Some interesting links from May

Kris Rusch had an interesting post about work habits--I'm particularly interested in the fact that she doesn't mind it when her time is all chopped up (which kind of kills my writing). Something to think about....

I think it's pretty awesome that Amazon has figured out a way to legally publish and monetize fan fiction. YouTube does something similar, and I'm all for it. I realize that makes me a bit of an outlier, but the fact is that people have always written fan fiction (in fact, there's an entire genre of fiction called the Robinsonade, which is basically Robinson Crusoe fan fiction--The Swiss Family Robinson is only the most famous example). In addition, some of my first fiction was fan fiction (a Firefly fanfic, and years before, a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode), and I think writing fanfic is a great way for people to learn to write novels--basically the character- and world-generation have been taken care of, so you just focus on plot and dialog and develop those skills. It's like training wheels: Eventually you get confident enough to create your own characters and world, and then you're off!

And this spoof is not actually about publishing, but it does underscore how you can spin data to mean anything you like. I'm particularly fond of #20: Electrification rates have stagnated since the 1960s. Just like the way the rates of e-book adoption are slowing!