Soft Cover, Hard Cover, Ebook: A Case Study

Our client, Johnna, called me with a problem. We completed her book early last year, and she published it with much fanfare, making it available on amazon.com. Her friends and family all bought copies. But then her life got busy. She has kids and a job, and her book project lost momentum. Now Johnna is looking for more and better ways to get her book out to readers. But what book, exactly? Softcover, hardcover, or ebook?

Softcover: Johnna’s religious self-help book, Celestial Marriage: Reflections on Marriage and Faith, is currently published in softcover. In fact, amazon.com will only sell softcover books. Softcover books are affordable, and given that Johnna’s book is filled with beautiful photographs, full color printing was a must. Amazon’s CreateSpace prints color books cheaply enough that the cover price is affordable for buyers online. Authors can buy copies even cheaper, at cost, and hand-sell them. And it cost Johnna nothing to put the book up for sale on amazon; print on demand means the buyer pays the costs of printing and shipping, not the author.

Pros: Sell and ship through amazon, no upfront costs, authors copies are inexpensive.

Cons: Quality is low, considering softcover’s glued binding, gives the impression of a cheap, disposable paperback.

Hardcover: Johnna would love to see her beautifully designed book in a classy hardcover. This would communicate its value as a “keeper”, and would justify a higher cover price, too. Big publishers will save on hardcovers by printing thousands, using offset presses. Smaller orders from self publishers are digital, and most digital printers have a minimum order of 25 for hardcover. This means some significant money out of Johnna’s pocket. The cheapest deal we could find for her 100 page full color book was about $32 a book. That would result in an attractive book at an unattractively high cover price, so it is unlikely she could profit.

Pros: Higher quality with longer lasting binding, better paper and cover choices.

Cons: Too expensive in small qualities to sell commercially; most suitable for high end private projects.

Ebooks: Ebooks are read by more people every year, and many authors hope to reach readers who purchase books through ereading devices. And there’s the complication: which format and device? PDFs can be read by any device, but they won’t resize as an ebook will. Kindle requires their proprietary format. Apple’s iBook for iPad accepts the universal EPUB, but requires an exclusive contract. B& N’s Nook is another sales channel, but it doesn’t get as much traffic. Should Johnna pay for two or three differently formatted ebooks? How to distribute them?

Part of the answer is Johnna’s existing website. Because she is already distributing digital media, she can sell her ebook on her website. Having paid once to format it, each successive sale is pure profit. However, her site will never receive the traffic that amazon does, and since her book is already on amazon, buyers can be sent to her page, see her softcover and Kindle version, and perhaps buy both!

Pros: Inexpensive to produce, a reformat of the original book files.

Cons: Ebook prices are significantly lower; profit per book is small. Requires many sales for success.

Our conclusions: Forget the hardcover; perhaps buy a few copies for the family. Use the internet to sell and distribute both the softcover and the ebook. Offer the ebook in the common epub format on Johnna’s website, and put the Kindle version up on amazon.

Reassure Your Relatives

What do you do if a family member is concerned about being listed in your family history book? This question comes up frequently, and together with client Marsha Allen, we devised a form letter to be sent to skeptical relations to solve the problem. Thanks, Marsha, for offering your records as examples.

First, we explain how genealogic records are recorded. Often, the relatives who distrust family histories are the ones who know the least about it. So we want to reassure them that we are following a tried and true format, one that every other researcher uses.

In many cases, the objection is based on a fear of identity theft. To alleviate that fear, we point out that this is information we have located through public records – we are not disclosing something “secret”. In fact, a cursory internet search will often turn up far more.

Next, we give an example of the record we wish to include. In many cases, the listing itself is enough to reassure the doubter. They will see for themselves how mundane these facts are, and that their family skeletons are not present here!

Last, we give them an “opt out”, with specific instructions for the actions they should take to modify the record. This puts the ball in their court, requiring a written response. In the same way that banks make your privacy policy a “passive opt-in”, the author offers to change the book only if a relative objects in writing. Those few people can specify which elements of the listing will be edited.

Most people, upon receiving this letter, will be satisfied that the author knows what she is doing! Those who had some concern will feel “heard” and be reassured; many will not care enough to take action. If you have a vehement objector, you have listened respectfully, and provided them with information and an appropriate action to take.

This win-win approach should settle any ruffled feathers among family members. Although you don’t need to send a letter like this to everyone, it is a helpful way to reach out to the few who may criticize, rather than applaud, your forthcoming book.

Sample Letter

Dear _______

Thank you for the interest in the family history book I am writing. It will be called _____ and will be about _____________.

Genealogy uses documents that are in the public record. Birth, marriage and death records are catalogued by software databases for family lines worldwide. As I have worked on my book, I have adhered to the traditional format and standards used by professional genealogists. For example, here is the listing of my own father: (Insert a sample record from your family here)

GOLD, Everett Van Orden  b. 6 Sep 1910 Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, UT; s/o Cyrus William GOLD & Annie Alazana PECK;  m. 3 Sep 1938 Cristobal, Panama Canal Zone to Thelma Lucille GRUBER; d. 9 Mar 1996 Scottsdale, Maricopa, AZ.

Here is a record of a living person, one of my own sons, as an incomplete record sample: (Insert a sample record from your family here)

ALLEN, Byron   b. 1972 AZ; s/o David ALLEN & Marsha GOLD; m. Janice GALE.

The above living person would be listed in a complete record as: (Insert a sample record from your family here)

ALLEN, Byron Frihoff    b. 17 Jan 1972 Mesa, Maricopa, AZ; s/o David K. ALLEN & Marsha Jean GOLD; m. 17 Nov 1994 Chandler, Maricopa, AZ to Janice GALE.

I understand that you have concerns about identity theft. Although this information is available in public documents elsewhere, if you prefer, I will edit your record to protect your privacy.

Now that you have been informed of what the complete record would state in the book, if you wish to limit your record, please mail me to identify which facts you do not want to be published.

Do not include for ______________________(name)

______ middle name

______ birth - date and month

______ birth - city and county

______ marriage - date

______ marriage - location

Thank you for helping me to contribute to our family’s history in as complete a way as possible. I am sure our descendants many years from now will appreciate knowing about all of us.

Respectfully,

Author

A New Year’s Insight

Recently, I was asked to write an article for a publisher’s newsletter. The topic was “What inspires you each day?” Each day? I’m sorry, but I cannot be inspired every day. However, I can be motivated, even resolved, to work at my long-term goals every day. I am good at New Year’s Resolutions. Those of you who want to write and publish a book need to stick to your resolutions, too. It is good work, but it surely won’t get done in a day.

I think “inspiration” is often misunderstood. In popular culture, inspiration is a rare lightning strike, and creative people seem to discover or “channel” their most brilliant work in those moments of inspiration. Me, I come from the other school of thought, that old 98% perspiration theory. My attitude toward work is a more earthly, manageable and mechanical phenomenon. Every day, I sit down and get to work, whether I feel inspired or not.  Despite my pragmatism, my daily work can be very artful and creative.

I have always been an avid reader, and I studied English in school because I wanted to get paid to read and write. I quickly recognized that I was different from the other writers. I don’t imagine I “have a novel in me”, and I don’t have one big idea or vision I feel driven to share with the world. (Although I do have lots of little ones – do they count?)  Instead, my joy in reading, and my joy in writing, has to do with deconstruction. People build books, I take them apart. I love analysis, particularly of text and ideas, and that has made me well suited to be an editor.

 (Photo courtesy of Larry Johnson, Creative Commons)

Analyzing a book is fun, but even more fun is imagining the better book it might be. It changes the way I read and think about books. It also leads me to help others, to explain these better ways of writing. I get to have wonderful, specific, right down to the paragraph /theme /setting conversations with writers who are still in the process of revision. I love that moment when someone says, “OH! So if I fix that, it will change everything!” And they dash off to rewrite, because their book will be so much better.

I do both editing and book design, and they both have their pleasures and challenges. But if I had to say which is most rewarding, it is that moment of enlightenment that someone gets to experience because of my rather uninspired, developed over a lifetime, not just in a day, editing skills. That’s the way progress is really made – new knowledge springs from the old, established knowledge.

Occasionally, you will have that “Aha!” moment, and you will get to sprint ahead because you’re inspired. That’s a real pleasure. For today, New Year’s Day, I invite you to recognize and give a nod of respect to your inner turtle, that slow-moving-toward-the finish-line part of yourself that gets the big jobs done. And may you get your big jobs done this year. Best wishes for 2012, -Nan

PS - What are you inspired to acheive this year? Let us know!

Can a Book Hold a Lifetime of Stuff?

Wow, you have a lot! A lifetime of stuff, and your parent's stuff, too. You’ve been researching your genealogy a long time, have you? Recently, Carol Davis wrote me an email, "My first goal is to have my collection cleaned up enough if so I drop dead tonight I will not have to listen to my family moan and wail because they do not know what in the world to do with what I have. They would not toss it, but I would know truly how they feel about me if that happened. More to the point, this is my mess and mine to straighten up." I replied, “Carol, believe me, you're not the only one with this problem.” 

Carol, like many genealogists, wants to leave a family history book as a legacy to her family. They may never be interested in “the whole mess”, but they will treasure a book, one that contains her most important knowledge, and one that was written for them.

Here's a way to think about sorting through your “stuff” that may speed up the process and make it more manageable. What if you consider all your stuff, and put it into two categories: digital and print. Not the form it's in now, but whichever form would be the best outcome. For example, anything that's strictly factual can be stored as digital, database information, and therefore it is easily preserved and can be archived for later.  Consider that family members can step in and complete this work for you most easily. You can feel safe about putting that factual digital information on the back burner while you deal with the rest.

The second category contains anything that is wonderful to look at and handle, like documents and photos. Many are suitable for a print project - and they are also more fragile and likely to be lost if anything happens to you! These are your most important artifacts. Most likely, they need you and your memories to explain them and bring them to life. After all, what does your family care about? You, and your memories.

Now, these objects can now also be sorted into two categories: worthy of a book project, or not. You may have one or more, even several, book projects in mind. Select and scan all the essential, book worthy stuff first.

Then scan the other, secondary stuff that won't go into one of your book projects and so will remain digital. Make folders of all those scans, grouping them simply by topic or period. That way, someone else can make sense of them if anything happens to you.

Next comes the fun part: narrowing down your first book project so that it doesn't overwhelm you. Instead of throwing in the whole kitchen sink (or your whole family history) into one book, look at your best scans, and think about what's most important for you to say, and for your family to hear after you've gone. For this first time out, limit yourself to a small book. Cover just four generations, instead of twelve. One do just one branch of the family. Why a smaller project? Because you will finish it.

Write the book simply, in your natural voice, and tell your stories. Utilize lots of the scanned images of your precious family artifacts. This way, you don't have to write as much text and the book will be move along more quickly, because the pictures will help to tell the story. You can always supplement the book with a CD, if you want to include more stuff, without taking the time to write a longer book.

Remember, you’re trying to finijsh this pproject before you “drop dead”. To do that,  you need to set a deadline, say within a year, and work on the book exclusively – expect to giveup your research time until you're done!

This method will also allow you to publish quickly, and to get that book into your family’s hands. They will be delighted! And they will want more. After all your hard work, they will still want more, because what does your family care about? You, and your memories. So, you put one book into their hands, satisfying your original goal, and if your hurry, you’ll live long enough to do another family history book. Even as you write your first, you can plan the second to include the things you didn't get to cover in the first. You'll be more experienced the second time around, and the process will be easier, so the second can be a bigger book.

But first, start with an easy, smaller project, and finish it. You know what they say... "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush."

An Ode to Wikipedia

I am old enough to remember hard-bound encyclopedias, those infallible sources for grade-school reports. And I am old enough to remember the pre-Google era, when I would wonder, and wonder, and yet my questions remained unanswered. Do you remember the days when you had to wait to go to the library?

Now, for a quick answer, above all, there is Wikipedia. Of all the innumerable sources of internet information, Wikipedia is my go-to source for quick answers to my constant questions. On my computer’s browser, it holds the place of honor, that first, left button on my bookmarks toolbar.

Here’s a small example of Wikipedia’s usefulness: Today, someone cryptically wrote“TIA” in an email to me. I was at a loss. I Googled it, and discovered that TIA is the acronym for a transient ischemic attack, and for the Telecommunications Industry Association, too. No luck. Wikipedia was more helpful: It listed every instance of TIA, categorized from medicine, transportation, people’s names, and literature and the arts, and that’s where I found my match. In my case, the meaning was "TIA" (thanks in advance), common usage in internet slang. How could I not know that? Well, now I do. Thanks, Wikipedia.

Today there was a banner at the top of the Wikipedia page, with a message from the founder, Jimmy Wales. I idly clicked on it and read the message. I'd never thought of it before, that Wikipedia is "a humanitarian project to bring a free encyclopedia to every single person on the planet." I was touched by Wale’s earnest idealism. I donated a few dollars.

What does it mean to have facts at your fingertips? What is it worth? A lot, to me. I think it has changed the way I navigate the world. Now, I expect to know – and if I don’t, well then I’ll find out. Thanks, Wikipedia.

Read Jimmy Wales’ message about Wikipedia, and consider donating a few dollars yourself by clicking the button below.

If everyone reading this donated a dollar, we would be able to keep Wikipedia strong, secure, and ad-free.

Not everyone can or will donate. And that’s fine, because each year just enough people support Wikipedia with a small donation. If you feel it's your turn, please make a small donation of $10, $20, $35 or whatever you can to keep Wikipedia free.

Most people don't know this, but I'm a volunteer.

I don't get paid a cent for my work at Wikipedia, and neither do our thousands of other volunteer authors and editors. When I founded Wikipedia, I could have made it into a for-profit company with advertising banners, but I decided to do something different. Commerce is fine. Advertising is not evil. But it doesn't belong here. Not in Wikipedia. Wikipedia is something special. It is like a library or a public park. It is like a temple for the mind. It is a place we can all go to think, to learn, to share our knowledge with others. It is a unique human project, the first of its kind in history. It is a humanitarian project to bring a free encyclopedia to every single person on the planet.

Every single person.

We're a small organization, and I've worked hard over the years to keep us lean and tight. We fulfill our mission, and leave waste to others.

To do this without resorting to advertising, we need you. It is you who keep this dream alive. It is you who have created Wikipedia. It is you who believe that a place of calm reflection and learning is worth having.

This year, please consider making a donation to protect and sustain Wikipedia.

Thanks,

Jimmy Wales

Wikipedia Founder

click the botton to donate

The Power of Memoirs

What's so special about memoirs? And what's the difference from a personal essay? Generally, a personal essay explores an idea, and draws upon personal experiences and reflections to draw a conclusion about that idea. It is personal, because it is one person’s opinion, their unique perspective. Personal essays tend to be focused and short.

A memoir can convey so much more than an essay, both in content and style. Like the personal essay, a memoir will delve into an individual's experience in a search for meaning and insight. A book length memoir will, inevitably, include a greater number of personal tales, which can then be linked together to examine cause and effect throughout one's lifetime.

A memoir can also be shaped into a highly artful literary form. As an editor, I often receive a rough draft of a memoir in chronological order. That’s because we tend to think of our life story as beginning at birth and ending with…well, you know. However, if you are asked, “What about the meaning of your life?” all sorts of different life stories will emerge. You’ll explore the turning points that shaped your identity and values. You’ll remember the people who influenced you, for better or worse, and how. These stories, which can be tied together by themes, rather than ordered by date, make for especially fascinating reading.

In the commercial marketplace, we often see published memoirs of famous politicians or celebrities, or memoirs by people who have had such an extraordinary experience that they make national news and sign a book deal. Yet each of us, perhaps in a less public or spectacular fashion, has stories to tell. Life itself teaches us powerful lessons, and if we’ve stopped to learn and reflect, we can share our experiences and teach those lessons to others.

At StoriesToTellBooks.com, we get lots of writers who don’t aspire to a national book deal, but want to self publish their memoirs for family and friends. Now that self publishing is so inexpensive, anyone can write a book for their loved ones, and some may even produce a book that is of wider interest.

What’s the difference between what you write privately, for family and friends, rather than commercially? Private self publishing means you can include the things your family will care to know, and to keep forever. We design books that include precious family photos, letters, recipes, documents. These images illustrate and amplify the memoir’s meaning. An illustrated memoir is wonderfully unique, reflecting the author’s life and interests. A commercial author, on the other hand, must consider what will be universally appealing to the general public, and shape their content to convey more universal and broadly appealing messages. They rarely contain more than a few illustrations, as these are too personal for the general reader.

One of the questions authors often ask is “How do I know if I am done yet?” That’s a good question, as there is a lot of flexibility in memoir; there is no one “right way” or a template to fill in. Like many editors, we offer “manuscript evaluation” to read the draft and advise whether to keep writing, or not. Generally, if the scope of your book is too broad, you’ll write a lot of too short, too shallow stories. With memoir, it’s better to cover less ground, in more depth. After all, if you have many, many stories with a lot of depth, you may have more than enough material to publish two books!

Memoirs are powerful because they touch the heart. They originate from true life stories, and the reader will inevitably put themselves in your shoes and imagine, what if it had been me? Your reader will not only think, but they will feel, as if they had been there themselves. When you tell your stories, you are transporting the reader to a different time and place, and they will know and feel what it was to have lived your life. What greater art?

Writing Commercial Fiction?

Check this out! There’s a new kid in town, and this one is accepting unagented manuscripts. If you write genre fiction, such as mystery, romance, or science fiction, this is a chance to be discovered. They are called Musa Publishing, and they have a number of genre imprints, and also a speculative fiction eMag called Penumbra.

Of all the obstacles that face new authors, being without an agent is one of the most formidable. After all, you just want to submit your book, right? Why this two-step process, then, of finding an agent to represent you?

Agents have traditionally been the gatekeepers of the publishing industry, screening manuscripts to locate the ones most likely to succeed at a given publishing house. For an author, this means giving up perhaps 15% of a book’s revenue to the agent – a tough price to pay. Traditionally, authors have grudgingly paid their dues to gain access to a publisher.

So when a publisher comes along who will deal directly with an author, without the agent’s cut, it gets interesting. And this new publisher, Musa, posts the terms of their author contracts online. http://musapublishing.blogspot.com/p/royalties.html

Musa royalties are set up as the following:

• For trade paperback copies sold less returns: 15% percent (FIFTEEN) of the cover price received for each sale made directly on the Musa Press site.
• For trade paperback copies sold less returns: 15% percent (FIFTEEN) of the cover price for each sale made on third-party wholesalers, distributors, resellers, or vendors sites.
• For electronic edition copies sold: fifty percent (50%) of the cover price received for each sale made directly off the Musa Press site.
• For electronic edition copies sold: fifty percent (50%) of the NET amount received for each sale made directly from third-party wholesalers, distributors, resellers, or vendors.
• For electronic edition copies sold on sale: fifty percent (50%) of the sale price received for each sale made on the Musa Press site.

Here’s the interesting twist it took me a moment to understand: Musa starts all authors off with ebooks, and then, depending on their sales, goes to print. Their site states:

PRINT—Musa will select books for our print line based upon sales. If your sales reach a certain level, your book will go into print. At that time, for any book sold on our site you will receive 15% of the cover price and through a third party you receive 15% of the net.

Is this a good deal? That’s a matter of perspective. The unknown question, as with any publisher, is what will they do to market and promote your book. How many copies will be sold? If your book is accepted by a publisher who then lets it grow stale on the shelf, it’s never a good deal. If the book gains lots of exposure because the publisher does the job of marketing and promotion well – then that is the stuff of an author’s dreams come true.

Mining Catastrophes

I just spoke with an old friend who lives in Roanoke, Virginia, about the earthquake that shook the east coast the other day. It was no big deal – she heard a few shelves rattling, but most of her coworkers in the office didn’t feel a thing. How about the local schools – any kids hurt? No. How about at the earthquake's epicenter, anyone hurt there? Nope, not really.

Why did we keep probing, looking for more damage? How could we be disappointed that this wasn’t a bigger catastrophe? I suppose it’s human nature. We don’t actually want injuries to schoolchildren; what we want is large-scale drama.

Since the earthquake was no big deal, our talk turned to other, bigger catastrophes we have experienced. I recalled that time my home was lost in a flood, and she remembered an electrical fire and how she, terrified, had to rouse the children to escape in the middle of the night. Soon, we were having a wonderful time, telling lurid tales of disaster. Have you ever done this? I am sure you have.

There is something about catastrophic events that makes life more precious and our roles on life’s stage more important. We enjoy putting ourselves at the center of truly big events, acknowledged to be game-changers, and we want to assert that we were there, experiencing it all first-hand.

How does this apply to memoirs and family histories? In my experience, memoirists expect to tap into their catastrophes for all they’re worth. Not only are memoirists convinced that their stories have dramatic merit, they intend from the outset to explore both the highs and lows of their lives.

Family historians often miss this opportunity. Perhaps it is because their sources are factual and dry, so the author is not viscerally aware of the powerful dramatic events that took place. Reading some first-hand accounts of catastrophes that took place in an ancestor’s life will help you to tell these stories with the drama they deserve.

Some family historians prefer to keep the image of the family’s past upbeat and positive, to cast all ancestors in a heroic light. Our culture rewards striving and success, and instead of sympathy, there is a tendency to blame people for their suffering and deprivation.

This is no excuse to sanitize history. We learn a great deal from lessons of hardship – just think of our ongoing fascination with the Great Depression, or recently with Hurricane Katrina’s survivors. In fact, I would argue that catastrophes teach us to be better human beings. And isn’t that why we write family history and memoirs, to give insight to others?

Margaret Atwood On Stories, Books, And Changing Technology

Who knew that Canadian author Margaret Atwood was a stand up comedian, too? She appeared this year at the O’Reilly Tools of Change conference to speak about "The Publishing Pie: An Author's View". Her humor and intelligence make this a wonderful presentation.

The author, Atwood says, is the original source – the one who generates the content that keeps the whole publishing world in motion. Yet authors are getting less of the pie. Ebooks, in particular, make it unsustainable to write as a career. Atwood explores new publishing models and the concerns of the changing marketplace.

Atwood discusses many ideas about the value of stories and books. And, for those of you who have been forced to read too many PowerPoints, she even drew cartoon illustrations for her slide show!

Photographers, You’re Going To Love This

What if you could reinvent the camera? Just as all our technological tools are moving toward miniaturization and wireless connections, cameras are undergoing a makeover. Photography designers Artefact have developed the prototype, the WVIL, which stands for "Wireless Viewfinder Interchangeable Lens.”

The whole idea is that in current camera design, the viewfinder is shackled to the lens. What is the lens was in one place, but the viewfinder and controls were somewhere else, say on your computer or an iphone-type console? You could wireless adjust the lens through software, making the kind of rapid, minute calibrations that our clumsy fingers often fail to achieve.

But wait, there’s more! Why just one lens? What if you could position multiple lenses around a subject, and control them all wirelessly? Photography is then transformed to a simultaneous input 3D art.

To learn more, check out this article in Fast Company. There's a fascinating video, too. “Artefact claims that the WVIL concept is less about redesigning the digital camera as it is about redesigning digital photography itself.

"It's about defining a platform for innovation in both hardware and software -- a camera operating system," Ronning says. "We've seen the effect that iOS had on phones. Now think of what effect a camera OS could have for photography."

I can imagine, and like the fanatical iphone buyers, I would stand in line all night to buy this.

Crowdsourced mapping

I’m still reflecting on my recent trip to the Oakland Museum, and how we can apply the methods used by these curators of culture in our own learning. In my last post on the subject, I talked about their interactive timeline.

The interactive map below is another example of using the information provided by a large group. How simple – a map, and stickers. In this case, the question is, “Where did your family come from?” Yet there are other questions you might ask, such as where have you traveled to, or where did your ancestors live in the 1600’s – each of which would produce wildly different data. You can do this - anyone can.

The graphic doesn’t have to be a map, either. Like the timeline I discussed earlier, these are just representations of the scope of the question we’re asking. If we want to know about places, maps are good. Time? You get it. The key is the ease with which people can give their answer. That’s what is clever here – a sticker, or a post it note is very user friendly. And the internet has made this kind of data collection even easier.

I first fell in love with the idea of crowdsourcing when Wikipedia appeared ten years ago. It seems the ideal way to tap into the knowledge of the masses. Crowdsourcing is controversial - in this Wikipedia article about crowdsourcing, I just discovered that Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales objects to the term. It has a negative connotation of taking advantage of free labor. (If you have a moment, check out the article’s list of terms related to crowdsourcing, including citizen science, collective intelligence, and a new one to me – dotmocracy.

So this most commonly used term, crowdsourcing, is a misnomer. Instead, the admirable model used at the museum would be called mass collaboration, or mass cooperation. That’s what’s happening on Wikipedia, and in different iterations it’s happening everywhere else, too. I always read the user reviews on amazon.com before I buy, and I’m careful to check that the majority rated the book highly. Don’t you? I filter my Yelp! searches so that I only need to consider 4-star restaurants. My favorite use of crowdsourcing (sorry, the term is imprecise, but you know what I mean) is the excellent user reviews on newegg.com, without which I could not navigate the world of technology.

The thing that ties these examples together is the absence of “experts”. It assumes that all of us have useful knowledge to share. The charm of crowdsourcing is that no one can force people to contribute; and yet people do, willingly. We are happy to help, happy to give what knowledge we have, especially when it’s a subject we care about.

The interactive map in the museum is just the tip of the iceberg – a literal, hands-on sign that people are willing to contribute. If you want to frame a question, any question, posting it to an well-chosen internet bulletin board will gather results from masses of distant strangers – and isn’t that something to bolster your faith in humanity?



Interactive Timeline Takeaway

We were in the Bay Area this past weekend and stopped in to Oakland’s excellent museum to see how the California history exhibit has been faring in our absence. I love museums, not just for their collections, but for the art of exhibiting information itself. Reading books is nice, but even I am willing to concede that interactive learning beats all.

Here’s one interactive exhibit I thought was a great idea for family historians. The timeline spans a long wall, so many people can view it and post on it at the same time. Imagine their conversations as they make their choices for the most important events of the year.

I can see many applications for this exercise, which could be set up temporarily and inexpensively at a family reunion, a seminar, or a book planning session. And it’s adaptable: just change the timeline to decades, for a longer-in-scope book, or to months or even weeks, for a memoir spanning a shorter period.

The key, I think, is the post-it notes. (What a brilliant invention – how did we ever live without them?) We recently suggested using index cards to get organized in one of our seminars, but some folks just couldn’t envision the color-coding. Anyone can get organized with post-its.