I didn’t like Uwem Akpan’s Say You’re One of Them when I first read it, yet some five years later, his short stories still drift into my head. They arrive with Sadness and Inspiration and, in their wake, leave me struggling with the reality of the fiction. I didn’t like Uwem Akpan’s Say You’re One of Them when I first read it. Instead, I so many other things’d Uwem Akpan’s Say You’re One of Them when I first read it—and learned from it. In 2006 I helped share the documentary The War Tapes. After watching a screener I sent him,…

Films aren’t created to keep theaters in business any more than books are written to keep brick-and-mortar stores operating. However . . . Past practices of some theaters and stores run in the opposite direction. A recent example comes via the release of the film Veronica Mars, which was released in theaters and via video on demand (for sale and for renting) the same day last week. “Theater chains are dead set on screening with exclusive window,” said director Rob Thomas in a Variety interview. “It’s why Warner’s is renting out AMC theaters.” Afraid that their ticket sales will be “cannibalized”…

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word. Benjamin: Yes, sir. Mr. McGuire: Are you listening? Benjamin: Yes, I am. Mr. McGuire: Plastics. —The Graduate Magic-Bullet Plastic For The Graduate’s Mr. McGuire, “plastics” was it—that sure-fire, magic-bullet road to riches. A couple of decades later, he might have said “home health care”—and today’s young Benjamin Braddock would perhaps have given him the same confused look, and the same follow-up Q&A would have ensued: Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean? Mr. McGuire: There’s a great future in [home health care]. Think about it. Will you think…

Jean-Dominique Bauby, Stephen Hawking, Francis Tsai—a journalist,  a theoretical physicist and an artist. The similarities? Olympic character. Olympic Character In his column DNA of Champions, Joel Stein wrote about having his DNA compared with Olympic Gold Medalist Sergei Bubka’s DNA. It wasn’t surprising to read that there are certain genes that are common within Olympic athletes. However . . . “The key Olympic success,” said Bubka, is that “you need to have character to go to your goal, to do your work, to be a hard worker.”

“To an engineer, fan belts exist between the crankshaft and the water pump. To a physicist, fan belts exist, briefly, in the intervals between stars.” —George Dyson That’s beautiful, I thought, after reading the quote above. But . . . What’s it really mean? Some background: This quote appears at the end of the following story, in the acknowledgements section of George Dyson’s book Turing’s Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe: In 1956, at the age of three, I was walking home with my father, physicist Freeman Dyson, from his office at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton,…

“In an Uber-fied future, fewer people own cars, but everybody has access to them.” —Marcus Wohlsen, Wired (January 2014 issue) In the above quote, “Uber” refers to a company. Set that factoid aside and think about the meaning of the German word uber, translated as above, beyond . . . Substitute the word cars with the word televisions or theaters, or books or radios, or other modes of transporting words and stories and sounds to readers and viewers and listeners. Then, substitute the word them with the corresponding action. For example: “In an uber-fied future, fewer people own televisions, but…

Last week, Steve, Shawn, Jeff, and I e-mailed a free ebook giveaway to First Access Subscribers and previous Black Irish Books customers, valid through December 31. It was Black Irish’s first online e-book giveaway and provided valuable lessons that will be incorporated into future giveaways and promotions. As usual, we’re sharing what we learned here, with hope that some of it will be of interest/help to you. First Up: The Pricing and the Format Black Irish wanted to thank readers for their support since its launch in Summer 2012. In the beginning, we made the decision to avoid discounting. We’ll do…

“Don’t major in the minor.” Mellody Hobson said it, but I’ve thought it these last few days, since watching Jeff Bezos on 60 Minutes this past Sunday. In case you haven’t heard, Bezos unveiled a prototype for package-delivering drones at the end of the interview. Without missing a beat, the character-bashing, Jeff-Bezos hating, Amazon-vilifying tribes descended, with articles and comments from one site to the next. They majored in the minor. I’m not saying that the drones weren’t newsworthy. They were—and I saw mentions pop up in everything from Outside Magazine’s site to Waterstones’ blog. And I’m not saying that…

The Nov. 18 edition of Fortune Magazine contains a story about Barefoot Books and Nancy Traversy, who: Pulled out of national store chains years ago because they made her eat large quantities of unsold books . . . AND Severed her relationship with Amazon this year out of frustration over its discounting of her products. AND Sells via partnerships with companies like Lakeshore Learning and a network of home-based sellers called Ambassadors. AND Marched into the digital age with its award-winning Barefoot World Atlas app for the iPhone and iPad, already downloaded 4 million times. (Side note: That app is…

The launch of Steve’s new book, The Authentic Swing, was unlike those preceding it. Steve, Shawn, Jeff and I (a.k.a. The Black Irish team) charted a new course after benefiting from the advice of a launch pro. Just as his personal experiences proved valuable to us, our hope is that some of ours will be of value to you—whether you’re launching a new book or business. Two different goals existed for why Steve wrote The Authentic Swing and why it was launched. The Authentic Swing was written for readers who’ve continued to ask Steve about the “how and why” behind…