Theme Story - A Kickstarter Campaign

(The theme this week was to create a Kickstarter campaign for an ancient invention. Here's my attempt)

Have you had ENOUGH of filthy gutter water?

We’ve all been there. You’ve spent a little too much time in the vomitorium, and now you got some on your best toga. What’s worse is your friend Maximus has been wandering behind you for the past half an hour, holding his nose and making loud comments about the freshness of your air. You go to rinse, change, and refresh, but all that remains in your drawing room is a ewer of sewer filth, containing all the poisons the plebians have left in the street. By Caesar, how can a citizen be expected to survive in such appalling conditions?

The solution, fellow Roman, is written in the soaring arches and stout columns of your palisade. We are going to build an Aqueduct – an ingenious method of transporting clean water from the hills outside of our glorious city right to the fountain in your plaza! No more will your hired servant be forced to stand in line with the other slaves and laborers. Imagine a public bath, with sparkling clean water delivered from the coolest mountain springs. Surely Saturnalia will be a much more pleasing experience for all once everyone has bathed in the waters of the gods!

Our Goal

We want to raise MMM Denari to build a prototype, which we will present to the Forum in the hopes of obtaining Senatorial and Imperial backing. The funding will be used for construction materials, engineering, testing, and for suitable honoraria.

Who we are

We are a guild of local stonemasons who are tired of bathing in the same filth as the mudslingers in the hovels down the road. We seek to honor the gods by bringing their gift to the wealthy masses.

Why we need your help

As you know, with our campaigns against the Goths many of the public funds for research have dried up. Your help will supplement this lack, allowing us to make progress for the glory of Rome and the Empire.

What do you get?

Obviously you want something in return for your investment! For those of you looking for something more than clean water, here are your incentives:

·      Donate V Denari or more, and earn a free ticket to the Coliseum. See the great mock naval battles, or relive our victory over Carthage as reenacted by the very Carthaginians we conquered!

·      Donate L Denari or more, and you can own your very own slave used in construction of the aqueduct, pending senatorial and imperial approval!

·      Donate CCL Denari and receive your very own lion! These exotic beasts make great guard animals, and are wonderful with children and vestal virgins.

·      Donate  D Denari, and your own name will be inscribed into one of the arch keystones! Be remembered for eternity!

·      Donate M Denari or more, and you will have your very own signature span of the finished product! Imagine having a private fountain filled with clear mountain water – take solace in the private luxury while knowing that your donation helped to further the empire!

Ranting - On form factors

I'm a big fan of e-readers. And by e-reader, I don't mean your Kindle Fire or Nook Color - I'm talking about actual, e-ink-based readers whose sole purpose is to replace the hundreds of pounds of books on my shelf with a single device. Things like the Sony Reader (my first e-reader was a PRS 350), or the Kindle Paperwhite (my newest reader, a gift from my lovely wife and son). These devices are intended to display text, and that is pretty much their only goal. In my opinion, they meet this goal in an absolutely stellar way. I can carry enough entertainment around in my pocket for years worth of idle-time, and the design goals of the e-ink display make sure that I don't end up with a headache for my troubles.

That's why I'm troubled when I see so many people opting for tablets as their reader of choice. With e-reader sales declining, far too many people are choosing an inefficient and incorrect medium to consume their text-based media. For me, the advantages of e-ink over a tablet are as follows:

• Reduced eye strain. An LCD is basically a bright light shining at your face. An e-ink reader relies upon ambient light, much like a piece of paper.
• Increased battery life. An LCD takes a hell of a lot of power compared to e-ink, and a lot of it is due to the frequency of the screen's refresh. The more often a screen has to change, the more power it consumes. E-ink displays change only when you switch pages, resulting in batteries that last for weeks. LCD screens change dozens of times a second, resulting in much greater battery usage.
• Reduced glare and contrast ratio improvements. LCD is a light-based medium, emitting light in order to generate the images we see. This means that if you shine a bright light back at it (say, something like the sun) then the image becomes much more challenging to discern. This is not a problem with e-ink readers, as they rely upon the reflection of light off of their surface - just like a piece of paper. This also results in a far higher contrast ratio - the difference between dark and light areas on the screen. This higher contrast ratio on e-readers allows the eye to do the same tasks with less energy, resulting in the reduced eye strain mentioned above.

The problem I see is that people want one device that does everything they could ask for - a Swiss army knife of entertainment. This results in millions of misguided individuals using their LCD tablets as a repository for their books and reading material, resulting in headaches and unnecessary power usage.

The issue is all about form factor. The central fallacy that lies behind these choices of gadget is that one form factor can fit every need. You see this confusion all over the place. One example is Microsoft's Windows 8 - a desktop OS heavily designed for touch. Touch interfaces can be excellent for some uses, but with the popularity of the iPad and smartphones far too many people think that a touch interface is the panacea for all computer applications. Touch is imprecise, it lacks sufficient tactile feedback for button presses and such, and requires a flexible display to compensate for the lack of resolution available. Furthermore, it often requires additional software running on a device to handle the input. Instead of a device driver generating interrupt requests, you're filtering the input through an application subject to the whims of an OS.

Human experience, at least in America, seems to be far too focused on fads. A new technology, or product, appears and instantly trumps anything even remotely related to it, regardless of the superior technology. VHS over Betamax. Touch-screen keyboards over physical keys. I suspect that tablet computers are quickly doing this to e-readers, and it makes me sad as both a tech guy and as a reader. I'm not looking forward to the forthcoming headaches once all devices carry a brightly-glowing LCD. I stare at a computer monitor too long as it is.

Theme Story - Finding the Theme

(The theme was late for this week, so I decided to be a smartass :) )

A blast of cold air caught the attention of patrons near the door as the man entered. He stood tall at 6’3”, a hulking frame wrapped in black leather and jeans. A few patrons glanced up from their libations, but their gazes quickly snapped back down. This was the kind of place where the curious didn’t last too long. A jukebox thumped weakly on a wall in the back as the man stepped towards the bar, his boots thumping in time with the forgotten country-western number.

The man approached the bar, pulling out a rickety stool and mounting it in a smooth motion that bespoke practice. The bartender, wiping a dirty glass mug with a dirtier rag, raised an eyebrow in the dim light.

“Beer,” the stranger said, his voice gravelly and deep.

“What kind?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

The bartender shrugged and stepped away for a moment, returning with a pale yellow swill in a water-spotted glass. The man took a sip, a sneer crossing his face as the failed pilsner hit his taste buds, then eyed the bartender as he set the mug back down on the bar. The bartender looked back at him, not wanting to back down in his own place, but a hint of fear was clearly visible in his eyes.

The man leaned forward and spoke in a quieter voice. “I’m lookin’ for something.”

“Lotsa folk are looking for something around here. Some of ‘em even found it.” The bartender shrugged. “Makes no business to me.”

“But you know this something,” the stranger asserted. “I have it on good word that you are a man that can find these kinds of things.”

The bartender quirked an eyebrow, his hands ceasing their incessant wiping. “And what kind of thing would that be?”

The stranger leaned forward. “I’m lookin’ for a theme.”

The bartender twitched in surprise, the glass in his hands falling to the ground with a loud crash. The few curious souls in the run-down tavern cast a wayward glance over, and the bartender continued speaking in a much quieter tone. “Don’t know nothin’ ‘bout no theme, sir. And even if I did…”

“Bullshit,” the man interrupted. “You know exactly where I can find a theme, and I intend to have one before I leave here.”

The bartender was visibly trembling now, looking around at the other patrons for support, but they all stared intently into their beverages. With a visible tremble in his hand, the bartender bent over and began to clean up the shattered glass. He addressed his comments to the floor as he spoke, out of view of the rest of the bar. “Now, I don’t know what you heard, but I got out of that business a long time ago.”

“Not my problem,” the gravelly voice argued from above.

“Now, now, that don’t mean I don’t have anything for ya.” The bartender stood, eyeing the man across the thin wooden bar top. “Happens to be I might know of someone who can point you in the right direction, if given the proper motivation.”

“Motivation, eh?” The stranger smirked as he slid a few folded bills across the bar. The bartender looked furtively about before palming the cash, and slid a piece of paper back towards the stranger. As he started to pull his hand back, the stranger’s came down atop his. The bar creaked as the man applied pressure, trapping the bartender’s hand with a painful grip. “I swear, if you’re screwing with me I’m gonna come right back here and rip your lyin’ tongue outta your head.”

The bartender shrugged. “As I said, I’ve been outta the game for a while. This is all I know now.” The bartender looked down, sweat beading on his forehead. “Can I have my hand back now?” The stranger held on for another second, glaring a threat at the bartender, before releasing the hand from the bar. The bartender shook some blood back into his fingers as he eyed the stranger. “Now kindly finish your beer and go.”

The man picked up the mug, draining the contents in a single pull, and stood up. Tossing another few dollars on the bar, the man headed for the door. As he stepped back into the cold, he glanced down at the scribbled drawing the bartender had handed him, and a smile crept slowly across his face.

Theme Story - Road Trip

I sat back, watching the waves slide slowly up and down the beach. The sunrise cast a surreal purple glow over the water. I thought it was odd that there seemed to be very little break in the water itself. Near the shore the waves crested, white breakers charging forward out of the sea, but out in the water the turmoil was completely masked, replaced with simple undulating motion.

I sighed as I stared out into the night. I'd finally made it. Three thousand miles and as many dollars in gas and repairs, just to feel another ocean on my face. A different ocean, one not laden with history. A flash of my old life popped up; a flash that I violently pushed down. That part of me was done. This was my fresh start.

The breeze picked up, and I shivered in the wind. I had expected southern California to be warm, but the weather here so far wasn't that far a cry from the oil-slicked Jersey beaches, covered in oompa-loompa tans and bleached blonde hair. It had been nice watching the snow melt on the way, though. If nothing else, I would hold that new memory dear.

I still didn't know why I'd chosen to drive. I walked through the train station every day. That 9:56 train from Cherry Hill could take me to Pennsylvania, then Chicago, LA, and San Diego. The train was a known quantity. Hell, I'd spent an eighth of every day over the past seven years on trains. Maybe that was the reason.

Out of reflex I pulled my phone from my pocket, and had my thumb on the button before I was able to stop myself. Looking at those messages meant looking back into the abyss, and once that abyss started staring back I'd end up right back where I started. Lonely, bored, disconnected. Stuck. That way lie danger. They'd just have to get along without me. I wasn't even sure they realized that I'd left.

I stood up and walked down the beach, stopping with the soles of my shoes breaking the crawling surf. I reached back into my pocket and pulled out my phone. I thumbed the button, and the first message popped up.

From Sarah: Where are you???

I pulled my arm back and threw, the plastic square sailing out into the night. My old life was consumed by the ocean, a small ripple swallowed up by the rolling waves. I chose the car because I wanted to begin anew. Time to get started.

Theme Story - The Wedding

A single rose petal floated down through the air. Sarah watched its tumbling fall, bright shining white against the burgundy and brown of the ancient chapel’s altar, and tried desperately not to scream. Would nothing go perfectly? She sighed mentally and began counting, and old calming technique she had picked up from her mother. It was bad enough that the priest had been stumbling all over words as though he had been gulping the blood of Christ, and that Rich’s best man had an unexplained bandage on his hand. Did no one understand the gravity of this event?

Sarah sighed internally again and redoubled her counting efforts. Somewhere around three hundred she was finally had enough peace of mind to focus on the ceremony itself. They were halfway through the second reading, and her darling niece Anna was pushing through something from the Letters. She had fought long and hard to keep any of that ‘obedient wife’ crap out of the question, and she smiled as Anna came to the end with a flourish - Anna’s theatrical tendencies finally overcoming her abject horror at public speaking.

The ceremony resumed, and Sarah turned her eyes - and her thoughts - to the man opposite her. He stood awkwardly, a good ol’ boy wrapped in foreign finery for one of the major events of his life. Their life, now. Sarah was still adjusting to that thought. She’d been independent for so long that she’d forgotten how to share her life with others. Indeed just the other night she had been fighting with Rich over finances. To think, he thought she should take on his debts...

No. Sarah shook herself internally. This was the happiest day of her life, and she was not going to ruin it by dwelling on inconsequentials. She looked at his eyes, those piercing green irises consuming her in an emerald pool of light, and felt that part of her deep inside melt once again. Damn his eyes were beautiful. She could still remember her first sight of them, glistening across the fire pit at Aunt Joanie’s Memorial day barbecue. How could she ever grow angry at eyes like those?

The priest was winding up to the big event, the vows. Rich had wanted to write his own, but Sarah wanted to stick with the traditional. She wouldn’t have her day in the sun ruined by awkward attempts at hillbilly humor. The fact that this also got her out of writing her own vows, putting into words that which had indescribably dominated her consciousness, was simply an added bonus.

“Do you, Richard Young, take Sarah to be your lawfully-wedded wife?”

“I do.”

Sarah had expected chills, but she was so caught up in the moment. Hardly any of it seemed real, as though they were simply running lines at a rehearsal for the actual event some interminable distance in the future. The priest was running through the list: sickness, health, richness, poorness, death, life, and so on. Wasn’t there supposed to be more of a sense of gravity?

“And do you, Sarah May, take Richard...”

Sarah was in a daze, simply inserting the appropriate responses at the appropriate times. Was this what shock felt like? Hadn’t she just a moment ago thought that it seemed all unreal? How could she have been so wrong? This was the most real thing in her entire life, and she was on autopilot!

“I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

Sarah looked into Rich’s eyes, those jewels on a field of white, and all of a sudden she trembled as though it was her first time all over again. She stepped forward and raised her chin, and felt all of her energy dissipate the moment his lips met hers. They kissed for a second that seemed an eternity, and it was a long minute before the roaring in Sarah’s ears gave way to the roaring of the family and friends in attendance.

The two moved down the aisle, hand in hand, leaving the solitary petal on the altar. Whether it was an omen of good or ill only time would tell, but Sarah didn’t care. This was the best day of her life.

Theme Story - Kitten fight!

Mr. Whiskers had his hackles up. The interloper – Mittens – had struck the first blow, a vicious bat across the face. Mr. Whiskers hissed a warning at Mittens, but it went unheeded. Mittens crept forward, ears flattening and jowls tightening to reveal teeth. Mr. Whiskers pounced, and the battle was on.

Mr. Whiskers barreled into the side of Mittens, and the two went tumbling in a ball of furiously flying fur. Mittens began to hiss and spit as Mr. Whiskers scratched him across the hindquarters, but his success was short-lived as Mittens got in a firm bite on Mr. Whiskers’ paw. The two leapt apart, panting heavily. Mr. Whiskers favored his left forepaw, while Mittens was obviously putting less weight on his rear right leg. They eyed each other like two prize fighters, retreating to the corner after a round has concluded.

There was no bell to signal the start of round two. Mittens was the aggressor this time, lunging forward. Just as he was about to collide, and Mr. Whiskers had tensed for the impact, Mittens pulled back and struck with a paw instead, striking Mr. Whiskers right between his namesake. Mr. Whiskers growled in surprise and pain, and leapt forward again. He was going to end this, one way or another.

The two rolled back and forth across the tile, neither gaining advantage over the other. For each swipe Mr. Whiskers landed, Mittens came right back with another. Fur was everywhere – in the air, in their mouths, in their claws. The sounds were horrendous, as though two weary warriors were giving their all in a battle to the death. In some respects this wasn’t too far off.

After a while the two parted. Mr. Whiskers knew his strength was flagging, but he refused to give up any ground over his piece of string. He stared at Mittens, tensing for another strike, and was surprised when he saw Mittens’ face fall. His opponent rolled onto his back, gracefully admitting defeat. Mr. Whiskers nodded, still not believing the turn of events but not questioning it either. He picked up the piece of string in his jaws and sauntered off, triumphant.

On Workshops and Wetware

This past Friday I attended a workshop presented by April Eberhardt and Susan Bearman entitled “Pathways to Publication.”  It was a very interesting workshop, presenting the “current” view of the ever-changing publication landscape as lived by two professionals. There was quite an eclectic group gathered in the conference room of Chicago’s University Center, representing essentially all stages of the production process and most of the phases of a literary career.

I have to say that while I had discovered a lot of the subject material on my own, I still found both the presentation and discussion useful. If you have an opportunity to attend a talk by one of these two women, I highly recommend the opportunity – they are both enthusiastic about their subjects, and energetic and engaging in delivery. Susan is an author as well as a marketing communications specialist, and April an agent with a list of clients at varying levels of the writing process.

My Primary Takeaways 

My primary takeaways from the conference were, in many ways, things I already knew. I am not a published author, nor am I particularly experienced at writing salable fiction, but I am (if I can toot my own horn here) excellent at researching topics and distilling the knowledge down to the salient points. Along these lines, I have done a lot of reading about writing and publication and have read points on all sides of the issue.

I tend not to write about publication and my opinions on the “right” or “wrong” way for two fairly simple reasons:

1. I am not yet published
2. I’d rather write than write about writing

There are hundreds of thousands of words out there about the various ways to get published, and they all boil down into the following categories:

• Individuals who firmly believe that traditional publishing is the only way forward, and any who disagree are heartless blasphemers who will never shake the negative stigma of the self publisher
• Individuals who firmly believe that indie publishing is the only way forward, and any who disagree are heartless blasphemers who will never earn even a tenth of their self-published peers
• Individuals (and, most likely, the truth) who lie somewhere in between these two extremes

I use religious terminology in the above because in many cases that is the style that is taken by these blog posts and various discussions – absolutes thrown out with aplomb by individuals wholly dedicated to their particular cause, and god help the poor sap who dares to express a contrary opinion.

These people are not to be taken seriously. At least, not by me. They are informed by their own success, and thus may be biased towards what has worked for them. That is not to say that they don’t have any useful information, but arguments and opinions should always be taken with a grain of salt.

And ultimately, that was my key takeaway from the workshop. There is no right path. There are different paths, suited to different individuals, with different goals. Some people may want to make a living from their writing. An exceedingly small percentage of those people may achieve that goal. Some may only want the cachet of the title “Published Author,” and a small percentage may achieve that goal. Note the repetition of the phrase “small percentage” – the only true reality is that thousands and thousands and thousands of books are produced each year, and only a small number of those obtain publishing deals, let alone any kind of cultural relevance.

So in the end, this is what I gathered (right or wrong) from my time at the workshop:

• Know your goal – am I looking to hit it big, or do I want the respect of a published writer, or do I simply want to create something that will live after I have died?
• Plan your path forwards – what are measurable steps I can take towards that goal? How much will the options available to me cost me in time and/or money? How do I know when my goal has been achieved?
• Do not dismiss any options until you are absolutely sure that they are not viable – the numbers game is already heavily weighted against me, would dismissing an entire market vertical help?
• Finally, make your own conclusions – the only person with all the data on my situation is me, not an opinionated blogger or a pretentious literary critic, so why should their passion inform my decision if their reasons aren’t applicable?

The Fringe-Benefits, and Why I Will Never Be a Politician 

As any experienced conference attendee will tell you, the knowledge presented is only half of the reason for attending the event. If the knowledge was the only important thing, we could just download the PDF and go on our merry way as newly-enlightened writers. The other half of every conference, expo, convention, party, box social, et cetera, is the social aspect.

When I was a young college student getting ready to make my way in the “professional” world, I had a strong aversion to networking. I was earning a degree in Computer Science, which is based heavily in mathematics. In math, you are right or you are wrong, and there is no real room for in-betweens – that’s what statistics and probability are for. As I of course knew everything possible to know about the world at that age, I firmly asserted that I had no need of networking with potential colleagues. That kind of glad-handing may be necessary for business people and politicians, but I was a programmer. I just had to be the best programmer, and bam – job time for me. I envisioned myself living in a world of true merit, where the most talented were rewarded and the bull-shitters would be exposed and shamed.

We were all so naïve, once.

Some people say that money makes the world go ‘round. However, behind that money is a directing hand. This essentially means that the hand driving the money is just as important to the angular momentum of our planet as the money is itself. Thus, there are two paths to having an effect on the world:

• Have lots and lots of money at your disposal
• Connect with enough people with similar goals and work together to achieve what you need

Now this is a simplistic view of the world dedicated to show one fact: the only people who can afford to ignore the social side of the world are people with the fiscal resources to do so. Want to advance in your career? See and be seen. It is not enough to be damn good at what you do – that will get you local notoriety and aplomb, sure. If you want to make it big, though, you have to advertise. Be your own salesperson. Know your upsides and down, and emphasize the up while diminishing the down. Talk to people. Connect. Network. Make friends and find colleagues.

And this is where I fail. I like to describe myself as a quiet person. I have few social skills of which I am aware, and my sarcastic and self-deprecating nature can be off-putting to some people. On top of this, I have… while not exactly a fear of social interaction, I certainly have some sort of mental block against it. I rarely feel confident when introducing myself, and I’m by no means a people-person. To put it simply, I’m not an aloof ass – I’m just shy.

This is an issue that has plagued me for a while, and this past Friday it more or less reached a tipping point. I’m not great at networking (I even forgot to have new business cards made, as I am no longer a graduate student in computer graphics), and I tend to hang back by myself in a crowd. Here I am with a room full of people who can prove great people to know and potentially build a long-term correspondence with, and outside of a few smiles I only really talk to the people who approach me directly. A fantastic opportunity somewhat wasted.

In computer programming we see three phases of every solution: the hardware, with all the lights and sounds, that makes the program run; the software, with the thousands of lines of code, that makes the computer do what you want; and the wetware, with the hair and the appetites and the sporting team affiliations, that directs the entire process. Like far too many computer programmers over time I have focused a large portion of my attention on the two former, and not nearly enough on the latter.

And that’s probably my ultimate take-away from the workshop on Friday. Somehow I need to learn to be a people person, because even though I might be able to tell n interesting tale, nobody will read it if they don’t know who I am.

Long ramble, complete. Shutting down for now