Looking for the person in the blog

So far I must say that I have been sorely disappointed with many small publishers' blogs. Many small presses are using blogs as an advertising opportunity. Their posts are filled with marketing copy announcing their latest releases and events. Company updates are fine, along with other content, but that balance is often missing.

I am not certain if some publishers are using blogs this way because news updates are their driving purpose behind the blog or if they are uncertain as to how use the medium. Although Laura Hazard Owen is focused on twitter in her article "Twitter isn't stupid-but publishers need to be smart about using it", her advise on successful micro-blogging easily spills over into the use of company blogs. Asserting that twitter is not an advertising tool, Owen points out that social media are an opportunity to get personal and connect with the audience.

I have to agree with her. Publishers, yes, tell us about your releases. Yes, tell us what products you are excited about. But tell us also your concerns about the future of publishing; tell us who you will be reading on the couch this weekend. We've met the product, now we'd like to meet the person.

Independent publishers engage in the new media era

The independent literary press has always had its work cut out for it. The publishing world, particularly in the last fifteen years, has become drastically concentrated into the hands of a few international media giants whose first order of business is turn-and-burn bestsellers. Now there is nothing wrong with a great story or entertainment for entertainment’s sake, but an overload of enjoyable, yet empty, diversions does not enrich us. Without a balance of voices that speak to the deeper chords of human experience, our lives are flattened, cheapened.

Struggling to maintain a presence in a publishing world dominated by fleeting amusements, small-scale publishing houses are gaining ground by engaging in new social media practices that, ironically, were initially popular for the quick entertainment they provided. The independent press now tweets, updates their Facebook statuses, diggs other publishers’ releases and blogs about the literary world (interesting that companies that survive by selling words now offer them for free).

Media Bistro’s Gallery Cat has declared that independent literary presses are actually leading the publishing industry’s transformation into the new digital era. Online, armed with social media tools, indy publishers have gone interactive. They have distinct personalities: some, like Soft Skull, are edgy and boisterous, others, like the Etruscan Press, are contemplative and graceful. Our smart phones, readers and notification boxes now light up with small updates that life is rich, exciting and full of great literature.