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Tag: work

Something for the Weekend

Pushing Paper — Ben Kafka asks why is there no Norton Anthology of Paperwork?:

My Norton Anthology of Paperwork would include some of the finest historical examples of boilerplate, alongside selections of letterhead, fill-in-the-blank forms, fine print, and the history of that wonderfully poetic instruction, “last name, first.” Indeed, the boilerplate metaphor could itself be a metaphor for a larger transformation, two centuries in the making, that has taken many of us away from extracting coal and forging iron and assembling boilers toward waiting for an inspector to come sign off on a certificate that needs to be filed with the local Department of Buildings. Paperwork occupies us and preoccupies us, whether we are maritime lawyers or nail-salon owners, congressional aides or human-resource managers, college professors or freelance web designers.

Hard Times Sam Jordison on the EU investigation into the agency model of e-book pricing and what it means for publishers in The Guardian:

The customer may be unpleasant, but he or she is always right. It’s clear that publishers do need to up their game to accommodate the new demands. There’s also the fact that they’ve been pretty dreadful at digitising the backlists of their living authors, while those of dead authors are widely — and often freely — available. Publishers have to do something to win over…pretty much everyone.

The trouble is that… digital editions still cost money to produce (and indeed that the physical costs of a printed book are only a small percentage of their price), that rights are hellishly complicated, and that authors fear losing out hugely if publishers start putting up their backlist digitally (since they would never go out of print and so never be able to escape their contracts).

And on a related note…

Tearing Their Hair Out — Margaret Atwood discusses e-books with Rosalind Porter in The Globe & Mail:

[P]eople sit there putting words on the page, and some of them make a lot of money for their publishers and others create huge losses because the publishers placed their bets wrong. When people say publishing is a business – actually it’s not quite a business. It’s part gambling and part arts and crafts, with a business component. It’s not like any other business, and that’s why when standard businessmen go into publishing and think, “Right, I’m going to clean this up, rationalize it and make it work like a real business,” two years later you find they’re bald because they’ve torn out all their hair. And then you say to them, “It’s not like selling beer. It’s not like selling a case of this and a case of that and doing a campaign that works for all of the beer.” You’re selling one book – not even one author any more. Those days are gone, when you sold, let’s say, “Graham Greene” almost like a brand. You’re selling one book, and each copy of that book has to be bought by one reader and each reading of that book is by one unique individual. It’s very specific.

See also: Margaret Atwood’s keynote speech at TOC.

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From My Desk…

I’ve mention Kate Donnelly’s blog a couple of times here previously, but now you can take a look at my office space on From The Desks Of should you be so inclined.

Other (more interesting) recent contributors to From The Desk Of… include book designers Peter Mendelsund and Coralie Bickford-Smith, and New Yorker critic Alex Ross. I’m honoured to be in their esteemed company.

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Something for the Weekend

More Than Words — Yves Peters takes a typographical look at the winners of British Book Design and Production Awards 2010 for FontFeed. The winners all look wonderful, but, as Peters notes, it is a shame that only the publishers are credited, not the designers of the books.

An Archaeology of Business Cards — Penguin book designer Coralie Bickford-Smith discusses her workspace and her work with From the Desk Of…:

Right now I’m in the middle of designing a 20-book series, as well as sundry standalone titles, and my desk is usually a mess of ideas and scribbles on innumerable scraps of paper. There’s a whole archaeology of business cards, post-it notes and other treasures under there. I like to be surrounded by the current proofs to make sure the designs are working and that any tweaks are made in time for the final print. I like my desk – it’s my own tiny world in a big office.

My Q & A with Coralie is here.

Reading the ProcessThe New Yorker’s Book Bench interviews book designer Rodrigo Corral:

Reading is always part of the process when we’re working on a book jacket or cover for fiction. I read, I take notes, I take breaks. I’ll stop on the title, re-read it, and think about how it plays into the book and its overall message and intent. It’s rare to be able to illustrate the tone of the entire story by only depicting one moment from the book, so I prefer using a new image or design that I feel represents the story accurately.

The Rejection of Literalism — Steven Heller talks about his biography of designer Alvin Lustig Born Modern* with Imprint:

I did not get the impression that Lustig went into the book jacket biz with a literary bent. He did, however, have the temerity to try just about anything. And since, as a kid, he was interested in designing his way, he just, well, designed his way. So, I guess “confidence” is the right word. It was ballsiness. He had a vision—wherever it came from—and he pursued it. He was largely self-taught.
And, also via Imprint

Design Dossier: Graphic Design for Kids by Pamela Pease published by Paintbox Press, seen at The Daily Heller.

12 Reasons to be Excited About Publishing’s Future — Following up an earlier post about the love of books, Digital Book World‘s Guy LeCharles Gonzalez asks book industry folks why they’re excited about publishing.

And finally…

Help Me Destroy Public Radio” — Alec Baldwin channels Jack Donaghy for his “Do Not Pledge To Public Radio” pledge drive promo for NPR.

* Born Modern is published by Chronicle Books, who are distributed in Canada by my employer Raincoast Books.

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The Desk

The Desk is a fascinating mini-documentary about our complex relationships with our workspace. It features commentary from experts Alice Twemlow, Eric Abrahamson, Massimo Vignelli, David Miller, Kurt Andersen, Søren Kjær, Alfred Stadler, Jennifer Lai, and Ben Bajorek:

Created by Imaginary Forces for L Studio, The Desk first episode in a series called ‘Lines’  that looks at the design of everyday objects and they affect us. Other episodes include The High Heel, The Lens, The Elevator,  and The Parking Structure.

(via Brandon Schaefer)

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Rework

Co-founder of 37 Signals and author of Rework Jason Fried talks to Peter Hopkins, co-founder of Big Think, in this hour-long interview for HP’s Input| Output series:

It all seems like good advice, especially if you run a small business (or thinking of starting one), and while it’s hard to pin down any specific relevance for the book industry,  it got me thinking about this post again, and the idea we should always focus on making stuff.

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What Is There In Life If You Do Not Work?

A winsome post by William Zinsser, author of On Writing Well, on work and writing for The American Scholar:

I’ve never defined myself as a writer, or, God forbid, an author. I’m a person–someone who goes to work every morning, like the plumber or the television repairman, and who goes home at the end of the day to think about other things. I can’t imagine not going to work as long as I can…

…It may seem perverse that I compare my writing to plumbing, an occupation not regarded as high-end. But to me all work is equally honorable, all crafts an astonishment when they are performed with skill and self-respect. Just as I go to work every day with my tools, which are words, the plumber arrives with his kit of wrenches and washers, and afterward the pipes have been so adroitly fitted together that they don’t leak. I don’t want any of my sentences to leak. The fact that someone can make water come out of a faucet on the 10th floor strikes me as a feat no less remarkable than the construction of a clear declarative sentence.

(via  Coudal)

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