Book Launch 2.0

This post's title is actually the title of a Youtube video by author Dennis Cass about the pain of an author trying to promote a book in a Web 2.0 world. It's very funny in a low-key way, and I'm tempted to buy his book as a show of support. Actually, if I were really with it online, I'd probably find a way to download the book for free, helping to make all his marketing work for naught. No wonder writers drink.

Running on Fumes: Presidential Politics and Gasoline Prices

I've been shaking my head over the latest round of blather in the presidential race, as two of the three major candidates are falling all over themselves in their desire to use gas prices as an "issue" to show themselves sympathetic to the needs of working people. Instead, let's say that they're being disingenuous at best and cynically manipulative at worst.

Both McCain and Clinton are on the "let's have a moratorium on Federal gasoline taxes" bandwagon. But what does it really mean? The tax is 18 cents a gallon. Say that you use a tank of gas a week, and let's further suppose that means 20 gallons. So your weekly savings would be $3.60, or $43.20 over the entire summer. I won't sneeze at having a extra pair of twenties in my wallet; however, if that is economic relief, then all my problems should be cured by giving up going out for coffee one day a week - oh, wait, I already brew my own.

At least Obama, for all his problems, isn't toeing the same path, and Clinton's bashing of him as not sympathetic to "regular folk" makes me want to take a shower after I hear her talk. I've found that if people are willing to bend words and thought completely out of shape on a regular basis to get something, they don't tend to stop after the acquisition. What's the next suggestion, end the federal deficit by having people donate empty bottles and cans so the government can get the deposit refunds?

A Screenwriter and Happiness

Cory Turner from NPR went to film school, met the girl of his dreams, wrote a script, found out that it was going to be produced but almost lost the girl. His commentary is almost like a mini romantic comedy. It probably wasn't so neat and tidy in real life, but just think of the movie it might make.

Unhappy Endings

Newsweek has an interesting piece on movie endings, and how they're often predictable, yet at the same time unsatisfactory. When I think of great movie endings, what comes to mind are such films as Casablanca and Chinatown, with great last lines; the surprise ending of The Sting; or even that last frozen frame in Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid. But the author came up with a completely different list, many of which I could hardly oppose (the final apocalypse of Doctor Strangelove, or that last scare in Carrie), and a good number I had never seen.

That got me wondering how universal a good ending is, or whether much of its power depends on the person seeing it. When is something cliche and when a nod to a previous influence? And what if you may see the imitator and not original? Should that be discouraged?

I've found that endings are often tougher to write than beginnings, which is saying a lot, as I find an opening line to be genuinely painful to find at times.. To draw a conclusion, tie up the lose ends, and allow the reader to have something to think about is difficult. Like right now.

Changes on the Wall Street Journal Front Page

A report from Mark Jurkowitz of the Project for Excellence in Journalism quantitatively shows the changes in the front page of the Wall Street Journal since Rupert Murdoch bought its parent company, Dow Jones. The paper has significantly decreased its business coverage while increasing the number of political stories. This is pretty interesting, as people buy the Journal for news of business, not politics. There's a significant increase in foreign coverage, which might be good, and I suspect it's difficult to say whether the WSJ would have increased political news on the front page anyway, as the primaries were ongoing. It would have been interesting to see a comparison not to the four months before the purchase, but the equivalent four months of the previous year, or even of four years before, when there was another U.S. presidential election. It would also have been good not to measure just "news holes," but the number of column inches uses, as well as the content of the paper overall. However, these are at least some numbers showing the changes.

Origin of Murphy's Law

I came across this origin of the term "Murphy's Law" and thought I'd pass it on. Apparently an Air Force captain, whose last name was Murphy, was an engineer working on a project to see how much decelleration a person could stand. On finding a miswired transducer - a device that transforms one type of energy into another, like a speaker changing electricity to sound - the officer reputedly said of the technician who had installed it, "If there is any way to do it wrong, he'll find it." A doctor associated with the project who gave a press conference mentioned that the clean safety record was because of adherence to Murphy's Law. There is some additional material, including a paradox named after that doctor.

Pentagon Manipulates Press

Although this seems to be the PR equivalent of a dog bites man story, the Pentagon, and Bush administration, managed to efficiently lead broadcasters around by the nose, and possibly print as well, by subverting third party sources: retired military personnel who act as military analysts:

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

Viewers and readers (because I refuse to believe that a lot of print journalists haven't also been taken in) don't get to hear about the business relationships that help drive the need to please the brass:

But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants. The companies include defense heavyweights, but also scores of smaller companies, all part of a vast assemblage of contractors scrambling for hundreds of billions in military business generated by the administration’s war on terror. It is a furious competition, one in which inside information and easy access to senior officials are highly prized.

In addition, the analysts would act as spies for the military, reporting back on planned stories as well as forwarding copies of their correspondence with the networks. A number of the analysts came out and admitted to the reporters of this story that they were duped. Nothing like keeping the lines of communication open, even if twisted, turned, and knotted.