Last June I followed all of the BookCampToronto posts on Twitter, and read as many of the follow-ups and round-ups and blog posts dissecting it afterward as I could. Most of them focused on e-books and social media and various technologies (though I’m sure there were other things discussed at the “uncoference”—is it okay that I don’t like terms like “unconference?” ’cause I really don’t), which are still the hot topics in the publishing industry. Ever since then I’ve wanted to collect all my thoughts and opinions about e-books into a single coherent post. The problem is that even after almost ten months of turning them over in my head, I’m still not sure I really know what all my thoughts and opinions are. Clearly it’s time to start writing.
I’m going to try to have something for you by the end of next week, but there’s been so much written about digital books that I’m just not going to be able to cover everything. One of the things I really don’t want to cover (in part because I have no first-hand experience of it) is what goes into making a book “the old-fashioned way.” Luckily, science-fiction author Charlie Stross has already done it for me, with considerably better results than even my best efforts would produce. Charlie sorts his blog by date rather than category, so here are links to all seven parts of his ongoing series, Common Misconceptions About Publishing: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, and Part Seven. Even if you don’t care at all for science fiction, or any other kind of commercial genre fiction, the series is a must read for anyone interested in books or publishing. Hell, his whole blog is. I don’t know why you aren’t reading it. In fact, why don’t you fix that now. While you’re playing with Charlie, I’ll get to work on The Post About E-Books.
