• Challenge,  Licensing

    Some More On Licensing Expo

    Dates Are Set for 2023 Licensing Expo 2023 will be at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center from May 23rd through 26th. That is Tues-Wed-Thur. Now, as I have said, I tried my best in the smaller show this year to see everything in three days. I walked the floor right up until the last hour the last afternoon. I was looking for everything I could see, every idea, every type of branding and licensing, and I ended up with a number of preliminary meetings with some. But my goal was to see everything if I could. I thought I had done a pretty good job, to be honest. So this…

  • Challenge,  Smiths Monthly,  Uncategorized

    Smith’s Monthly #62

    Laying It Out Now… June issue. It will be out later in the month. Yes, issue #62 of a monthly magazine that has about 70,000 or so words in it every month. All written by me. No one else. Do the math. That’s is over 800,000 words per year in just Smith’s Monthly, not counting anything else I do. Except for a light copyedit and the actual loading to the accounts, I do everything else on this magazine. I do all the covers for the short stories and the rest of the contents and the magazine itself. I do the layout into trade paper in a two-column format in InDesign.…

  • Challenge,  Recommended Reading

    THREE DAYS LEFT FOR STORYBUNDLE

    Great Books and Reading in This Bundle! I curated a new Storybundle called VISIONS OF THE FUTURE. Some really, really fantastic science fiction from a lot of writers. Since I sort of buried this the first time under talking about a ton of steps I did, here is my initial blog once again about the Storybundle. I am very excited about this one. Great writers, great stories. But only three days left to grab this one. VISIONS OF THE FUTURE BLOG… I knew, without a doubt, I was going to really enjoy putting Visions of the Future together as a StoryBundle. I just love science fiction of all types, and any form…

  • Challenge,  On Writing,  publishing

    Blogging and Bill…

    August 21st, 2011… My close friend, Bill Trojan, book dealer, died suddenly on the last day of the World Science Fiction Convention in Reno.  I spent most of the next year working on his estate, which was why I ended up losing the vision in one eye. But I made a promise to Bill to honor what he had spent his life doing, and that was collecting. (Bill was a hoarder, but it is commonly known that you are not a hoarder when you collect books, comics, stamps, coins, art, and very high-priced pulp magazines, even when there is nothing more than a path in your three-bedroom home and in…

  • Challenge,  Licensing

    Trademarks…

    Something to Learn… At the Licensing Expo, you often hear about trademarks. And just about every writer I know has no real understanding about trademarks. Sadly, fiction writers know little to nothing about copyright, let alone a trademark. Trademark is something that you have been making money on. It is a business tool to protect something you have been making money on, such as a business name. So here are some really, really basic things a writer needs to understand without me writing a book trying to explain the details. (The TRADEMARK book by Fishman from LOLO Press will give you a basic, bare-bones start, which is all you need…

  • Challenge,  Fun Stuff

    Embedded Technology Conference

    About As I Had Expected… And was warned about. Since it was free and about a mile or so from where I live, I decided to go look around, see if I could find anything that had any kind of future application to publishing. Nothing direct, and I walked the entire show. They had six stages with speakers on five of them, all giving presentations of a product. I listened to a few, but like any business, a lot of hype, which means the speakers were good. (Yeah, I know, writers don’t like hype, which is why they don’t sell more books.) Frighteningly, I understood a lot of what I…

  • Challenge,  workshops

    More Workshop Sales??

    Getting That Question a Lot on this Last Day of this Sale… The answer is that we don’t know, but we doubt we will do more workshop sales. We have been meaning to cut off the sales, since they were started to help writers through the pandemic two years ago. And honestly, since this is a time of great forgetting, which is why we decided to do this sale, not a lot of writers have taken advantage. So doing this sale flat didn’t help many if anyone through this time of the year. So I honestly don’t know if we will do more sales or not. More than likely not.…

  • Challenge,  workshops

    Two Days Left On Half-Price Workshop Sale!!

    Almost Over!!! Just two days to get the classes, the workshops, the subscriptions, the study-alongs, the pop-ups, and everything else on Teachable. Ends Thursday evening. All things on WMG Publishing Teachable are half price. Everything!!! Code to get a class or workshop or anything else on WMG Teachable at half price is: SummerHoliday Just hit the one you want, then put in the code and hit apply and the price will be half. I know this is the time of great forgetting, but a workshop or class just might help you get a little more done during this time. Also, you can get workshops, classic workshops, pop-ups, and lectures for…

  • Challenge,  workshops

    June Regular Workshops Starting Up

    And Half-Price Sale Still Going On… Today (Tuesday) and Wednesday, all the regular six-week workshops are starting up for June. Here is the list of June Workshops… Class #51… June 7th … Covers 101 Class #52… June 7th … Making a Living with Novels Class #53… June 7th … Writing Into the Dark Class #54… June 7th… Writing with Speed Class #55… June 7th … Teams in Fiction Writing Class #56… June 8th … Depth in Fiction Writing Class #57… June 8th … Writing Short Stories Class #58… June 8th … Advanced Depth Class #59… June 8th … Approaching Pulp Speed Class #60… June 8th … Killing Critical Voice Class…

  • Challenge,  workshops

    Special Workshop Links Sent Out

    Special Workshops from the Kickstarter… Everyone signed up for those two special workshops should have a letter from me with the links and codes to get into them. First sessions start Tuesday and second sessions of both start July 5th. If you thought you signed up for a workshop through Kickstarter, and didn’t get a letter from me tonight, then check your spam filter. The letter has links that will often send it to spam. Then if not there, make sure you are checking the email you used on Kickstarter. If still can’t find it, write me and I’ll send it again. Everyone, remember there is a half-price sale going…