“There are a multitude of ways to resist modern corporate culture. One can turn the TV off, walk to work or live off the grid.” Link
This intro copy is better than the actual blog post. I was hoping for a some business wisdom like a list of: ‘7 highly effective ways to resist The Man’ or ‘21 irrefutable rules for living outside the matrix.’ But, nay, verily, only a blog post about something that didn’t require reading beyond the intro paragragh.
[end transmission]
Deborah wonders if poets need to do a “better job of writing with an audience in mind.”
Seth suggests that people might improve their writing if they think like bloggers. He offers 9 tips:
What would happen if poets adapted those nine tips into their poetry?
You don’t have ‘a facebook.’ Facebook is a place, a network, not a page. You’re ‘on facebook,’ or you ‘use facebook.’
Seth Godin Link
An internet meme (link):
I’ll post my answers next weekend.
Every product starts out as inspiration, moves to the drafting board, the production line, and then goes into someone’s hands before ending up, finally, on the scrap heap.
Jeff Gomez, Print is Dead Link
[Originally uploaded by coffeehouse junkie]
Most Thursday nights a few years ago you would find me haunting the Beanstreets open mic. Then Beanstreets closed and there was an open mic vacuum.
The Dripolator used to offer an open mic event every Thursday, but that has changed to the first Thursday of the month. And it’s a different atmosphere from the Beanstreets days.
Courtyard Gallery has an open mic every Thursday. But last night it was canceled due to lack of host and attendees.
I sat on a bench beneath the Vance monument drinking coffee from a paper cup and wondered where to soak up some poetry vibes. Plenty of singer/songwriter open mics. But where’s a poet to go to squander a few verses on a polite crowd?
Seriously, being in the male minority at a Friday lunch with coworkers, it is equally humorous and awkward when female coworkers discuss why men think they need 4-hour sexual performance pills.
I don’t pretend to know how to respond to the question, “Why do men think they need a 4-hour pill? They’re just going to fall asleep afterwards.”
I thought about snoring loudly. But I can’t enjoy a jerked chicken sandwich while snoring.
Holy Shoot! Is this for real? From the Asheville Citizen-Times:
Two new high-rises planned for downtown
“…plans to renovate the Haywood Park Hotel and adjacent properties between Page and Haywood avenues downtown call for adding a 25-story tower…. The new hotel… would stand alongside a more modern residential high-rise of 21 floors overlooking Haywood Avenue…. Fraga plans to add an additional 500 parking spaces underground, as well as convert the existing Haywood Park hotel space to office and retail space.”
and
Fraga unveils plans for 25-floor hotel tower
“Tony Fraga…. said…. ‘I believe that cities have to grow vertically. Instead of developing subdivisions and increasing our dependency on foreign oil, we have to go up in downtown, not up into the mountains. And in this area, we have a tower that was already planned….’”
For out-of-towners, the downtown Asheville area is so congested it is almost insane to consider high rises and the relative human element to fill those residential and commercial outlets. Asheville might as well rename the city—New York South.
For local Ashevegas residents, might as well get ready to change your colloquial expression of “Hi, ya’ll” to “Hey, yous.”
The story creates the work and the work creates the story.
Seth Godin Link
Regarding generational synergy:
“there are opportunities to see where Gen Y is going by… looking at their relationship to… their Boomer parents, and other times in their shared code with Gen X. Codes of caution and status (Boomer) and codes of instigator and notoriety (Gen X). The reality is that generations are shaped by the ways they choose to assimilate or differentiate from the other generations in their world”
(via Brand Noise) Link
When describing what you want in a design, make sure to use terms that don’t really mean anything. Terms like “jazz it up a bit” or “can you make it more webbish?”. “I would like the design to be beautiful” or “I prefer nice graphics, graphics that, you know, when you look at them you go: Those are nice graphics.” are other options. Don’t feel bad about it,you’ve got the right. In fact, it’s your duty because we all know thaton fullmoons, graphic designers shapeshift into werewolves.
Ways to drive a Graphic Designer mad. #5. (via yyoyoma)
My new favourite is ‘I’d like it look more designed”.
(via misssnowwhite)
Biltmore Village – The Bohemian Hotel: The new Bohemian Hotel creates a concrete canyon in the Biltmore Village and dwarfs almost everything around it.
Biltmore Village new construction: Chico’s and Talbot’s extends their reach into the Biltmore Village area—physically imposing their presence in this new commercial development.
Argh, I read these posts and want to scream! Why don’t you just tattoo the letters AMATEUR across your forehead.*
I know what you’re thinking… “But I can finally publish my lousy, self-absorbed poems and people will love me and want to buy my book and maybe sleep with me.”
No, that’s not what poetry is about. And don’t dare visit Lulu! Only idiots use Lulu for their own creative validation.
And then you upload your crappy ass covers that scream CorelDRAW and MS Word and you want publishing cred?!?
If you’re going to DIY and publish poetry in a unique and deserving manner, at least exhibit an intimate love for the physical package of a book… like this or this.
*Forgive me, after seven years of publishing independently I cringe when people make the same mistakes I made during the early years. And, not to brag, but I have been able to sell and ship over 14,000 copies of various titles at my current post. Rule #1: Selling books makes you a publisher. Rule #2: Printing a book makes you a printer (duh, not a publisher). Rule #3: Just because you publish it doesn’t mean people will give a flying flip and actually buy it. Rule # 4: Covers sell books. Rule #5: I don’t care what’s beyond the book cover, the cover sells the book. Rule #6: See Rule #4 and #5, again. Rule #7: Have a business plan including production, distribution and customer service details. Rule #8: If you don’t know the difference between RIO, P&L and ISBN, don’t get involved in publishing just step away from your laptop and go back to Kinkos where you belong and photocopy your precious little chapbook and pass it out to friends and family and vagrants. Rule #10: If you read this far you realize Rule #9 are missing. It contains secret ingredients that I can not post, but may be able to e-mail you.
From a spokesperson for the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation regarding Poetree.coop being shut down (via Seth Godin):
“We applaud the work of the FBI in shutting down this travesty of copyright. If we want great poetry, America, we’re going to have to pay for it.”
Seth Godin observes:
“Many of the world’s top poets reported dramatic decreases in royalties and sales as a result of the site. ‘When poetry is free, no one is willing to pay for it,’ one poet is quoted by Wired. Even though some poets had reportedly been earning three or four million dollars a year in royalties and advances, it apparently wasn’t enough.”
I’d like to know what poets earn that kind of money in royalty. It sure isn’t anyone I know.
Coffeehouse Junkie 