“In deep recession, with my job of 10 years ending [in June], and a baby on the way in August, I haven’t looked at a single job board or sent out a resume,” says Dan Blank, former Director of Content Strategy & Development for Reed Business Information. “I’ve just been talking to people, identifying problems, and considering ways I can help. That is how We Grow Media is forming.”

Having spent the past decade helping an impressive variety of editorial teams leverage the web — including Publisher’s Weekly, Library Journal and School Library Journal — Dan Blank’s understandably excited about his newest project, We Grow Media.

Half of WGM is consulting with media companies and online publishers to create compelling content and attract a vibrant community of fans and customers. “The other half,” he explains, “is working with writers, authors, editors and journalists to train them in building their online skills. Most of what stands in people’s way of growing is not lack of information, but fear. Working together, we can move past that. I work with creators one-on-one or via online classes I am creating.”

Blank is highly regarded by his peers because he really understands the “social” part of social media.

“So many people talk about the business or technical changes, but what I find even more interesting are the human changes. The economic meltdown, coupled with the business and technical changes affecting media have reshaped attitudes and the career paths of everyone in publishing and media.”

Which of these changes are you loving?

BLANK: I love how everyone has access to the world’s information and to each other. That we can not only dream, but take a step down the road to BECOME. That a 17-year-old in Alabama can create a piece of art and sell it to someone in London because of Etsy.com. That a college newspaper reporter in Montana can network with established media folks all over the world, and build credibility with them years before they enter the job market.

That a poor, struggling 13-year-old anywhere on the planet can access not just information, but the best teaching tools, and other people who can help them experience their passion. If astronomy is not taught in their school in India, that’s no problem. Just go online, and discover thousands of resources and thousands of passionate astronomy buffs to connect with.

This is the opportunity that I see for publishers.

What’s the biggest challenge?

BLANK: The fear that I know many people are going through. The sense that this is not where they wanted to be and they are powerless to know which way to move forward.

The sadness of institutions dying.

Who in publishing do you really admire? Whose creativity do you want to emulate?

BLANK: How much time do you have? I define publishing very broadly, so bear with me here:

• Debbie Stier (@DebbieStier): We have only met in person once, and I already feel like I would lie down in traffic for her. Brilliant energy.
• Betsy Bird (@FuseEight): Her passion, her work ethic, her ideas – she simply never stops amazing me.
• Heather McCormack (@hmccormack): So honest it’s frightening, and willing to try anything to better serve her audience.
• Calvin Reid (@calreid): When I grow up, I want to be Calvin. Nobody experiences their passions more openly and fully than he does.
• What I’ll call “the new generation” of movers and shakers who form their own clique on Twitter: Ryan Chapman (@chapmanchapman), Ami Greko (@ami_with_an_i), Kate Rados (@KateRados), Guy LeCharles Gonzalez (@glecharles) and several others: not only are they smart, not only are they savvy, not only are they doing things for the right reasons, but they are so open to helping. It’s astounding, and I feel incredibly lucky to know them.
• Gary Vaynerchuck (@GaryVee): I’ve become a bit obsessed with Gary. I think what he is doing is critically important – he is building the future. 
• Andrew Warner (@AndrewWarner): More than anyone else in the past six months, Andrew has reshaped how I view the world. Every day, he interviews an entrepreneur on Mixergy.com, and shares their story online via video/audio chats. His line of questioning goes beyond just the facts, to the emotional side of building something, and exploring in detail how decisions are made. If you want to build something – ANYTHING – I can’t recommend Mixergy enough. This is not just the business side of how to build something (although that is there), it is the human side.

 Clearly – a huge number of people are missing from that list, those are just the first who popped into my mind.

How are you staying up-to-date with industry news?

BLANK: Staying up-to-date comes down to this: sleep is optional.

Twitter is a great resource for me, because it’s not just that I am finding so much great information, but the context of who shared it makes it more meaningful. I know what people are talking about and what they are saying about it. I now follow 550 people on Twitter, five times as many people as I thought I ever could. And I get so much out of each of them, that I can’t bear to unfollow anyone! 

Conversations are a huge way to stay on the ball. I love – LOVE – grabbing a drink, a coffee, breakfast, lunch with someone, and just chatting for an hour. That takes you behind the facts, to the real-life transitions we are all going through.

I often try to take online conversations offline – even if it’s just via phone or Skype. I love learning about what other people are working on, their goals, their passions, their failures.

We have so much to learn from each other.

Future of publishing – half full or half empty?

BLANK: COMPLETELY full. If all you care about is protecting an established business model, then you are missing the point. And missing the future.

Dan Blank is the founder of We Grow Media, and was most recently Director of Content Strategy & Development for Reed Business Information where he worked across 40 business media brands, including Publishers Weekly. In April 2010, Dan was named to the Folio: 40 list of top innovators in magazine publishing. He doesn’t own a television, but goes to the library at least twice a week. “It’s like candyland for the mind.”

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

The first time I met Ron Hogan was during the Digital Book World Conference back in January, when he was still Senior Editor of GalleyCat and right before he started at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt as their Director of E-marketing Strategy. There was a seat between us during a panel, and there wasn’t a moment when some person wasn’t clamoring to ask him for a favor, run an idea by him, say hi, or offer to massage his feet.

If there was a contest, I’d vote Hogan Nicest Dude in Publishing, which is why my jaw literally dropped when I heard about his abrupt departure from HMH two weeks ago.

In the mid-90s, Hogan worked at a Los Angeles bookstore while finishing his Master’s in Film Studies, and originally wanted to be a professor but had doubts about academia. Those doubts coincided with the rise of the Internet, and he launched Beatrice.com in 1995, publishing interviews with authors as they came through LA.

“Like a lot of people, I kind of thought it would be cool to do a website.”

Since then, Beatrice has become one of the top book blogs, a destination site for anyone who loves books and is looking for something new to read.

“It’s not pinned down to any one type of book or story. I talk about things I happen to think are cool and some of that catches people’s eyes on a relatively regular basis.”

The HMH Drama

While running Beatrice, Hogan has freelanced for a number of dotcoms, took a staff position as Category Editor at Amazon.com, was the Senior Editor of GalleyCat, and most recently, became the Director of E-marketing Strategy at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, a job he “really enjoyed doing.”

So what happened?

“Basically, as I’ve come to understand in retrospect,” Hogan explained, “the VP who conceived of this position and hired me was herself let go during an earlier corporate restructuring in March. I can only assume that the people who weren’t invested in this position from the beginning have reevaluated their needs. I think they believe their e-marketing strategy can be met by existing marketing staff.”

“I didn’t accomplish half of what I had hoped to accomplish in that position. I hope the publisher will continue to move forward in some capacity. They are serious about online marketing, as any major publishing has to be at this point and the books are fantastic. One of the reasons I was so glad to take this job was that it was an opportunity to work with an incredible front list of consistently excellent titles.”

A free agent again, he’s keeping an eye out for a similar position, with a publisher that is open to using online tools to engage readers more directly; and to be more responsive to those readers.

“That’s the kind of staff job that I would be looking for at a house,” Hogan continued. “In the meantime I will be consulting for authors, small presses and independent booksellers on using social media tools. Coach them on identifying what they want to accomplish, picking out the tools, giving them an action plan and then touching base with them and tweaking their strategy a bit. Giving them tools and the know-how.”

“It’s a great opportunity to do a lot more than say, ‘Oh, our book comes out today.’”

Hogan wants publishers to use those tools to bring communities of readers together and actually take seriously what they have to say. “That will result in a much more significant long-term advantage,” he said. “These aren’t just more platforms to put out news of new releases.”

Future of publishing – half-full or half-empty?

“The best answer I’ve heard is: ‘Twice as big as it needs to be.’ I’m very optimistic about publishing’s future. I don’t know if that future is going to be print-oriented, or how much of a chunk will be eBooks, but I am confident that there are publishing companies forward-thinking enough to be responsive to communities of readers and that they will be able to deliver stories and information in any number of formats. The rest is containers.”

Ron Hogan helped create the literary Internet by launching Beatrice.com in 1995. In 2010, after writing about the business side of publishing as a senior editor for GalleyCat for several years, he briefly served as the director of e-marketing strategy for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. His most recent book is Getting Right with Tao, a print edition of his popular online “translation” of the Tao Te Ching into modern vernacular.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

For transmedia novelists (and publishers) to retain creative control will require more than a repurposing of content. This might give a ‘taste’ of what transmedia can ‘do’, but for it to work on all levels it must be intrinsically built in and not bolted on.

–Alison Norrington, Transmedia Requires New Breed of Writers, Publishers

Back in January at the Digital Book World conference, Alison Norrington spoke about her book, Staying Single, for which she created social media profiles for her protagonist, Sophie Regan, on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc. Then in March, I wrote about location-based social media and the potential, as bookseller Stephanie Anderson noted, to “check-in to the intangibles.”

Now, with the launch of Roorback.com, I’ve become even more curious about authors’ creating social networking profiles for their characters and websites for brands that engage with the real world, but only exist within their books.

Aidan Cole is a blogger for Roorback.com, a Gawker-esque gossip site that sports the provocative tagline: “A defamatory falsehood published for political effect.” And then regretted.

He is also one of the two main characters in David Goodwillie’s new – and first – novel, American Subversive (Scribner; April 2010). The novel, which has a traditional online presence, has received tons of good reviews, and the Associated Press called it “a triumphant work of fiction.” Roorback.com is still in its early stages, but it’s been gaining momentum fast, mostly as a snarky gossip blog, but also as a very cool transmedia experiment.

Explaining the birth of Roorback, Goodwillie noted that just four years ago an author could write a book, and then only be loosely involved with its online marketing plan (usually involving MySpace).

“The literary landscape has changed,” he said. “The web is one giant marketing opportunity, and while a good publicist can help navigate this vast and open ocean, most of it remains uncharted, and overwhelming.  No one really knows what sells books online (or off, for that matter), though fresh ideas certainly beat annoying the world with friend requests and promotional tweets.  And so my editor, a few friends and I sat down and came up with one.”

Goodwillie describes Roorback as “a real-world blog populated by fictional characters.” What the readers see as “Aidan’s” posts are anonymously written by a few Brooklyn bloggers.

The concept is great and the execution is even better, but because the fictional Cole is engaging with and commenting on the real world, I wondered how Goodwillie manages to balance the fact that Cole doesn’t really exist.

eg: A recent Cole post about the latest YouTube sensation, Greyson Michael Chance:

And for the first time in a very long while, something resembling joy stirred in my black heart. With the pipes of an angel and the hair of the Vampyre Justin Bieber, he’s bound to get to get to second base with all the swooning groupies his heart desires… Act now, eighth grade girls, before he turns thirteen and realizes your rapidly developing female bodies do nothing for him.

As of right now, there is no overt reference to American Subversive on Roorback.com, except for a vague banner ad in the upper right-hand corner. People who stumble upon the site via a link or search without having read the book will most likely think it’s just another gossip blog.

“I don’t want the book to be too front and center,” Goodwillie said, “but I also don’t want people to leave the site without knowing what the real deal is.”

Zack Sultan, a collaborator on the Roorback project, said, “I think we can be very honest with the audience, and ask them to come in as collaborators in the joke rather than trying to pull one over on them. I think if we do that, and are super straight-forward, we can achieve both more focus on the book, while supporting the ‘artistic’ endeavor of the blog.”

“You don’t have to have read American Subversive to enjoy–and contribute to–the blog that lies at the heart of it,” says Goodwillie, “but as Roorback ramps up in the coming weeks, you might decide you want to.”

Where do the boundaries, if any, lie when you’re blurring the lines between fiction and reality?

And what other ways can authors expand their stories beyond the printed (or electronic) page?

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

Interested in learning more about using transmedia storytelling and cross-media strategies? Join us at StoryWorld, the only major gathering of industry leaders, decision makers, and transmedia specialists, to explore new business models, innovative partnerships, and fresh revenue streams.

“This decade has been about the advent of easy to use free blogging platforms, online communities and how we get our information.  I don’t think most of our industry has fully grasped how big that shift is.”

–Debbie Stier

My favorite thing about Debbie Stier is the fact that she’s been in publishing for over 20 years, but no one would ever accuse her of being a dinosaur.

“When I started in book publishing,” Stier notes, “computers existed, but for some reason the industry didn’t use them. I worked for a literary agent and had to type submission letters on a typewriter with carbon paper. One letter would take me a week.”

By the late 1980s, Stier was working at Ballantine Books where one computer was shared by the entire publicity department and there was a signup sheet.

“Your turn on the computer meant that you’d go to the middle of the floor to type your press release during your one hour slot.”

In 1990, at Warner Books, Stier says each employee had their own desktop computer, and “a year or two later, we got email, and that really moved things along. A few years after that, I remember a bunch of us hovering over Larry Kirshbaum‘s desk, checking out the internet for the first time.  Little did we know how much that would change our daily lives. When I think back, it seems like we must have gotten so little done.”

Besides the introduction of computers to the workplace, Stier loves the potential that all technology brings to the industry, especially the ability to connect directly with readers.

“I love that word-of-mouth is scalable. I love that anybody can share, and connect, and spread the word about great books and ideas without ever having to get permission.”

It’s the permission part that gets her down: “I’m allergic to bureaucracy. Publishing is full of protocols; I find it frustrating when people see their role as putting up barriers and looking for problems. I’d rather make something great happen.”

While some authors grumble about how they’re expected to do so much more than write nowadays, Stier quite likes that specific change. The ability to fully participate is what makes publishing so exciting!

“It’s liberating to know that you are in control of your own destiny and don’t have to hope that the gatekeepers allow you to be recognized.”

Stier credits Jane Friedman, former CEO of HarperCollins and now co-founder and CEO of Open Road Media, as both an inspiration and the source of her most useful career advice; effectively: “Don’t look for a job that exists. Make it up.”

Anyone in publishing who you really admire; whose creativity you want to emulate?

“Jane Friedman from Open Road Media is an inspiration to me because she’s a fearless woman who’s gotten where she is by forging new paths.  I’m inspired by Guy LeCharles Gonzalez because it feels like he created a flourishing community, seemingly out of thin air. (I can’t even remember life before DBW.)  I admire Susan Danziger because she’s not afraid to try something new, and for being bold and introducing thought leaders from other industries to share new ideas with the publishing community.”

“I like people who think differently, aren’t afraid to try new things, and go beyond crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s of ‘the job.’   I am inspired by people who make stuff happen.”

Future of publishing: Half full or half empty?

“Half full, definitely.  With books available on so many devices, I read more than ever, and I know I’m not alone in that.  This is definitely an exciting time. I think it’s going to look very different in five years.”

NOTE: Writing this profile was all sorts of fun for me because Debbie Stier is pretty much who I want to be. Every time I see something new she’s doing, I am 100% in awe.

Debbie Stier is the Director of Digital Marketing for HarperCollins, where she is responsible for educating and evangelizing digital trends throughout the company. The trends encompass how people communicate, what technologies they are using, how other industries are using technology, and how this all applies to book publishing.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

For me, I’ve been asked more than a few times ‘well, how did you get into digital publishing?’  And the answer’s never fun… ‘I just read stuff.’ But that’s actually 75% of it.  The other 25% is having a passion for the digital side of things.

“Doin’ It Digital“, Kate Rados

Kate Rados, the Director of Digital Initiatives for the highly regarded niche publisher, Chelsea Green, actually started out in television, first as Casting Director for MTV Animation/Nickelodeon, then at the Food Network where she was the Publicist for Rachael Ray, Giada DeLaurentiis, Mario Batali, etc.

“Food Network was where I started handling book tours and loved every second of it.”

In 2005, she moved to Sterling Publishing as a Senior Publicist, eventually working her way up to become the Director of Digital Markets.

“Digital years are like dog years,” says Rados. “Back then, publishers weren’t really thinking about ‘going digital’. I was lucky enough, and ninja-nerd enough, to pounce on the opportunity to create the department at Sterling. About five years later, in January 2010, I started at Chelsea Green.”

Despite her (relative) newbie status in publishing, Rados believes that the relationship between reader and publisher has been “turned upside down.” Publishers can’t just shovel books into the marketplace and expect readers to accept what they’re given, they have to listen to what their readers want, engage with them on a regular basis to see what’s working, and what’s not.  They have to cultivate relationships.

Despite these changes (or maybe because of these changes), Rados loves the camaraderie that’s developed among publishers, at least on the digital side of things. People are sharing information, brainstorming, “all for the sake of keeping publishing not only alive, but marathon-ready.”

One place that camaraderie is most present is on Twitter, and Rados is a Twitter fiend. When asked whom she admires in the industry, in addition to usual suspects like Debbie “Publishing Warrior” Stier, and Guy “Master of Community Building” Gonzalez, she suggests taking a good hard look at all of the publishing people who are active on Twitter.

“Every single person brings energy, unique ideas, and feedback, and we are lucky to be able to connect and collaborate with them every day.”

There are some changes that aren’t syncing with this Digital Ninja, though.

1. “Square peg, round hole.”  A souped-up Jane Austen enhanced eBook with video commentary and companion iPhone app.
2. “Me Too!” publishing.  Zombie-Dog-Vampire-Memoir anyone?
3. Press Releases.
4. Launching a product in a vacuum with NO marketing efforts outside of Publishing Trade Press.
5. The notion that Digital is a just a department with a costly budget line.

Rados feels that the biggest challenge for publishing is avoiding becoming “The Man”. While everyone’s fighting about pricing and business models, readers begin to feel that everyone in the publishing industry is “old, greedy, set in our ways, don’t care about them, and are too lazy to check the quality of our work”. She finds this particular challenge the most frustrating and wishes there were a publicity firm for the industry itself.

And her response to the requisite Future of Publishing Question: half-full or half-empty?

“Full. In a child-safe, recycled-plastic tumbler that will never break, though it may be knocked around from time to time.”

Kate Rados is Director of Digital Initiatives for Chelsea Green Publishing. Before this position, she was the Director of Digital Markets for Sterling. Kate never takes off her consumer hat, attributes her theater training as the best resource for dealing with any situation and is a self-proclaimed gadget geek. In her spare time, Kate is a vocalist and can frequently be seen rocking out in karaoke bars across Manhattan.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

When I first decided to pursue a career in publishing, I toyed with the idea of enrolling in one of the many publishing courses, including the summer program at Columbia University. There were also the programs at NYU, Pace University, University of Denver, and the now defunct Stanford Publishing Course for Professionals.

But at as much as $5,000 (give or take), I wasn’t sure if it was really worth it.

I’d love to take a class at NYU’s Center for Publishing where they offer a Master of Science, professional certificates, continuing education courses, and a six-week long Summer Institute. The classes sound like a lot of fun (or at least they do for nerds like me), and you only need to take five to receive a certificate, but I don’t know how I’d choose!

At the Digitize Your Career: Marketing & Editorial Forum, Kevin MacDonald (Senior Production Editor, Hyperion) suggested that taking a class or two would offer a good overview for anyone because we could all use a little bit more understanding of what our co-workers actually do. While many classes may focus on editorial functions – the “most interesting part” – MacDonald, perhaps not surprisingly, recommended taking a class on book production.

While I think we’d all love to take a course or five to refresh our memory, learn more about the industry, or get a leg up when applying to jobs, you’d need to actually be sure that your $500 (or more) is going to be a worthwhile investment. I know while I was unemployed I didn’t have that kind of money to drop.

Would it hurt? No, probably not; but while I’ve heard that it’s a good thing to have on your resume, it won’t necessarily land you your dream job. Most people say a good internship is just as valuable as any certificate, and some would argue even more so, as you actually get hands-on experience rather than just theory.

But what about networking opportunities? These classes are usually taught by some seriously impressive, well-connected professionals.

Manuela Soares, a lecturer at Pace University’s Publishing Program, says their program is definitely worth the investment. “Absolutely. With our Master’s degree, students can work more effectively in the industry. Would an employer rather hire someone straight out of college with no experience or someone with an advanced degree who knows how the publishing business is organized?”

Melissa Breau is a freelance writer and editor specializing in business content, currently working full-time as an associate/web editor at a business-to-business magazine, and a graduate of Pace’s Publishing Program. Breau enjoyed it “immensely,” praising her time at Pace, explaining that the assignments helped expand her understanding of the field, the lecturers helped expand her network, and she credits the program for helping her quickly climb the career ladder.

“I do not think I’d be where I am in my career right now without the program.”

Lara Simpson, a publicist at Da Capo Press, graduated with an M.A. in Writing Literature and Publishing from Emerson College in December of 2008. Simpson says the program was worth the money “if only for the connections,” as she was able to develop relationships with some of the top people in the industry. Her career path stemmed from classes in Book Publicity and Sales & Marketing where she met Lissa Warren, VP and Senior Director of Publicity for Da Capo Press, and her current employer.

When I asked if she would recommend others take such a course she said, “Yes and No.”

“Yes because I know that going to Emerson is the reason I’m employed right now. No, because I know a lot of people who didn’t go to graduate school who are still thriving in the business and have learned more than enough on the job to allow them to be great at what they do. Looking back, I’ve used skills I learned in almost every class. My experience copyediting, using InDesign, and even having a basic knowledge of the overall process of book publishing are all things that continue to aid me in my current career.”

But could she have learned all that on the job? Maybe. Maybe not.

“In my first year teaching in the program,” Professor Soares recalls, “a student said to me: ‘I’ve been working at a major trade house for almost a year in the Marketing department. No one explains anything. I’ve learned more in a month of classes than I have the entire year on the job.’”

With the industry changing so rapidly, though, can these courses keep up and offer timely, relevant information?

“Honestly, no,” says Breau. “However, since each of my professors worked in the field, they could bring in examples of how the changes taking place were impacting their jobs and workplaces… This allowed for new developments to be incorporated into the class as they developed – notably, the Google book settlement happened during my ethics class, and we discussed it in-depth.”

“I think there could have been more about e-publishing and classes on where book publishing was headed,” Simpson says about Emerson. “I believe the school is offering more in that realm now though.”

At Pace, Professor Soares says, “Our curriculum reflects the changing times – digital marketing and social networking, for example – while maintaining a core curriculum that prepares students for all aspects of the publishing industry.”

Babette Ross, former Associate Director of Sales Administration at Random House, is enrolled in NYU’s certificate program and noted: “Since I’ve been around a lot of these ‘future of publishing’ events, in addition to the classes at NYU, and I read so many marketing newsletters, blogs, etc… I’ve found that so much of this info just isn’t new to me. That’s not a criticism of the program, but I’m on the lookout for ‘aha moments’; a gem of an idea that I hadn’t heard about or thought of in a particular light.”

Ross says the best part of the program is the people she meets. “All of the professors and guest speakers are incredibly helpful in terms of sharing networks.”

While experienced professionals might not get as much return on their investment in a certificate or MS in publishing as someone brand new to the industry, with so many educational and networking resources now available, even the less experienced may find that they’re not learning anything new. While pursuing a certificate or Master’s right after college might make sense for some, it may not be the best option for those who already know the ins and outs of the industry.

Of course, the opportunity to learn on the job requires actually having the job, and for many these days, it’s the getting the job part that’s difficult.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

“No one can say for certain where Eleanor Wakefield’s opinion ends and Joseph Illidge’s opinion begins.”

–Joseph Phillip Illidge

Joseph Phillip Illidge is a co-partner at Verge Entertainment and was one of the panelists at Digital Book World’s Digitize Your Career: Marketing & Editorial Forum two weeks ago. He first caught my attention during a discussion about the challenges of establishing an online identity without getting fired from your day job, when he said: “I can have my cake and eat it, too.”

Illidge has the ability to blog about whatever he wants without getting in trouble for his public views because he is lucky enough to have an outlet that actually requires him to spew all sorts of opinions, albeit not necessarily under his own byline.

He writes for ExpoWeekly, an online gossip site that is a cross between The Huffington Post and TMZ. Not that we need another site like either of those, but ExpoWeekly is somewhat unique as its staff consists entirely of, well, fake people.

ExpoWeekly came about when Illidge’s partner at Verge, Shawn Martinbrough, came up with the idea for an entertainment website slash “digital intellectual property.” Because traditional journalism is shifting into the digital space and its seasoned writers are fast becoming the new generation of bloggers, Illidge, Martinbrough, and Expo co-owner Kevin McCarthy brainstormed their way into the fictional universe behind the site.

As the company’s head writer, Illidge developed most of the characters and their origins, and his three avatars are Editor-in-chief Keisha Parks; Creative Director Cassidy Chase; and Global Affairs Reporter Eleanor Wakefield.

Interestingly, during the Forum he spoke often about having an “authentic voice” when using social media, but he writes from the perspective of three different fictional female characters. That’s kind of awesome because he can let different aspects of his personality take over in order to really get into a character; so if you think about it, fictional universe aside, there’s nothing more authentic than that!

“Relating to the three ladies is easy because they’re all extensions of various facets of my personality,” he said.

As a former editor of the Batman comic books for DC Comics, Illidge connects with Parks’ “multitasking mind and advocacy for quality work”. Chase is relatable due to her smarts and chutzpah, and I think Illidge really enjoys the fact that she’s “opinionated as hell.” As for Wakefield, he “admires the hell out of New York Times columnist and author Maureen Dowd,” and figured he could show his political side “while portraying older women with the respect that’s due them.”

Illidge had complete say on the characters he wanted to portray, and after the team put together the basic archetypes, he was able to flesh all three out to full realization. “It’s crazy, because I can tell you the histories of all three women, from the death of Keisha’s mother to Cassidy’s college affair with her professor to Eleanor being a co-novelist with her ex-husband. And the fact that all three are women means I get to show my feminine side!”

Getting into each character isn’t hard because he knows all three so well, but the “Expo Bible” helps, with a breakdown of each character’s history, created by himself and his Verge partners.

• Keisha is a crusader for good writing, story and language, to the point where she’s anachronistic to a lot of people, and texts in perfect English. She’s my cultural pride and writer/editor persona, along with a sprinkle of self-assuredness.
• Cassidy always refers to herself in the third person as “The Chaser” and is in her early twenties, so when I wrote the tribute to Corey Haim, I knew Cass didn’t see The Lost Boys when it was in the theaters. She is my intolerance of stupidity, mixed with the fearlessness and self-righteousness I had when I was her age.
• Eleanor has high standards, marched in opposition to the Vietnam War, and wants to force people to think instead of just act and consume. We’re both good dressers, don’t care about reality TV, and would watch Mad Men before ever paying to see any Transformers movies.

“What is crazy, though,” Illidge explained, “is that I’ve been affected by the opinions of the characters. I gained a whole new level of respect for Mario Lopez after Cassidy Chase wrote ‘The Nine Lives of Mario Lopez’, because he adapts to any and all challenges with determination and a smile.”

So far, the response to the site has been good and Illidge says they see pretty hefty traffic spikes when AintItCoolNews mentions them, or he spreads a gossip rumor (eg: Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are going to be in Christopher Nolan’s upcoming Superman film). Their fictional characters have even interviewed industry professionals like film producer Reginald Hudlin and novelist L.A. Banks, with more to come.

At the Forum, Illidge said, “Being able to express myself under fictional guises allows me to comment on anything I want to, but the face isn’t me. I can have my cake and eat it, too.” When I asked him to elaborate a few days later, he told me, “Suffice it to say, the bigwigs at my Clark Kent job can’t give me guff because of what I write as Superman, because the lines between me and the fiction cannot be clearly identified.”

Illidge has it pretty good, both as a writer and publishing professional [the Clark Kent job], able to express himself creatively without any bureaucratic obstacles.

“The worst part is loving it so much that I want to write three Keisha columns in one day, but then my girlfriend reminds me that I could spend some time with her instead.”

Hard life, man. I want his job!

Joseph Phillip Illidge has been an editor and writer of comic books, graphic novels, and columns for over a decade. He’s worked on DC Comics’ Dark Knight, THE BATMAN, and the WB television series, Birds of Prey; Milestone’s STATIC; and most recently as the co-creator, co-writer and editor of the Ayre Force graphic novel and animated webisodes for digital entertainment giant, Bodog.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

“Production editors are the forgotten heroes of the book world.”

So proclaimed Kevin MacDonald, Senior Production Editor at Hyperion, during last week’s Digitize Your Career: Marketing & Editorial Forum, much to the delight of the attendees.

Participating in the closing session of the Forum, “Working with Production and IT”, MacDonald contributed to a highly entertaining and insightful discussion whose primary objective was to improve communication between some of the “forgotten heroes of the book world”, and the editors and marketers who depend on them.

All three panelists — MacDonald, Pablo Defendini (Open Road Integrated Media) and Kate Rados (Chelsea Green) — agreed that everyone in publishing needs to learn how the other departments they work with operate, understand their capabilities and responsibilities, and really know what they will and will not (and can and cannot) do for you.

“IT, at least to me and what I think it is, is a very specific discipline which has shit all to do with everything else,” declared Defendini. “These are the guys who are optimizing network performance, managing firewalls, email servers, etc. It’s very different from the production side of things.”

“People like the bucket of ‘IT’,” Rados agreed, clarifying, “Information Technology does not equal ‘Anything That Beeps’. I kind of feel like I’m in a unique position as I’m in marketing half the time, the other half in IT, but communication [between them] is definitely key.”

MacDonald suggested that physical separation causes some of the communication problems, particularly in large corporations with departments on different floors.

“At Hyperion, we’re on different floors meaning there’s less social interaction and therefore less communication, especially in terms of understanding what the other does.”

MacDonald also felt the need to clarify that production is very different from other departments where change is happening so fast it’s often overwhelming.

“Production is dealing with something that’s very old; set in stone. Marketing is dealing with something changing every day.” While production does try to find ways to make things faster, at the end of the day “we’re still putting ink on paper.”

“We’re aware we’re dinosaurs.”

Some practical solutions the panelists and attendees came up with included:

• Make a point to learn what the other departments are responsible for. This will not only make you friends, but reduce the anxiety that will inevitably pop up when you need something done fast.
• Once you know what the person next to you does, recognize and appreciate it. In terms of developing productive relationships across your company, “individual recognition” is your most powerful tool.
• Stop expecting everyone to move as fast as you do. While publishing is changing at an extraordinarily rapid rate, every department faces its own unique challenges; take a deep breath and realize not everyone is on Twitter. Talk to the people around you, too.
• Help find replicable ways to make things faster. MacDonald made an excellent point when discussing crash books; most people don’t understand how a regular production schedule is put together, and a procedure for crashing books needs to be developed instead of reinventing the wheel each time.

Despite the fact that a lot of attention is given to editorial and marketing because it’s “the interesting part” of the business, it obviously pays to give a little more attention, and credit when due, to the “forgotten heroes of the book world”.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

Not counting the informal 7x20x21 networking events, Digital Book World’s Digitize Your Career: Marketing & Editorial Forum was the new publishing community’s first in-person event since January’s inaugural conference, and the goal, according to Director of Programming and Forum moderator Guy LeCharles Gonzalez, was for the attendees and speakers to “leave here excited about what you do, with some new ideas on how to move forward.” A smaller, more interactive program by design — with an impressive number of Sterling Publishing employees in the room — I was surrounded by some the most innovative and plugged-in minds in the industry, all of whom I follow on Twitter and was finally able to put some real-life faces to their digital avatars.

Because I’ve become so ingrained in the publishing industry lately, and because blogs are where I get almost all my information, and because the people who run those blogs are the most plugged-in –  real publishing “celebrities” like Chapman/Chapman, LJNDawson.com, and The New Sleekness –  I never really questioned how their employers felt about all this public information-sharing and engagement. In my mind, I was sure they were cool with all the blogging and the tweeting and the Facebook stalking.

It wasn’t until Gonzalez asked, “How many of you have a personal blog? How many of you can’t have a personal blog because of corporate policies?” that I actually remembered these guys have careers outside of their blogging personas.

Approximately half of the room raised their hands to the first question, including Harlequin editor Stacy Boyd.

“Harlequin has a very open blog policy,” Boyd said, but then immediately followed up with: “I obviously can’t talk about anything confidential, and have to couch everything as my personal opinion. I try not to write anything that Harlequin might disagree with, but have run into situations that other people in our part of the industry – like authors – have disagreed with me. Authors are very important to us so it’s challenging to be both personal and corporate at the same time.”

Back when I worked the 9-to-5 grind, I was a book publicist while also keeping up with my own personal blog. I didn’t talk a lot about the industry, but I did often write book reviews, which my boss told me I had to take down as those authors might be potential clients. It was frustrating, but I did understand; an author is hardly going to hire a firm that employs people who write bad reviews of their books!

But I wonder how much of this is about companies playing CYA and how much is just plain ignorance about the importance of engaging readers and colleagues online?

“The whole system is hidden,” said Dan Blank, Director of Content Strategy & Development at Reed Business Information, former publisher of Publishers Weekly. “People don’t know the editors or publishers for a lot of these books.”

Most people know the name of bestselling authors, maybe even a major publisher or two, but that’s usually it. With social media engagement on the rise, though, more and more consumers are recognizing that there are people in the industry beyond the author who play important roles in a book’s creation.

A great example of an industry professional publicly strutting her stuff is literary agent Colleen Lindsay. Not only does Lindsay keep her own blog, she manages to use Twitter very well, both personally and professionally. In her #askagent sessions, Lindsay and other agents like Elana Roth from Caren Johnson Literary Agency, and Jason Allen Ashlock of Movable Type Literary Group, open up their Twitter feeds to answer questions from publishing hopefuls. The conversation is enormously successful and – while it’s now tacky to talk about numbers, I’m going to anyway – Lindsay has amassed over 18,000 followers, and done so without following over 18,000 people to do it.

“I can always count on a handful of folks who read my Twitter feed to pass the message along at the speed of light,” Lindsay noted in a recent post, “because most writers who have participated in #Askagent want to come back for more!”

We all love what Lindsay and her fellow agents are doing and how they’re using Twitter, helping demystify the industry by putting themselves out there to engage directly with people.

But what if your company isn’t down with having you and their business splashed all across the interwebs, and has policies limiting social media activity?

“If you’re waiting for permission, it’s probably too late for you,” said Blank. “You’re already so far behind the curve.”

Maybe it’s a little harsh, but is he right?

“If you don’t think you’re going to get fired, you’re not doing anything interesting,” suggested Ami Greko, Director of Business Development for GetGlue. While that may be true, in this economy people aren’t going to start risking their jobs so they can have a little blog fun.

Instead, maybe it’s about figuring out how you can toe the line while helping move it forward at the same time?

Greko noted that while she was at Macmillan – a “great environment” – no one was doing much of anything online, and while publishers can benefit hugely from having an engagement strategy, it still looks like it’s up to the individual employees to really take advantage.

“If you want to be in the digital space,” she continued, “that’s what you need to do.”

What do you think? Has your blog/Twitter account/Facebook profile helped or hindered your career?

How do you keep your job safe while developing your own social media presence?

Or, do you just throw it all out there and hope for the best?

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.

Laura Dawson has been in the publishing business since she was “a little baby intern in 1986,” and even before then, she worked at her local public library.

“I always wanted to be in the book world.”

And now that her love for books and love for technology have collided, she couldn’t be happier.

“That happened in 1995,” Dawson explained, “when I began working with Muze. We licensed Bowker’s Books in Print and began hanging all these cool features on the spine of that metadata. We created an amazing search interface that was never fully implemented, but it taught me an awful lot about how technology works to lead people to books. I then went to BarnesandNoble.com and did similar metadata projects, before landing at a library software developer, where I worked on powering user interfaces for public and academic libraries.”

“I’ve been consulting since 2003. I really love consulting because it brings me in front of a lot of different sorts of problems, so I am never bored and always learning.”

Today, her clients consist of publishers and the service providers who need help talking to them, “mostly technology firms who are very aware that they want to penetrate an insular industry, and they need help navigating that.”

But as we all know, the publishing industry is rapidly changing, and someone can have a quarter century of experience and still be completely out of the loop. Not Dawson, though. She recognizes those changes — both the obvious, like the increasing integration of technology in the publishing process, and the less obvious, like fear.

Fear?

“Publishing didn’t used to be afraid,” said Dawson.

“They told everyone what to read (what they were going to publish), and people consumed it the way they were told to (via book reviews, ads). Now, publishing has gone from a business-to-business operation (publisher-to-distributor-to-bookstore-to-consumer) to a business-to-consumer operation, and so very many publishers have no idea why they are suddenly being portrayed as out of touch, clueless, etc. They’re doing what they’ve always done!”

“But the market has shifted; consumers now have greater power than they ever did, and much more book finding is happening on the web. Publishers have been, in my experience, unnerved by that. I spend a lot of my time explaining things to publishers that I, as a consumer, take for granted. So that requires a lot of patience and empathy. And periodic forays into hobbies which have nothing whatever to do with publishing.”

Among the things she hates are “jargon, snobbery, and the assumption that social media is going to ‘save publishing’,” and she sees the biggest challenge being “the myth busting and political wrangling. The only thing that’s going to save publishing is getting books (in whatever format) to readers (in the format they want).”

Not all these changes are bad though, and for many, fear isn’t necessarily the most appropriate response. Dawson loves the opportunity for innovation (there’s that word again); she loves the new tools that are out there that “help bring books to market more effectively. I’m loving the recognition that identifiers and metadata are important marketing tools – the fact that all this wonky stuff I’ve been so passionate about is finally seeing the light of day!”

Anyone in publishing who you really admire? Who’s creativity you want to emulate?

I am a HUGE Brian O’Leary fangirl. He’s so incredibly smart, thoughtful, and I love how methodical he is. And, of course, I also admire Richard Nash and his Cursor project.

But I also have so much respect for those in production and IT; the folks who are not, by and large, considered creative by their companies. Anyone who can turn out a good ONIX feed, or design a functional eBook conversion process, or package books together in a database and license it — these are the people I have the most admiration for. They are grappling with data and structure issues every day, and are on the front lines of the stuff that consultants like me pontificate about. I rely on them to tell me when I’m full of it.

How are you staying up-to-date with industry news? How do you stay on the ball?

Publishers Lunch, of course. And Twitter; I am getting most of my industry news from Twitter these days. @jafurtado is a one-man news bureau. There are also some blogs I follow closely: Brian O’Leary’s, Jane Litte’s and Kassia Krozier’s. And I belong to a listserv that is a never-ending source of news and opinion – very valuable.

Future of publishing – half full or half empty?

The future of publishing is packed full! No halvsies.

Laura Dawson is a 20+ year veteran of the book industry, specializing in its technology issues. She has worked at Doubleday, Muze, Barnes & Noble.com, SirsiDynix, and as an independent consultant whose clients have included R. R. Bowker, Chuckwalla, McGraw-Hill, the Book Industry Study Group, Ingram Library Services, Audible, IBS/Bookmaster North America, Harvard University Press, Yale University Press, Lexis-Nexis, Cosimo Books, and Dial-A-Book.

Marian Schembari digs social media and books. Usually at the same time.