Bringing the Ball To You: The Audience
Some formal complaints have been made and some things I fiddled with turned out to basically be as useless as I thought they would be (I’m looking at you Adsense). The honest truth is, I’m finding ads to be wholly insufficient. I’d love to have more relevant ones (such as the occasional ad from publishers). I find Google’s policies on ads and the like to be rather ridiculous considering that their ad model is literally one of the worst I have ever seen. They need a targeted ad system, one which allows users to have full control over what shows up on their sites. But as far as I know, they don’t. So, complaints have been made and things that will not be happening include Adsense and the paid post thingies. This is why I have readers: you can tell me when I cross the line. I have crossed that line, and now am backtracking. In fact, I want to use this space to ask for any other comments from readers. What don’t you like about WISB? What do you like? Seriously, I want honest opinions. If you despise something, tell me. If you like something else, tell me. I want to understand why you come to WISB and what might make you leave it. Your opinion matters and changes will be made if there are things that really need to go to preserve whatever it is you find most appealing in this website. So let me know!
To My Readers: Appreciations and Questions
Have I said that I appreciate all my readers lately? Probably not. But I do. I appreciate you folks quite a bit, because without you, WISB would just be another one of those blogs that nobody ever reads. There are well over one hundred of you reading, which doesn’t sound like much, but is a lot to me. I don’t know who all of you are (some of you comment; most of you don’t), but regardless, each and every one of you is important. With that in mind (call it *sskissery if you will), I’d like to put a shout out to all of you reading to come in and leave a comment (or email me–I really appreciate emails from readers) based on the following: What are some topics you’d be interested in me discussing? By this, I don’t necessarily mean specific subjects, such as what’s going on with the whole RaceFail09 thing or random things about science fiction, but more specifically to things you’d be interested in hearing my opinion about. Think of this as a sort of semi-Q&A thing. You ask me a question, I respond in a blog post. The reality is, that while I do blog about a lot of SF/F/Writing related subjects, I undoubtedly miss subjects you’d be interested in me discussing. Not too long ago I wrote about how to write reviews, which was prompted by an email from a reader, and I’d like to turn that into a tradition, if possible. I’d like to interact with as many of you as possible in a more direct way, where applicable. The one thing I really enjoy about blogging is interacting with you guys. So, if you have a question about writing, science fiction, fantasy, or, heck, even something unrelated to any of those, feel free to fire it my way! You can leave it as a comment, send it via email, or both.
Realms of Fantasy: Alive Again
This just came to me in my email: Realms of Fantasy is not dead. It was just resting. The announcement reached my email a few minutes ago: Realms of Fantasy has been bought by Tir Na Nog Press and will continue to provide the fantasy and literary community with fabulous stories and artwork under the editorial direction of Shawna McCarthy. More information can be found at SF Scope. Good news indeed!
Book Plug: Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn
I recently discovered that one of the members of a small writing groups I’m a part of has had her first novel published! It’s called Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn and can be found either through her personal page or at the publisher’s page. Here is the novel blurb: When the Gold Wizard comes looking for the Child Warrior in Reina’s village, it’s no surprise he’s only looking at the boys. However, when the wizard magically selects her younger brother as the warrior prophesied to defeat the Red Wizard, Reina has mixed feelings—jealousy and concern. Austyn is only six.Allowed to accompany her brother, Reina soon finds they’re in deeper trouble than she thought. The Gold Wizard’s fake beard is ripped off by attacking harpies, revealing he’s only seventeen, not to mention his magical demonstrations tend to go awry. Unfortunately, with the Red Wizard’s harpies and snakewolves on their trail, finding a new (and better) wizard mentor is hardly an option. If anyone’s going to find a way to track down the elusive Sword of Chivalry for Austyn and get him into the Red Wizard’s castle to fulfill whatever the obscure prophecy insists must be done, it’s got to be Reina. If you’re interested in a debut novelist’s YA fantasy novel, then check out Chosen Sister by Ardyth DeBruyn! And expect to hear more about this in the near future!
RIP: Philip Jose Farmer
Apparently Mr. Farmer, one of the grand masters of science fiction, has passed away at the ripe old age of 91. He published more than 75 novels and had fans all over the world. He will be missed, surely.
The Facebook Fiasco Has Ended: Terms of Service Back to Normal
Well, it looks like all our kicking and screaming has paid off. The Facebook folks have gone back to their original ToS. Additionally, discussions on the issue have caused the following bits to be written for clarification purposes: 1. You own your information. Facebook does not. This includes your photos and all other content. 2. Facebook doesn’t claim rights to any of your photos or other content. We need a license in order to help you share information with your friends, but we don’t claim to own your information. 3. We won’t use the information you share on Facebook for anything you haven’t asked us to. We realize our current terms are too broad here and they make it seem like we might share information in ways you don’t want, but this isn’t what we’re doing. 4. We will not share your information with anyone if you deactivate your account. If you’ve already sent a friend a message, they’ll still have that message. However, when you deactivate your account, all of your photos and other content are removed. 5. We apologize for the confusion around these issues. We never intended to claim ownership over people’s content even though that’s what it seems like to many people. This was a mistake and we apologize for the confusion. Looks like it’s all back to normal! Good work everyone!