Booksquare

I have a serious question for you. What if thousands of kids were reading and writing and nobody bothered to notice? I swear it’s happening. We are raising a nation of readers, writers, artists, and even activists. Better, we are raising a nation of communicators.
Now we have nurture and protect this new wonder.
I’m serious. All [...]

It’s like we invented the written word, and we decided to only write books.

Anyone cringing? Feeling a twinge of guilt? Sort of thinking “that’s me, that’s what I’m doing”? Then, “But, hey, books are the be-all and end-all of storytelling, I’m cool.”
No worries, mates! That quote wasn’t directed at you. Jane McGonigal was talking to [...]

I’m still trying to create some coherence from this year’s SXSW Interactive Festival. Lots of ideas coming in, very few coming out. I think there’s a high level meeting happening in my brain. Presumably, the neurons will let me know when it’s time for me to get involved. In the meantime, one quick thought about [...]

While I wait patiently for the kind folks at Hatchette to send me a Sony eReader (surely I am the next logical step in their process), I am thinking about the myth of Sisyphus. You recall it, of course: Sisyphus mails tons of ARCs and press releases to a closely guarded mailing list, only to [...]

I swear this is going to be my last TOC 2008-related post*. There is one more topic that has been rattling around BSHQ and, well, it’s time to get it out in the open. Blogging. It’s good, it’s bad, it’s ugly, and it’so misunderstood. We need have some frank discussion.

There is no such thing as [...]

Last night, I missed my bookclub*. My fault. I hate missing my bookclub meetings, but, well, someone screwed up her calendar. No names. When I first joined, I was a paranoid newcomer who thought it was about intellectual discussion and critical analysis. I read some serious dreck before I caught on. Maybe your bookclub trudges [...]

I am not worried about the future of the book. I am not worried about the future of reading. I am not worried about the future of spelling (I am almost-but-not-quite ready to accept the “spelling is relative” argument, !@#$ British and their extraneous use of “U”). I am worried about the future of publishers.
Your [...]

Way back in the day, I was all hot diggety dog (is there a correct spelling for diggety?) about defenders of traditional media dismissing the blogosphere as nothing but a bunch of noise. Since even I can hit prey when shooting fish in a barrel, the sport of exposing holes in logic grew wearisome. I [...]

Imagine, if you will, a bright, cold Tuesday morning in New York City. But you don’t mind the chill outside because you’re inside, attending Day 2 of the second annual O’Reilly Tools of Change conference. In fact, at this moment, the only worry on you mind is what fantastic session to attend (don’t worry, I’m [...]

One of the privileges of being me (as opposed to one of the privileges of living with me) is that I have brilliant, smart, creative friends. And I don’t brag about them (brag on them? I am told this is proper English, but my people don’t speak this way) often enough. And I should. So [...]