Ron’s company, selfpublishing.com, sells publishing and printing. But it is one of the best sources of education about printing and publishing on the web. This recent piece of his is typical of the no-baloney style of his articles.

What is the difference between a $149 cover design and one that costs $1500? The easy answer, of course, is $1351.  This is one of the most debated topics in many of the online news groups, although it’s mostly debated between designers who charge the $1500 price or more as justification for their pricing. In reality there is very little visual difference in the final product between the low end and the high end “design”.  It’s a matter of time… the designer’s time… and your money. More

With over a quarter-million Kindles out there (according to TechCrunch) and more than twice that number expected to sell over the coming year, that’s a big market. Especially when you consider that Amazon.com solves many of your marketing and all of your distribution challenges as an author.

Amazon.com gives you all the tools you need to convert your text to the html favored by the device.

As with other books you distribute via Amazon, you set your price, and get to keep 35% of it when Amazon sells a copy.

If you have written a book, I see no reason not to invest the few hours it takes to convert it for the Kindle. It’s almost pure gravy for you.

Just discovered this great site. It’s full of excellent tips and a forum, sure to be of help to any kind of writer. Check it  out!

This is not a trivial question. There are so many forms in which words on paper can be packaged. Why are some books, and others not?

If someone tells you, “I’ve written a 508-page manual!” you may be impressed. But if someone says, “I’ve written a book!” you are even more impressed — even if the book is only 64 pages long, and double-spaced. Why? Obviously it’s not number of pages, thickness, or density that are the criteria.

I don’t know the answer to this question. I want to speculate, and hear your speculations.

My speculation:  “I wrote a book” means “I had an idea, developed it inside of me, then put words to it. I packaged it in the form of a book, and it’s reasonable for you to expect it to have a beginning, a middle, and an end. I present it to the world — standing, in a way, naked in public.”

We might read the book and not like it. Or not understand it. But the fact that someone wrote it, someone thought about it and put the words together and published it, is undeniable. It changes the way we view the author.

What do you think?

It includes death.

We buried my brother Jerry yesterday. Ultimately, Social Security had compassion upon us, and gave us Jerry’s number, so that we could get the death certificate, so that the mortuary could get the permit, and the burial could take place.

Many of Jerry’s friends came. All had good things to say about him. In a town — Las Vegas — where integrity, honesty, and generosity are less prominent than they are elsewhere, Jerry stood out like a shining light.

I am proud to have had him as my brother for 58 years.

The book of Jerry’s life is closed. But its positive and loving impact will continue to be felt.

But is it really? My brother’s burial is being held up because I can’t find his social security number. It’s not in his papers — he used an ID number that wasn’t his social security number. His ex-wife has no record of it. Social security themselves want the number before they can give me the number…:-)

When you write, do you think “everyone knows” what you are referring to? Are you leaving your readers perplexed and frustrated? Be sure that you are laying out the facts — or the fiction — in such a way that a completely uninformed person can pick up the narrative and make sense of it.

Just read this very thoughtful application of anthropologist Desmond Morris’s work on human intimacy and strength of relationships to the vendor-customer link. This is well worth reading and thinking about.

Not just insider gossip, but all manner of wisdom and good writing show up here. Here’s an example: Why Blogging Your Book Works. Highly recommended.

You’re writing a book. At some point, you will want to sell it, and other things — coaching services, other products, etc. To do this, you will have to write sales copy, and that is very different from writing a book.

For a wonderful summary/introduction to the topic, read Michel Fortin’s blog post here. Michel is one of the leading copy writers on the Web today.

Not only is this a wonderfully enlightening piece, you can link through it to more of Dustin’s excellent work.