Category: Guest Posts

Please, sir…can I have a review? by: M.M. Brownlow

Author MM Brownlow

You’re trolling for something to read. You wander the aisles of your favourite bookstore or click your way through your favourite online shopping spot, checking out the covers. Once you find something that looks interesting, you flip over to the blurb and then you check…the reviews. If you’re anything like me, you have the cover and you have the blurb, but the reviews can remain elusive.

I hate begging. I have no problem giving away my works for free if it’s going to get me something in return (like a review), but finding people to actually read my books can be difficult. Then along comes Bloggerdise. (www.bloggerdise.com) Bloggerdise is a site where authors can create book banners to pair up with bloggers who want something to write about. It’s easy to use, the bloggers usually review ebooks, and the site itself is free! If you’re like me – and I’m hoping you are ‘cause otherwise I sound really pathetic – your marketing budget is as close to zero as you can get away with, so a free way to get reviews is perfect. Continue reading “Please, sir…can I have a review? by: M.M. Brownlow”

Tuesday Tutorial: Hootsuite 101 by Troy Stewart

Marketing Strategist Troy Stewart
Troy Stewart

Hootsuite 101- Twitter Just Got a Lot Easier
So you’ve been using Twitter and starting to gain followers. Perhaps you log in every morning and check to see what your followers are saying. Maybe, you even click on hashtags to see what is going on with current trends. That’s great, better than most actually. But there is a lot more that Twitter has to offer.

How do you access the rest? By using Hootsuite.

A Dashboard

Hootsuite is a “social media dashboard.” Basically, it takes up a page or tab of your browser (it is completely web based) and allows you to see Twitter through an entirely different lens. Hootsuite allows you to view Twitter in a “column” view. That is, your home feed, your @ mentions, your Direct Messages and everything else is put into columns for you to easily access. Continue reading “Tuesday Tutorial: Hootsuite 101 by Troy Stewart”

Getting it Right: Standards of Evidence by Karen A. Wyle

Author and attorney Karen A. Wyle

[This is part 3 of a three part “Getting it Right” series by author and attorney Karen A. Wyle. This series is aimed at helping authors understand and add meaningful and convincing detail in writing courtroom drama. Part 1 can be found here and part 2 can be found here.]

Any writer planning to deal with criminal trials should understand the reasonable doubt standard of proof. And anyone writing about other sorts of trials should realize that the reasonable doubt standard doesn’t apply.

Only in criminal trials must the prosecution prove the defendant’s guilt by the well-known standard, “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Depending on the crime(s) with which the defendant is charged, the prosecution may have to prove a list of particular facts (“elements”) about the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Continue reading “Getting it Right: Standards of Evidence by Karen A. Wyle“

Amazon.com and the Anti-Trust Suit by Arline Chase

I have seen many, many, many articles accusing Amazon.com of “ruining” the publishing industry and implying that the Justice Department is after them in an anti-trust lawsuit that is making on-going news.

Recently the NY TIMES (who should know better) posted yet another such inaccurate article. Someone with actual knowledge of the e-book industry dissected it and if you want to see what they said, click here: http://mikecanex.wordpress.com/2012/04/16/the-worst-article-about-the-ebooks-anti-trust-suit/

For those who want to know the facts:

1. Nobody is suing Amazon.com! Anti-trust means the company is cheating their customers.

2. The Justice Department filed the price-fixing anti-trust lawsuit against the Big 6 paper publishers and the Apple computer corporation, not against Amazon.com.

3. Amazon sets prices on the books that they sell. This is Big News? Every retailer in the country sets prices on the goods they sell. Some offer discounts. Customers like discounts. Continue reading “Amazon.com and the Anti-Trust Suit by Arline Chase”