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Yes, according to various pundits, blogs are So 2005. Or even So Over. I say nay. I don’t think blogs are dead, but blogs are changing — just like everything else in the media. 

It used to be that a “web log” (for those who still don’t know that that’s where the word “blog” comes from; believe me, there are more of you than you think, and there’s no shame in not knowing!) was one person’s ramblings (at AOL, they began as “AOL Journals,” for example). It was a functional form, meant to allow a web user to capture their daily ramblings online. Early blogs — from those that quickly died natural deaths on to those that still exist today, like the hugely popular Dooce — were about one person’s voice and consciousness. 

The good ones (the aforementioned Dooce; wish she would write more and fiddle with her design less for example) work like neverending stories. Perhaps a better comparison would be to serialized novels in the Dickensian vein, or early radio soap operas. What will So-and-so do next? Did that really happen? What a great anecdote! Etc.

Group blogs came along circa 2006 (Weblogs Inc., with its popular Slashfood, was early in the game, although of course Gawker had been making progress in that vein already), and quickly became like fun little tabloids, filled with specialized departments, recurring features, and lots and lots of photos. IMHO, the Gawker Empire sites were much better in their older format, where some spots got more real estate than others. The diversity made my click-finger itchy. Now I just scroll past everything.

But a funny thing happened on the way to O’Reilly Conferences. People started to realize something that I’d realized in 2006, when I started the first Blogging Book Club: Blogs are a terrific way to form, shepherd, and grow community. Most devoted blog readers will now tell you that the Comments sections on popular sites like The Huffington Post and Jezebel are more entertaining and informative than the posts they follow. 

Of course, this was when the collective Internets got their collective knickers in a twist about Web 2.0. For those of you who have never heard that term (and why innocent civilians, as opposed to web programmers, should know it is not clear), “Web 2.0″ refers to community-generated content. In other words, the hoi polloi are storming the bastions of the press! 

Thank goodness. I’ve talked often about how everyone needs an editor, and I believe that (NB to my colleagues: Anyone want to edit me? Please?). But that doesn’t mean there aren’t ways to corral user-generated content so that it’s clear which sections of a site (or blog) are edited by “professionals” (read: Someone who has a stake in the advertising and promotion) and which are contributed to by “amateurs” (read: people who are often much smarter than the “professionals”). 

Tomorrow: What’s Next? Web 3.0?

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Good morning, all! We’re this much closer to the launch of The Book Studio. 

To keep myself out of trouble until the new site is live, I’ve decided to try something Completely Different for a giveaway. I’ve got just three copies of Dara Horn’s new novel All Other Nights available, but instead of having you just leave comments here, I’m going to have you take a walk on the Twitter side if you’d like to nab one of those copies.

The three books will go to three random responses from the first 30 to send me a “tweet.” I certainly understand if you aren’t interested in signing up for Twitter, and I’ll have plenty of “regular” giveaways coming up in the next couple of weeks for my loyal readers. This one is Twitter-specific, however. 

My Twitter “handle” is thebookmaven, and you can find me here: http://www.twitter.com/thebookmaven. Just send me a message (a “tweet”) saying you’d like a chance at All Other Nights. 

Thanks for trying out something new with me!

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Long-time readers can skip most of this post if they like… I’ve been blogging as “The Book Maven” since August 2004, when my then-boss at AOL asked me to start a blog and choose a name for it. At the time, the book of the moment was Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, in which he talks about different kinds of people (e.g., “connectors”) including “mavens.” When this site becomes The Book Studio next week, I’ll still be The Book Maven here, on my more personal blog, and maybe somewhere else, too (must keep you guessing!).

I liked the concept, but I also loved the word. It’s Yiddish, and means (as I’ve mentioned in the past) both “expert” and “freak.” It makes sense. After all, the more specialized one’s knowledge in a single area, the more one tends toward freakishness. In a good way. A bookseller once described me as “the self-titled Book Maven,” which I suppose was meant to be disparaging. How dare I deem myself an “expert?” 

I was thinking more of the “freak” side, you see, when I chose that moniker. 

One of my regular blog entries in all of the places I’ve blogged has been to ask readers “What’s on your nightstand?” I can’t stop it now. As my daughters (AKA “The Mini Mavens”) squawk whenever we try to skip a stop on our annual Cape Cod vacation: “It’s a tradition!” 

Of course, there are new ways to ask people what they’re reading, now. I can ask on Facebook, and this morning, I asked on Twitter and got a slew of replies from the early-morning tweeple (I’ll have to “re-tweet” my question later, for the office Twitterers). But on Twitter, at least, responses are severely limited. I thought I’d ask here, so that anyone can leave a list as long as they like of the book stacks by their beds. 

What’s on your nightstand? I really want to know, as much now as I did nearly five years ago.

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In an exciting announcement, a spokesperson for “Masterpiece” from PBS said that starting next year, the decades-old beloved series will cease covering classic works of literature and instead focus on today’s new classics — graphic novels.

“To tell you the truth, we’re completely bored with the classics,” said Cholmondeley Rodriguez, spokesperson for WHAH, the heretofore unknown PBS station in Poughkeepsie. “All those bonnets, carriages, and British accents? They don’t fit with today’s consumer’s needs.”

What does fit with those needs, Rodriguez says, are graphic novels. “We want to introduce the faster storytelling pace of modern graphic novels. We’re working on a completely authentic version of Watchmen right now. None of that Zack Snyder superficial stuff. We didn’t simply build an Owlmobile; we went back in time to make sure we constructed it only of materials that Alan Moore could have envisioned during the 1980s.”

Projects in development include Hellboy, starring Hugh Laurie; The Dark Tower, starring Colin Firth; and The Sandman, starring Derek Jacoby. All female characters will be portrayed by Helen Mirren. 

There has been much jockeying for the coveted position of “Masterpiece!!! Graphix” host. Rodriguez admits that great consideration was given to Neil Gaiman, but the host will be Michael Palin. “He’s still under contract for an unfinished series about soccer hooliganism and its effects on Cotswolds gardens, so he’s cheap,” says Rodriguez.

Happy April Fool’s Day from Bethanne!

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In less than a week, we’ll be unveiling some very, very big changes here at Author, Author! — so big that the site won’t be called Author, Author! anymore! 

You might want to set a new bookmark for www.thebookstudio.com, currently a “Coming Soon!” placeholder screen. 

This blog will be a big part of the new site, but we’ll also have brand-new author videos produced on a new set. I’m really excited about them; they look terrific. It’s also completely searchable by genre, author name, title…I hope it will make your reading life a little richer. 

The anticipation is killing me. I wish I could show off the new site now, now, now. But the people doing the heavy lifting still have some modules to push into place, and they’re working very hard on getting everything just right. 

Please be patient, and please: Watch This Space. Good things ahead!

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The real fun of any book festival comes not in its panels, but in its social events. From catching up with an old friend over coffee to attending a big party, book business fades and book gossip increases — and when I say “gossip,” I don’t necessarily mean the negative, toxic kind. I mean connecting, chattering, and sharing. 

For example, I said in my last post that Alan Cheuse was irascible during our Book Review Superstars panel. After we finished, Bella Stander asked if I could give Cheuse a ride back to the Omni, as he was driving back to his Maryland home that evening. Since I was already chauffeuring Lou Bayard, I said sure, and we all hopped into my Mini for the very short ride across town.

Unfortunately, since everyone else chose that moment to leave the UVA Bookstore parking garage, too, we three were trapped together in my little car for much longer than we’d expected. We were in close quarters. We were still wearing the faux-bling necklaces that Bella Stander had draped over our necks at the panel’s start. We had no choice. We had to…talk.

Now, Lou Bayard and I can talk each other’s ears off, and have even been known to break into song from time to time (just don’t ask about the late-night rendition of “All the Single Ladies”). But neither one of us has met Cheuse socially before, and we felt a little shy — especially after hearing him on the panel. 

But you know me. I can’t just sit there and waste an opportunity to get to know an author, and Cheuse had been gracious enough to take one of his books and inscribe it to me. Before we could get to the lowest parking level, I’d discovered not only that one of his daughters went to Smith a few years after I did, and that said daughter is a fantastic publicist with whom I’ve worked several times. 

A few minutes more and all three of us were having a wonderful conversation about politics, DC, children, books, reading, and more. There was no irascibility and there was no line-drawing; it was a fun, collegial chat. I’m looking forward to interviewing and working with Cheuse more in the future (although he may not agree to vogue with me a la Sasha Fierce). 

Tomorrow: Dinner with agents and authors, and why knitting matters

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Many, many years ago, when I was in high school, I went on an interview to be an exchange student and the committee members couldn’t stop exclaiming about how I looked like “a young Sally Field.” 

I no longer look like a young or old Sally Field (that woman’s got good bones), or even a young Bethanne — but I still have a lot in common with Ms. Fields. Remember when she exclaimed during her 1985K Oscar acceptance “You like me! You really like me!”? Everyone razzed her for that overeager and vulnerable outburst.

Not I. I understand! Sometimes you are so unsure of whether or not anyone’s paying attention that you can’t help breaking open and letting your tattered self-esteem slip show. You’re never supposed to let anyone see you sweat, right? Well, that may work for business meetings, but when you’re in a creative line of work, it’s not the same.

So yesterday when I received a book and a handwritten note from a publicist saying “I thought your Amy Dickinson video interview was FABULOUS, and wondered if you’d like to do the same kind of thing for Author X,” I was thrilled. I don’t get many comments on the author interviews that I post (and really, why would you leave lots of them? The interviews speak for themselves most of the time). To know that someone had watched, had liked it (really liked it!), and wanted a repeat performance for another author? That’s my measure of success, Web metrics be damned. 

So thank you, really thank you, to everyone out there who is watching. I’ll be doing more Flip video interviews with authors once my fractured leg has healed, and if any publicists out there have candidates for those, please let us know. You can always email me: thebookmaven at gmail dot com. 

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I apologize for taking so long to post more from VA Book, but a) during the Festival, things are so hectic and so many conversations are taking place that it’s hard to Twitter, let alone blog; and b) on Monday morning, while driving the Brigadier of previous post to his country’s embassy, I was involved in a car wreck. My beloved Mini Cooper with its “Book Maven” plates is no more (as my Tweeple already know).The Brigadier suffered a badly bruised hand, the driver who slammed into me hasn’t a scratch, and I am really OK except for a minor leg fracture. I’m so grateful we’re all alive. (That photo is not really my car or our accident site, but I did have a silver Mini…)

I’m also grateful that this accident didn’t happen last week, before I drove down to Charlottesville. I had an absolutely great time at the Festival, and while I may not be covering everything in minute detail, I’d like to be sure I wrap up this year’s blogging by giving a brief postmortem of the two panels in which I participated, as well as a snapshot of Saturday night’s Author Reception in the Special Collections building.

My first event was the “Book Reviewing Superstars” panel, consisting of “Mod Ron Hogan” (as @bellastander dubbed him on Twitter) as moderator, and Michael Dirda, Alan Cheuse, Louis Bayard, and me as panelists. I said in a tweet that Dirda was sanguine, Cheuse was angry, Bayard was bemused, and I was a cockeyed optimist. Seriously, I felt like an antique Pollyanna as I continued to tell stories of how things are changing in a productive way for book reviewing and publishing, especially when Cheuse began to fulminate on how democracy will tumble into the sea without major newspapers supporting their book reviews in print.

If you ask me, The Washington Post could do a great deal by simply supporting Book World online. Right now the site is in need of some serious glamor-shot work, and its editors know that. Marcus Brauchli, hello? They can’t work magic without wands…

Tomorrow: More about Book Review panel, Agents Roundtable, and Authors Reception

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Our dear old friend the British Brigadier has come to stay for just one night before he’s off to some conference of spies somewhere. The Brigadier does funny stuff, so for many years whenever I spoke to his lovely wife and asked after his whereabouts, I knew if she replied “He’s upstairs” that that meant I simply didn’t want to know.

I’ll be whisking our friend off to his embassy shortly, but as we sat around the breakfast table with our coffee and toast, he mentioned he’d like to send the younger Mini Maven a copy of Conn Iggulden’s The Dangerous Book for Boys as a gift. I told him that she does already have The Daring Book for Girls, in case he would like to save his Euros. 

“Oh, nooooo,” he said (it was more like “Och nauw,” since he’s Scottish, but I’ve promised not to make too much sport of his foreign tongue). “The book for boys is much, much better. Did you know that they’ve got a guide to recognizing freshwater fish and also a list of the kings and queens of England?”

Uh, no, we didn’t. And, um, how exciting?

“Ahhhhh,” said the Brigadier. “But hidden between those pages is a spread of information about how to build a detonator. In a book for children! When I am explaining about the basics (Ed. note: “The basics” !!!!), as I’m handing round different explosives, I bring out a copy of The Dangerous Book for Boys and open it up to show them the directions. Iggulden gives such clear instructions on booby traps that it’s better than any military manual.”

HarperCollins, what hath thou wrought? 

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