your agent and to critique, because you want to give something to your reader. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love rejoices in the truth (1 Cor 13)--the true story you weave through fiction, the story beyond what is "publishable." But love bears all things.

Love is the best way to write a book.

Johnny Storm gives us a black Human Torch--but I'm afraid he's only going to reinforce racial stereotypes

David Willis recently posted this comic, and it was funny. Folks have taken Marvel superhero Johnny Storm (Human Torch) and apparently they're going to make him black. Some people are apparently complaining, because they hate black people.

Detail, cover of Fantastic Four #542^{[date missing]}
Art by Adi Granov, found at wikipedia

I'd be more worried about Johnny Storm doing a disservice to the black comics community at large. He's loud, obnoxious, reckless, and a sleeping-around-cheater--basically every stereotype white people throw at black men to justify racism. While Storm's newly-black sister Sue might be a voice of reason, it's super-easy to stereotype the "mystical black woman" and she might well fit that stereotype, depending on the writing. Better idea: why can't they make Reed Richards black? Oh, is it because the smart scientist isn't allowed to be black? They had to choose the noisy obnoxious loud guy to be black instead? Geez, that's great.

These comic artists cannot get race right. When you pallete-swap an already-established character you're almost always going to fall into some kind of stereotyping--the authors are too old and too white to make a "black version" of an established character without egregious anti-black racism involved in some way or another. In comics, it's better to make all-new characters with fresh storylines. Static Shock, for example, was created based on a black Spiderman, but he became his own character with his own powers, and it was always interesting because he's his own guy. The black Spiderman in Ultimate comics isn't a black Peter Parker--he's his whole new own character and he rocks. See, there should have been more unique black characters to begin with. We don't need the same characters booted over and over. Put them to rest, let the stories end, and get all-new characters so that creativity can flourish and race stereotypes aren't permeated. Creating a "black batman" or a "black superman" is just a way for old white men to point out to black people, "look, we never made any black characters for you--so you can re-use on of our old ones. We're too lazy to actually make good, unique characters for you, we'll just reboot some we've already used to death."

I want new superheroes that actually speak to all races and subcultures, not re-sale, re-used, re-washed pallette-swapped stereotype opportunities. What about some decent Asian superheroes, or mixed race superheroes? If you just keep painting Superman or some other guy all different colors, these different characters don't actually get to interact. Where's the fun in that? The black audience is worth more than reboots and used characters. The black audience is worth fresh characters that span a whole gamut--not just one or two that fit certain stereotypes--with new powers, new costumes, and all kinds of new awesome.

Three Good Ways to Make Money as a Casual Writer...

...because when I first started out I had no idea where to start. I was just googling. Go forth! Read below!

Way 1: Ghost-write an ebook for someone

What: If you're casually writing, and don't have time to market/build an ebook, write someone else's book. You get money, they get the rights. The money can range from $200-$450 for a small, easy book, to several thousand if you're an experienced ghost-writer working on a major project. It's great voice practice (eventually, if you ever write first person POV, you don't want all your characters to sound like you) and you'll learn a ton about whatever topic you're researching. I don't ghost-write fiction, because I think then someone else is stealing all your creativity, which is appalling, but when you ghost-write nonfiction you're essentially helping someone else tell the world something important that you wouldn't otherwise know. So that's cool.

Warning: Whatever you do, do NOT take less than $150 for 50 pages. In the freelancing world there's this huge problem where part-time freelancers will take horrible rates--like a few cents a page--which screws over all the full-time freelancers. Why? We can't make a living earning a $4 an hour or whatever you get for a few cents a page. For you, maybe it's just a fun way to get paid for writing, but for other people you're controlling the Invisible Hand into a stranglehold. Besides, don't you think your work is worth more than a few cents a page? Some people would put the threshold even higher than I've put it here and say don't ever write for less than 3 c a word. For easy projects, and to be realistic--because not all small business owners can afford something like that--I bend that, especially when I'm taking on a project I care about. I helped write this awesome book for about $2 a page, which is about 1/14 what I normally make and a terrible rate, but I'm proud of it because I helped someone--who didn't have a lot of money, or the writing skills to tell his awesome story--say something that makes a difference. That's what ghost-writing is about.

Why is this a warning? If you accept substandard rates on content you don't really believe in, I will send Batman to come strangle you.

Yes, Batman. He owes me one free strangle. I ghost-wrote his best stuff.*

How to get started: Check out sites like odesk.com. I found my best long-term clients through Odesk. Go back and read the warning up above, because there are a frack-ton of people out there buying hard work for nothing. Don't take that crap. Take good rates. Calculate minimum wage, and add and subtract how much a project means to you emotionally, and let that be your guide.

Way 2: Ghost-blog

What: Companies--especially small businesses--need to increase their web presence, and thankfully, google won't let them do that by just spamming keywords onto the internet. With the new google updates (not so new anymore), google looks for good content that people want to read. So what if you've got a small business owner who needs that web presence, but doesn't have time to write a whole buncha good blogs?

That's where I--or you--come in. I love ghost-blogging, because I get to actually use my biomedical engineering and history research experience to, yannow, research. I get about $25 a blog. I don't like taking less than that, because these are pretty darn research-intensive (I do science blogs mostly). Write what you know.

Warning: Voice, voice, voice. Get your voice to match your client. There's a two-way paradigm here. As long as your name doesn't go on it, it's not going to hurt you, so write whatever your client wants. Edit the way your client wants you to. On the other hand, you want to be able to get recommendations in the future, and your writing samples are the best tool you have to get more writing done. So don't write veritable crap.

ALSO, "Fight for the Users" (#tronreference) and don't put out misinformation. People out there will trust you. You want them to trust you. You don't want your client to promote lies, and you don't want your client to look stupid. You want to write with love. Seriously. So keep that in mind--"how will this thing I'm writing benefit my client and my reader"--and don't write crap.

Anything that has your name on it? Don't sacrifice a bit of quality. That's no longer ghost-blogging. Don't let them make you write lifeless stuff, either, or stuff you don't believe in.

How to get started: Scripted.com. I've been "scripting" since 2011 and I really love it. However, scripted is starting to get so many writers now it's hard to find jobs. So it's great for casual money-making. You can find some ghost-blogging jobs on Odesk, too.

Way 3: Write to an online magazine.

What: This is straight-up normal writing. No ghosting, nothing super-fancy or secretive. Usually 3c a word. Check out this awesome list of markets.

Warning: Sometimes it's better not to write the article until after you've gotten the "okay" with the pitch. Check individual market guidelines so you can tailor your tone for a particular magazine.

How to get started: I gave you a link up there. Were you paying any attention?

^_^ Alright casual writers, go make money. I remember when I first started I had NO IDEA where to start, so I think this should help you a lot!

*Batman is not real^

^(Yes, he is.)