4 posts tagged “new york times”
Authors are showing up on blogs to take reader questions and write guest posts. The appearances aren't limited to book blogs either. Have you written a book about a blossoming Jewish wallflower? Then you may want to write a post on a Jewish dating blog.
An interesting idea.
Every American may be working on a screenplay, but we are also continually updating a treatment of our own life — and the way in which we visualize each scene not only shapes how we think about ourselves, but how we behave, new studies find. By better understanding how life stories are built, this work suggests, people may be able to alter their own narrative, in small ways and perhaps large ones.
“When we first started studying life stories, people thought it was just idle curiosity — stories, isn’t that cool?” said Dan P. McAdams, a professor of psychology at Northwestern and author of the 2006 book, “The Redemptive Self.” “Well, we find that these narratives guide behavior in every moment, and frame not only how we see the past but how we see ourselves in the future.”-- New York Times, May 22, 2007 [link]
As a person who has been sharing his life story on the web for a few years now, and a journalist and writer telling other people's stories, I enjoyed the perspective in this article.
[Updated: Realized I forgot to link to the article.]
“People think publishing is a business, but it’s a casino.”
“The Newspaper Association of America has a staggering amount of data on people who read newspapers. The book business has, basically, nothing,” said Professor Greco. “They’re not going into the marketplace and doing mall intercepts and asking people, as they leave the bookstore, ‘What did you buy? Did you find what you’re looking for? What motivated you to choose that book?’ ”--New York Times, May 13, 2007
From the New York Times a great piece about the problems facing the publishing industry. Funny thing is, they know what the problems are, but "it's the way this business has run since 1640,” according to the article. Publishing companies have no real data on who's buying and reading their books. Seems like if a publisher would embrace the ideals of Web 2.0 they could turn the industry on its ear.
Now that the three young women in Candy Hill, a glossy rap and R&B trio, have signed a record contract, they are hoping for stardom. On the schedule: shooting a music video and visiting radio stations to talk up their music.
But the women do not have a CD to promote. Universal/Republic Records, their label, signed Candy Hill to record two songs, not a complete album. --New York Times [link]
That's right two songs. iPods and the iTMS have helped create a culture that values tracks over albums. Call me old school, but I still buy all of music by the album. I like to think that the artists making these albums put a lot of thought and effort into the song sequence, and that they want their listeners to hear them in that way in order to have a better, richer experience with their music. One of my favorite albums last year, The Decemberist's Crane Wife, definitely has to be heard as an album.
This singles mindset will only hurt artists, fans and music in general.
