If this is a writers Blog, why don’t you write about writing?
So goes the sixty-four thousand dollar question, which I was asked over this past weekend for about the sixty-four thousandth time.
Simple answer? I’m too busy…. and that really is not pure unadulterated B.S.
Beyond my work as a writer/editor/publisher, I do write about writing and books, but I also write about the complex technologies that are behind this thing we call The Global Internet and the user portion of that network… the World Wide Web to which, unless you are are reading his via an RSS text-based news-reader, you are currently connected.
Why?
If you’re reading books on a Kindle or other network accessible book-reader, an iPad or other network accessible tablet , laptop or desktop or via your IpTV (a television that runs applications that are connected to the internet) you’ve used the Internet to get to an eStore (eCommerce site) on the World Wide Web to buy those books. If you’re reading downloaded content, you are or were using the internet to get to it.
The book or files you downloaded came from storage attached to a server attached to a host which is attached to the internet via a series of routers and bridges… and it is entirely possible that the majority of that hardware is sitting in one of our world-wide data-centres and/or network management centres.
If you’ve used any one of a number of on-line ebook format converters, it is likely it is sitting on one of our hosts that resides out there in “The Cloud”… which really means computing hosts running many virtual servers sitting in a building somewhere in the world at one or more of our worldwide locations that is connected to one or more sets of data storage devices residing somewhere within that infrastructure at any given moment, depending upon what is being accessed by which user from who knows where who is a client/customer of who knows which company that is one of our client/customers.
Add to that the attached Print On Demand servers located at various centres around the world that churn out hundreds of books and thousands of user manuals for everything from toasters to jet aeroplanes… every day… that ship directly to assembly plants or customers based on shipping orders from clients…
But, you don’t write about the mechanics of writing.
A lot of writers write about the art of writing as they learn it. Others write about it from the standpoint of experience after years of success in print as a published author.
I could, as both writer/editor and published author with years of experience behind me offer kernels of knowledge and bits of wisdom gained from experience over the twenty plus years in the business… but I won’t.
If I were a well-known “name” I suppose I would be obliged to offer random rewards to readers and fellow writers alike, but there are so many others who do it so very well that I am content to read and learn… and kibitz on the rare occasion that I feel I have something to contribute.
I also do not, in the normal course of a day use profanity, nor do I feel the need to employ it to express anger or urgency or to make a point… or to piss you off, but that’s my choice.
And I Do Not, as a blogger, feel obliged to use anger or opposition in order to draw readers or elicit commentary from you, my readers. If you have something to say, to add to the discussion, then you will via the comment box.
If you want to read about my ideas on the mechanics of writing, you can read my monthly commentary On Writing Well articles at On Fiction Writing or read one of the many excellent writers blogs published by our members and friends.
So, until next time, Write Well.
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