Why Do You Ask?

Someone on twitter sent me a request for a follow back and shout-out to my followers. This person is trying to get his or her name out there.

I tweeted back, "Why?"

I am not being a jerk, but my question is serious. I'm not seeking any quid-pro-quo. I looked at the person's twitter profile and it was very generic. There was no identification of the person's name, location, interests, and with only 10 tweets, the account didn't have sufficient content for me to get any idea what this person is about.

Why is this person trying to get his or her name out there when s/he can't even put it in his/her twitter profile?

When you go onto twitter, you should think about personal branding.

I'm Steve Poling. I live in West Michigan. I'm a Geek Who Writes. More significantly, I write about Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes. And science fiction--actually subversive fiction. I am interested in science and I try to divide my time on twitter into thirds: science news, promotion of my writing, and personal interaction.

Bottom line: I try to make sure I pass a Turing Test. I expect you to, also.

If you have complimentary interests, you'll find following me on twitter a worthwhile use of your time.

I happen to be a human being with interests and I'm happy to meet other human being with similar interests. And I'm very pleased to follow back and shout-out to other human beings with similar interests.

But if I can't discern anything about you or where you're from or what you are interested in, why should I follow you back and give a shout-out? So, I ask, "Why?"

You might be an alien infiltrator who wants to suck my soul out of my body like in the most recent Dr. Who episode. Or worse, a Republican.

Or better, a gorgeous fembot with a penchant for evil.

Add A Title To Your KDP Bookshelf

(This is step #10 of my How To Publish An Ebook thang.)

Kindle Direct Publishing isn't particularly difficult to work with.

Let's suppose you have created an eBook and you've formatted it for the Kindle. Suppose further that you've shown this Kindle-formatted file to a dozen or so advanced readers. Suppose even further that the editor you hired and these advanced readers assure you that the eBook is flawless, perfect, and without any typographical errors, grammatical errors, or spelling errors.

You have to make sure the quality of your eBook is perfect, perfect, perfect, because it bears the stigma of being self-published. Self-published works are looked down upon by many readers. Traditional publishers want everyone to believe "self-published books are trash." They want to serve as gatekeepers. They would like you to believe this is to protect the reading public from a flood of low-quality self-published works.

I wish that were the case. They are simply businesses trying to make the most money they can for their shareholders. They aren't really running a conspiracy to bring in the antichrist or to persecute you. If they believed he could make them a lot of money, they'd publish the devil himself.

Truly, traditional publishers produce edited works day in and day out. But traditional publishers also exclude works from publication for other reasons:

• they pursue different markets, 
• they already have similar titles for sale, 
• they don't publish Commies, Whigs, or Delusional Paranoids.

It is the responsibility of the self-published author make a lie of the traditional publisher's aspersions about his work.

A thousand self-published works can be great, but all it takes is for the reader to get one low-quality work to vindicate the traditional publishers' propaganda.

Once you upload your eBook to the KDP Bookshelf, there's a chance you'll create that bad impression about self-published work. So, now is a good time for you to ask yourself for the last time why you are self-publishing and also to ask whether you're deluding yourself about your deathless prose.
(You can find the bullet-point outline of How To Publish An Ebook here.)