How many of you remember working on a book, getting to a place where you needed some information about a time, a place, or a situation in order for your story to feel authentic, yet you didn’t have that information? How many of you remember having to drive to the library to find out the facts? How many remember scooting down to your local bookstore and browsing the shelves looking for some book, any book, that could shed light on the rules of baseball in 1890 or the hunting habits of a jaguar in Brazil?
Yes, I’m dating myself, but I’m guessing there’s more than one or two of you out there who can relate. Continue reading “Writing Research in the Digital Age”
Google is ubiquitous. There’s no getting around it. What’s worse, Google tracks EVERYTHING! How extensive is Google’s tracking? They’re tracking you even when you think they aren’t. With cookies, filter bubbles, IP addresses, fingerprinting, flash cookies, HTML storage, and other tools; Google uses your information more than you do.
I took a day trip with the freckle-faced girl recently to the United States. We live in Canada, a few miles from the border, so occasionally Costco’s ice cream or some other worthy endeavor calls to us. I’m in charge of the shopping cart duties and with some minor instruction I usually manage to fulfill my obligation. We have a Nexus pass that allows us to get into the fast lane when we cross. This makes the process easier, but, even with my youthful transgressions occurring many moons ago, and nary even a speeding ticket to my name in years, I still get a bit nervous when I reach that little window. I keep thinking there’s something that I’ve forgotten to mention, and the border guard will click his little mouse, and check his computer screen. His eyes will light up like a UFO saucer and I’ll have some explaining to do. 
Recently I stumbled across this post for