On Getting Published Weblog

August 20, 2008

Rules vs. Guidelines and the Challenge of Blogging

Filed under: blogging, writing — marami820 @ 12:17 am
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The challenge to being a good blogger is blogging even when you aren’t feeling up to it or finding time even when time is scarce. The challenge for many good writers in any medium is exactly the same. As my advisor, Brock Cole used to tell me regularly, Butt in Chair, Mara. Butt in Chair.

At any rate, here is a thought for today. As always, I’m looking for comments. 

I don’t believe there are a lot of rules for for writing, but I do believe there are a lot of good guidelines. Understanding the guidelines is what I call craft. Knowing when to bend and when to break those guidelines is what I call genuis. If a writer breaks writing guidelines by accident or because he or she doesn’t know or understand them, the writer looks foolish and the writing bad. However, when a writer breaks those guidelines with understanding and with purpose, then he or she looks brilliant.

Anyone want to offer examples of this? Or have writing rules they think should never be broken?

August 7, 2008

Cool Links

Filed under: Publishing, blogging, writing — marami820 @ 10:15 pm
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As a part of my intro into blogging and more specifically the concept of Web 2.0, I was given this video link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=NLlGopyXT_g  It’s worth watching if you are interested in Web 2.0.

Also, editorial anonymous is running a pitch clinic. A few weeks ago, EA ran a contest for pitches (good and funny/bad) Now she has taken the time to analyze them so others can learn from them.

Best,

Mara

July 23, 2008

blogs, and facebook, and twitter, oh my!

Filed under: Publishing, blogging, writing — marami820 @ 2:51 am
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So in my first post, I mentioned a couple of reasons for starting this blog. The main reason was that I wanted to start a conversation about publishing. (Thank you to everyone who has commented!) The secondary reason was that I wanted to learn the ins and outs of blogging. After all, blogging is a type of publishing.

To this end, Marc (Thank you, Marc) sent me a link to problogger, a blog about blogging. The first post I read was about a medical doctor who traded in his medical career for blogging. More than four-million people go to this guy’s technology website each month. Wow. Yesterday, I had my highest number of views at 28. Better keep my day job.

Marc also told me about blog rolls, which unfortunately are not like caramel rolls. He says, “the reason blogs have really long blogrolls is because quality links will increase your google ranking. Cross-linking helps too…. You should be able to divide your blogroll into sections, like Children’s Publishers, Poetry Publishers, etc. “

Okay…. I can do that… I think…

Please pass on any good publishing links or blogs that you think are valuable and/or would be valuable to others trying to get published. Let’s stick to the publishing theme. I will look forward to checking out your suggestions and passing them on through my blog roll and in my posts.

As always, feel free to offer your thoughts about publishing, or trying to get published, or getting rejected, or trying to get published again, or, hopefully, finding success. Or feel free to offer blogging critique. We’re all in this together.

BTW, School Library Journal is encouraging us to get our Web 2.0 groove on with their “All Together Now, a Web 2.0 Experience” blog. (Just to be clear, Web 2.0 is a philosophy not an upgrade…. blogs, and facebook, and twitter, oh my.)

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