Cobb on Stamps? Maybe not, but your puppy will work fine

So I'm watching BBC America and I see an ad for Photo Stamps with the catch phrase: "Real Postage. Really You."

Yes! You can now print out U.S. out postage stamps with your own photos on them.

Right away I'm thinking great, I can make stamps that express my political opinions through the use of carefully chosen images. And right after that I'm thinking, "No way! They would never let you do that."

A quick trip to the web site confirms it. Here are some of the things you can't put on these stamps that they advertise as "Real Postage. Really You."

"Material that is obscene, offensive, blasphemous, pornographic, sexually suggestive, deceptive, threatening, menacing, abusive, harmful, an invasion of privacy, supportive of unlawful action, defamatory, libelous, vulgar, violent, or otherwise objectionable..."

Most of that is fair enough but "otherwise objectionable" is very broad. What about the photo of the nasty spider bite I got--I'd like to raise awareness of the dangers posed by spiders. Is that objectionable? And wait, there's more that won't be allowed on "your" stamps...

"Material that depicts celebrities or celebrity likenesses, regional, national or international leaders or politicians, current or former world leaders, convicted criminals, newsworthy, notorious or infamous images and individuals, or any material that is vintage in appearance or depicts images from an older era."

What if I myself am notorious? Does that include notorious for always leaving the bar before I buy a round? And what's this opposition to all things "vintage"? Some people think I'm vintage. And it doesn't stop there. Any attempt to push this vague but very tight envelope could cost you:

"If Stamps.com, in its sole discretion, determines that any material you upload may not meet these content requirements, Stamps.com may reject your order without explanation. Stamps.com reserves the right to charge a processing fee of $10.00 for each image, graphic or photograph that you submit as an order which violates our content restrictions."

And don't even think about complaining:

"In addition, in the event you violate these Content Restrictions and you intentionally publicize such violation, you acknowledge that Stamps.com will suffer substantial damage to its reputation and goodwill and that you can be liable for causing such substantial damage."

So, go ahead, express yourself on stamps. With just the right amount of flair. Or else.

p.s. Feel free to use the above photo on your stamps. We're pretty sure it meets the requirements and we hereby release it to the public domain.

Seeing No Progress, Some Schools Drop Laptops - New York Times

Seeing No Progress, Some Schools Drop Laptops - New York Times

"the latest example of how technology is often embraced by philanthropists and political leaders as a quick fix, only to leave teachers flummoxed about how best to integrate the new gadgets into curriculums. Last month, the United States Department of Education released a study showing no difference in academic achievement between students who used educational software programs for math and reading and those who did not."

First you teach them to read and write really well. THEN you let them have computers.
.

Is This Art:? Coverage of the Virginia Tech Coverage

For years people have complained that network news and the major news networks have become less about news and more about entertainment. A fad? All about the money? No. It is an emerging phenomenon of considerable significance to human development (both in general terms and in the specific terms of Hegel's Aesthetics, which I happen to believe is the most prescient of his works).

The conclusive proof for me is that the best political journalism on TV today is The Daily Show. No doubt about it. Doubt it? See Jon Stewart's handling of the coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings.

That is art.

Coverage of the Virginia Tech Coverage

The best political journalism on TV today? The Daily Show. No doubt about it. Doubt it? See Jon Stewart's handling of the coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings. I have discussed this elsewhere and I tip my hat to Mr. Stewart for saying what needed to be said.

John Stewart and the 24x7 Multi-channel Mediasphere

Complain all you like about the shortcomings of today's 24x7 multi-channel mediasphere, nobody can deny there are times when it provides political insights that might have been missed in a less media-centric world.

A good example of this are the Jon Stewart [Daily Show] montages of news clips. He has several standard play books for these. One is the "spin detector" which shows a group of allied politicians and administration officials all using the same word or phrase to affirm or deny something, in other words, reading the party line from a spin doctor's script.

Another effective Stewart tactic is "compile and contrast." Here is a brilliant skewering of a politician with his own words.

You'd have to do some heavy dial spinning of your own to catch all of these clips, but the 24x7 multi-channel mediasphere makes it possible (BTW, it would be interesting to know how many people who watch TV today actually used a dial to change channels on a TV).

Lively up your space with some really coool images

A new collection of fine art posters based on the amazing photographic talents of Chey Cobb (yes, we are related) is now online at Zazzle. Take a break and check out the miniature art show below. See something you like, click for a closer look, order the size and frame style you need.

Chey's Cobb's Fine Art Posters at Zazzle

Cool Fine Art Posters: Lively up your living space, work space, head space

A new collection of fine art posters based on the amazing photographic talents of Chey Cobb (yes, we are related) is now online at Zazzle. Take a break and check out the miniature art show below. See something you like, click for a closer look, order the size and frame style you need.

Chey's Cobb's Fine Art Posters at Zazzle

Of Beatles, Brits, and the Slave Trade: History gets personal

If you are a history buff you may know that 2007 is the 200th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in Britain. The British might have been big bad imperialists--okay, they were big, bad imperialists--but they had the decency to ban slavery before their American cousins gave it up. (In fact, it was not until 1833 that the ban on slavery took effect throughout the British Empire).

If you are a Beatles fan, and I mean a serious fan, you may know that the street name they made famous --Penny Lane--got its name from a wealthy eighteenth century Liverpool slave ship owner and ardent opponent of abolitionism: James Penny. (Liverpool ships transported half of the 3 million Africans carried across the Atlantic by British slavers.)

I am not for one moment suggesting that, in some weird way, the Beatles supported slavery. Indeed, I think it is safe to say all four of them were strongly opposed to racial discrimination of any kind and, through their music, did much to promote themes of equality and racial integration. What I am saying is that slavery was woven into the fabric of British life and, to this day, Britain reaps lingering benefits from past slavery. For example, it is my belief that the benefits of an affluent society that I enjoyed while growing up there came, in some part, from slavery.

When you look at England, a country much smaller than Greece or Romania, then look at the one fifth of the world's land surface that was called the British Empire, you have to wonder how they did that (I'm using England rather than Britain in this statement because the Scots and Welsh and Irish probably don't want to be included when it comes to the nastier aspects world domination carried out in their name).

You have to wonder where such a small country got the means to achieve that much power and influence. Okay, so Sir Francis Drake and his like made good money stealing treasure from the the Spanish conquistadors (who had stolen it from the people of Central and South America) but a big chunk of the wealth that funded the expansion of the empire was derived from the slave trade.

Which helps explain several things, including an entire web site devoted to marking the 200th anniversary of the abolition of slavery. I encourage you to visit this site. It also explains the depth of sorrow expressed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York when they led a procession through London to mark the 200th anniversary of Britain's abolition of the slave trade. It may even explain why someone like me, born and raised in England but now living in America, feels drawn to issues of racial equality.
.

Publish or Be Published: Sixth part

In talking about self-publishing in the last few parts of this piece I did not intend to give the impression that Amazon is the only way to go. By no means. Plenty of other online outlets exist, as well as other old-fashioned channels like book signings and boot sales. Lets look at one online alternative to get started:

Privacy for Business listed at Atlas Books, operated by Bookmasters.
compare to:
Privacy for Business listed at Amazon.com.
and
Privacy for Business listed at Amazon.co.uk.
and
Privacy for Business on its own site.

The first thing to note is that Atlas sells the book for $18.97 which is a price set by me (in fact, I am about to lower it to try and clear out the last remaining copies of this version). I could have chosen to make Atlas the sole source on the book's web site. but felt like leaving the Amazon option open. The Barnes & Noble option has not been very productive. Amazon sells the book for an attractive $16.47, so the ten bucks or so that I get per copy through them is a good deal. I may try lowering the Atlas price to $15.79 and see if that pulls more sales across to Atlas. What Atlas does not offer is a UK outlet. Amazon does, and it requires no extra work by me. They sell the book for £17.99 which means a decent chunk for me, although I am not aware of any UK sales yet.

So why Bookmasters/Atlas? Well, Bookmasters is the only company I know that is both a regular printer and a bookseller. This can save you a lot of money in shipping. You get a competitive price on the printing of your books, based on a run of 1,000 or more. In other words, this is not the much more expensive print-on-demand pricing you will see at some online operations. Then you escape shipping charges because Bookmasters warehouses the books for you. Buyers can get the book from the Atlas web site and through 7x24 toll-free ordering (some people still like to order by phone instead of the web). Plus, Bookmasters is hooked into one of the big distributors, so bookstores can order direct from them. So can you. They will ship a carton of books to you when you need one, or to a buyer (I sell about 40 books a quarter wholesale to a university book store and they go straight from Bookmasters to the store).

The warehousing is not free. I pay from $50 to $70 per month in charges. And obviously Atlas is not Amazon when it comes to online presence. But this brings us to an interesting question: What is going to drive sales? If you are out on the speaking circuit generating buzz, it may not matter that you are not on Amazon. All you need is a simple way to channel people to the order page. For example, you put a "buy now" link on your web site (hopefully you have already registered your name as a web site) or on the book's web site (hopefully you have already registered the title as a web site). That link can be to Atlas and the price can be whatever you decide.

Of course, neither Amazon nor Atlas are exclusive, so you can go with both, but I am not sure how many people buy books on Amazon just through browsing. In other words, without buzz your Amazon sales are not guaranteed to be anything more than one or two a month. (At some point I will get around to discussing how to perk up your Amazon listing to increase sales).

Lulu.com is an interesting example of print-on-demand. Check it out at lulu.com. You submit your manuscript and cover design, they print copies when people order them from the web site. Their pricing model seems complex at first (check it out here) but if you have read the previous parts of this posting you should be able to grasp what they are getting at. If not, check the example on this page and keep trying, it's a good way to learn the ropes.

You can see that copies sold through retail distribution (e.g. by Barnes & Noble) are going to make you $4.00 per copy. This might not sound like much but it remember you have zero up-front costs, zero shipping costs, zero warehousing costs, and $4.00 is probably twice what you would get with a mainstream publisher. Now look at the Lulu Marketplace price. You could get $10.00 per book sold direct through their web site ($4.00 royalty plus the difference between $13.53 and selling price, e.g. $19.95-$13.53=$6.22). If you are actively marketing your book then telling people to order from lulu.com may work well.

Now, I ended Part V by saying we would talk about how to move a lot of books in a hurry. I don't mean to be crass but one of the best ways is to give them away. Please wait a moment before you ask the perfectly logical question: "Where's the profit in that?" Remember the question I put to you in Part One? Why do you want your book to be published? If you want to "get out the word" or become "renowned author and expert" then giving away some of the first print run can be a smart move.

Think about the cost of your books. If you pick them up from the printer in your car they can be under $2.00 each (that's for the 6x9 240 page glossy covered paperback we have used in previous examples). Now look at the list price on the back (we will deal with pricing and the all important ISBN number and bar code in Part 7).

That list price is more like $22.00 than $2.00. In other words, the perceived value is at least ten times the raw cost. But if you, the author, whose name and photo are on the cover, hand the book to someone, they will feel it is worth even more than the cover price. That's because you, the author, handed it to them, spoke to them about it, maybe even autographed it.

Think about what could happen if you were to take boxes of your books to a trade show where you are promoting the services or products of yourself or your company. You make sure everyone at the show gets handed a copy of your book. With the right book this will seriously boost your credibility AND jump-start sales. And you'll be surprised at how many people will ask you to sign the book. I've had congressmen and CEOs ask me to autograph books I have given them. Never under-estimate the combined value that personal contact + your name and photograph on a book jacket generates (the photograph is particularly important in any professional field where it is helpful for people to know what you look like).

If your book is good—which of course it is, right!—then the chances are it will stick around on the desk or bookshelf of someone to whom you handed a copy for quite a bit longer than other books. Recipients of complimentary copies are likely to recommend the book to others, who will have to buy their own copies. One person who got a free copy of one of my books at a conference ordered 30 copies the next day to hand out to his employees.

I don't mean to belabor the point but think about the traditional tchachkes that companies hand out at trade shows. They cost at least $2.00 each and have a perceived value of what? Rarely as much as $20. Furthermore, their value seldom relates to the features and benefits of the company/service being promoted. I have a nice coffee mug from an encryption company. It reminds me of that company when I use it, but that is not often because I have a lot of other coffee mugs. And a coffee mug adds nothing to my opinion of the company's encryption expertise (except perhaps that they drink a lot of caffeine when they are coding).

In the next part we will look at several practical aspects of the book production process, including the ISBN number, the bar code, and the selection of a printer. We will also discuss getting your book adopted as a textbook.

Lovin' Our LaCie External Drive: You get what you pay for

Over the years I have put together quite a few external hard drives, typically buying a bare enclosure to put around a "spare" desktop or laptop drive that had been replaced by something larger or faster. The primary use for such drives was backup storage, like a quick backup of my laptop before heading out on a trip, or archives of image libraries and business files. These are files that do not need to be clogging up my work drive, but still need to be available quite quickly from time to time.

On the whole, the external drives that I 'built' did a decent job, but they tended to be a bit noisy. Lately a new storage need emerged on our home/office network: access to large image collections, video, and music libraries. My wife's photo art was the prime mover. She's an Apple user and bought a LaCie brand external drive from the Apple Store.

I have to say at first I was a little ticked. These are not the cheapest drives and Apple Stores are not noted for their low prices. But after using it for a couple of moneys I am impressed. It is quiet. It is fast. It wakes up and goes to sleep appropriately and does not seem to skip a beat (in fact, after some reconfigurations of our home/office network we are now using it for the 80+ gigabytes of iTunes content we have accumulated.). While LaCie drives always seem to price out slightly more expensive than the competition, this could be a genuine case of "They're worth it."

Recently I noticed some decent prices on Amazon.