Let me start this off with a bit of a disclaimer: Yes, I am a Digital Community Builder. And yes, I do work in book publishing. As such, one can rightly assume that I am genuinely excited and intrigued by the steady stream of developments being made in my chosen field. The various new forms and means of procuring, possessing, and consuming content blow the lid off of constraints that readers have faced for years, giving a much larger number of people access to all kinds of information and in a mind-blowing number of ways. Amazing!
That being said: ENOUGH! Seriously. Enough with the e-book, e-reader, and e-pricing articles. I just can’t take it anymore!
Let me paint you a picture, if I may: When I arrive at work each morning, my inbox is e-bulging with a heaping dose of new emails (in addition to those left over from the day, week, or month before). On average, each day, at least half of these are e-book-related articles forwarded my way. And, as much as I appreciate the genuine emotion behind their arrival (don’t want to burn any e-bridges here), there are – always- more urgent missives to attend to. So, in an attempt at organization (honestly, this has never been my strong suit), I began filing these forwards in an ‘Articles to Read’ e-mail folder. Based on my records, I’ve been doing this since February of 2010. I’ll spare you the total count, and just say this: In the last 3 months alone, I've amassed articles in the triple digits. TRIPLE DIGITS.
The topics of these articles cover everything from e-book company launches to e-book pricing and e-rights models; e-readers compared to other e-readers; e-reader connectivity and networking capabilities; e-book and digital copyright conundrums; all things app: app-building, app-pricing, app-marketing, and much much much more. I’ve got search results in the thousands for words like Apple, iPad, Amazon, and the like. I’ve posted pieces about Facebook book forums on my Facebook feed, and Tweeted treatises on reading group hashtags out to all of my Tweeple. And that's the worst part: When I read these articles, I send them on, as well. So now…I'm just as much part of the problem as I am part of the solution. It's a horribly vicious and seemingly unavoidable cycle!
The thing is this: I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. Nor do I mean to sound uninterested. I am neither of those things. What I am is over-stimulated. I spend all day – literally, all day – in front of a computer screen. When I’m not reading and/or writing on said device, I’m discussing the ways in which other people read and write on their own devices. When the time comes for me to head home, that’s exactly what I do – and I DON’T bring my computer or these emails with me.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to pack the actual newspaper clippings that my mom still sends me (shout-out to Barbara Kaufman, who’s been ‘forwarding’ articles since before the internet existed) , and head over to this café.
Whoops.
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