I have been at this gig now well into my third year and I need to pause and take stock of what I have learned from blogging. There are a lot of pros to this endeavour, I have discovered, as much as there are pitfalls. Here is a list of both for those of you […]
My Lessons from Blogging Read More »
Writing gurus advise us not to despair when the rejection slips pile up, they urge us to keep going back to the well and digging deeper until a real gem pops out, for after all, “a good story must be told”. After a while, this sounds like another feel•good•ism to sooth the battered writer toiling
A good story will be told – ultimately! Read More »
It is (municipal) election time in my part of the world and the campaigns (including the mud•slinging ones) are out in force. To play the straight guy is to risk losing these days. So go out and smear your opponents with the smelliest shit is the mantra it seems. And while you are at it,
Positioning – or lying to win votes. Are we falling for it? Read More »
I get sent “interesting” videos by friends, fans and strangers, but a couple I received recently turned my stomach. One was of a raid by soldiers on a village in a country that will remain unnamed; the soldiers—for they were uniformed—arrived in this dusty main street of the village on a busy market day, disembarked
The Savage within us Read More »
When I think of the dead ends I have followed over the years and the amount of time I spent on walking those futile pathways, I must have wasted much of my life. Let me itemize a few of these duds that would not offend friends or family (the rest, you will have to imagine!):
The Dead-ends in Life Read More »
I think we are becoming a bunch of depressed people, unwittingly. I mean, look at that piece of converted tree pulp we call a newspaper that we reach for each morning before sipping our wake•me•up coffee. And you computer geeks, you who reach for your laptop or Blackberry instead, you are not absolved either —you
A jolt of bad news with your morning java Read More »
Once upon a time, a man (or woman) entered a job, worked his entire life, and retired not seeing the light of day in another company, not knowing the travails of unemployment unless his own company went bankrupt, remaining naive and loyal, and at retirement receiving a pin, a handshake and a pension. These symbols
The World of the Pieceworker Read More »
I remember the old days when we wrote letters to relatives and friends in distant lands, when we phoned the ones nearby to “keep in touch” and when we read the obituary notices to find out who had died. I have to admit I do not do any of that today. All my friends and
The Facebook Family Read More »
How does one make money at writing today? That question seems to be the “pre•occupation de jour” of most commercial writers and journalists. The cyber airwaves are chock full of content: blogs, wikis, e•mail, self•published books, e•zines. How does a writer insist that he gets paid for his work when there are equally good, or
Monetizing Content in the Hippie Era of Writing Read More »
When the towers came down in New York innocence was lost in North America, they say. People wanted only to read about news and features – they wanted facts, facts, facts…When was the next calamity going to happen, and where? Were we heading towards the end of days, and when? And whenever escape became an
The Return of Fiction in the Google-era Read More »