Blog Book

Matt Ward of Highland Marketing e-mailed me a link to his review of our book today. As always, it’s great to hear that people are finding the book useful.

I was particularly impressed with the one caveat he offered:

The one thing I would caution readers about is Byron and Broback’s exuberant level of enthusiasm. Now don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against enthusiasm. Actually, I think that their enthusiasm is a wonderful thing. My primary concern is that, if the reader is not careful, he or she could find themselves missing the critical truth that blogging takes a lot of commitment and resources. So, while I don’t think that Byron and Brodback overstate the benefits of blogging, I do think that their book could paint a picture that makes successful blogging appear somewhat simpler than it actually is. Of course, in the end this is not a bad thing. The reader just needs to understand that the authors are writing from a particular position, and that, as always, that position will invariably colour what they have to say.

I couldn’t agree more with this assessment. As bloggy types, we tend to get mega passionate about all the great new communications technologies out there. But they do take a lot of time and commitment. I spent many many hours each day researching and writing blog posts and moderating commments.

What’s more, interacting with my RSS reader sometimes feels like I have my mouth around a fire hose when all I really want is a sip of cold water. In fact, John Battelle pointed out to me at the last BBS conference that RSS as it currently stands will never really take off as a medium for data gathering until the sheer overload is tempered in an effective way.

But for me, it’s the right way to do my job. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

We’ve had a number of questions come in about the free book offer, so I’d like to make a few more clarifications.

• If you do not have a mailing address inside the United States, we cannot send you a book. There are no exceptions. We apologize for any inconvenience.
• If you are not associated with a legitimate business, we cannot send you a book. We ask that you prove your association with a legitimate business by e-mailing us at freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com from an e-mail address associated with that business. E-mails from services such as Comcast, Earthlink or Hotmail will not be eligible to participate.
• If you are associated with a legitimate business, but do not have an e-mail address to prove it, e-mail me at teresa [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com. We evaluate these appeals on a case by case basis
• You must fill out a survey to get your book. A number of people have sent their mailing addresses to either the freebook address or another of our contact addresses expecting to get the book. If you do not fill out the survey, you don’t get the book. No exceptions.

Here is the step by step process to follow in order to get your book:

1. Send an e-mail to freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com from your business e-mail address
2. Receive an e-mail back with a link to a survey.
3. Click on the link to fill out the survey.
4. Receive your free book in 2-4 weeks.

Also, in the interest of transparency, I should mention that we’ve been experiencing some problems with the filter we’ve been using to determine whether an e-mail address is associated with a business. Some people have received multiple responses. I can imagine that this experience would be very annoying and I’m sorry that the filter got screwed up. No person and no system is perfect and we sincerely apologize for the annoyance and inconvenience this malfunction caused.

Based on the first round of requests for Publish and Prosper through our free book offer, I’d say that our optimism about businesses blogging is well-founded. Requests have come in from real estate agents and CEOs, PR professionals and entrepreneurs. This preliminary information seems to support what we’ve been saying: the blogosphere is a permanent part of the future of business, and business people are waking up to that fact.

I’d like to issue a couple of reminders at this juncture:

1. There are only 500 books being offered at this time, and they’re going fast. If you’re interested in the book you should send an e-mail to freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com from your business e-mail sooner rather than later.
2. You can’t get the free book without first proving that you’re from a business and then taking a short survey. Please don’t send e-mails to any of our contact addresses requesting the book. You won’t receive one, and you will only annoy me. The only address that you should e-mail in order to get a book is freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com.

If you’ve got any questions, you’re welcome to e-mail me at teresa [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com.

If you can’t come to the conference this October, you can still learn about business blogging from the folks that put on the Blog Business Summit. As part of our mission to get businesses blogging, we’re giving away 500 copies of our book Publish and Prosper: Blogging for Your Business free of charge.

Obviously there are some provisions associated with this promotion, and you can read all about them here. Basically, you need to e-mail us at freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com. Our e-mail filter will determine whether your e-mail address is associated with a verifiable business. If the filter determines that you are associated with a business, it will send a reply with a link to a short survey. Fill out the survey, get the book in 2-4 weeks.

So why are we doing this? There are a couple of reasons. First, we really care about business blogging.

But we are a business and businesses rarely do things for purely altruistic reasons. We are working to raise awareness of the conference this October, our partners Marqui, Six Apart and Attensa, the book, and our blog.easystreet.com)

“Indispensable…a practical guide to blogging for business.” -Mobil’Homme via (Amazon.com reviews)

“If you are a manager and have heard about blogs but don’t know what they are or how they can be used, then this book is right for you. The messages are clear, complete and will prove invaluable if you are considering or planning an entry into the blogosphere…Read this book before you start a business blog!” -Charles Ashbacher via (Amazon.com reviews)

So there you have it, if you’d like to get a $22 book for free, e-mail freebook [at] blogbusinesssummit [dot] com.

According to a survey conducted by Australian broadband Internet service provider Whirlpool, approximately 1/3 of Australian broadband users are using their high-speed access to download pirated television shows.

In our book, we talk about how the evolution of the Web has brought us the content-on-demand generation. People who are used to using the Web often want content in a variety of formats that make it convenient and desirable for them to use. Many businesses in the entertainment industry have taken notice of this revolution - ABC now streams many of its hit shows for free over its website, and countless television networks are offering their shows for download on the iTunes store.

And the concept doesn’t stop at the entertainment industry. Newspapers need to make their online content available in formats that are supported by the ever-growing number of wireless devices that support data access. To take an example we use in our book, even the makers of Purina dog food make their Animal Advice radio show available in podcast format.

To make the evolution and success of the Web translate to additional success for your business, you’re going to have to figure out how you can provide your core audience with the content they crave and the formats they want.

Via Digg.

I’ve just posted over at the blog book blog about another perspective on the network neutrality debate and its subsequent political ramifications in Congress.

Be forewarned: this is another “we talk about this in The Book” plug, but it’s interesting anyway so read on!

So basically what’s happened is that some really cool people have created a mashup that makes it super easy to put Yahoo! local maps on your iPod.

This is what we call really good content on demand. Grab the maps, change the format, get out the door and drive with the Pod (that’s what all the cool kids call ‘em now).

Via digg.

We know, we know, you’ve all been dying for a sneak peak at Publish and Prosper: Blogging for your Business a Peachpit/New Riders Voices that Matter book due out in just a few weeks.

We are very happy to now be able to offer a sample chapter of the book over at our book site.

The sample chapter is Chapter 1: Meet the Blogs, in which the authors introduce readers to the blogosphere.

Enjoy, folks!

Byron has posted over at the blog book blog about our book going to press today!

We’re all very excited to see the finished product.

One of the things we talk about in our book is blogs that don’t look like blogs - which is to say, blogs that don’t follow the traditional three column (or two column) bloggy looking layout.

Rising from Ruin is a good example of a blog that doesn’t look like a blog.

Another amazing example is Byron’s Clip-N-Seal blog which is a fairly recent development. This beautiful site doesn’t look like what you picture when you picture a blog, but it was built with Movable Type and lots of brilliant design work.

So when you’re thinking about building a business blog, the sky is really the limit. Blogs can look, feel and behave in ways that aren’t necessarily “bloggy” while retaining all the power that makes them “Websites on steroids.”

One of the blogs we talk about in [our book](http://www.blogbusinessbook.com/) is [TDF Blog](http://www.tdfblog.com/). When it launched, it was the only bike-racing site that offered RSS —and that’s why it beat out competitors in this niche and gained considerable traffic. The site’s publisher, Frank Steele, aggregates cycling news from around the web, adds his perspective, and offers an RSS feed.

This week Frank started another [blog for the Tour of Georgia](http://www.tdgblog.com/), America’s biggest stage race that attracts an international field. For those not familiar with bike racing, the TOG is like the World Baseball Classic, where players from all over the world play in the US and it’s on now.

Another topic in our book is [mashups](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mashup_(web_application_hybrid) (and proof that I can relate most anything to cycling and our book!), a term used to describe a web application that is created by combining and mashing up data from other applications. VeloNews has combined a sports ticker, current results, course profile, photos, ads, and [GoogleMaps](http://maps.google.com/) into the [TOG mashup](http://www.velonews.com/Admin/ticker/georgiaonmymap5.html).

For more on mashups see the [Wikipedia entry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mashup_(web_application_hybrid) and they are featured in the [April 3rd issue of InformationWeek](Mashups are featured in the April 3rd issue of InformationWeek).

Byron has posted over at the blog book blog about the incredible effort and amount of time that went into this book and the many people who have made contributions to it.

I’ve spent a lot of time on this project over the past few month, making Steve’s subjects agree with Byron’s verbs and convincing the two authors of the difference between dashes and parentheses. And I can tell you without any shade of loyalty or bias that this is one amazing book.

In the course of working on this project, I have become a better business blogger. Just being around Steve and Byron while they throw their expertise around has given me an astonishing level of insight into the blogosphere and the myriad ways that businesses can become involved, now and in the future.

Ok, I’m going to stop my gushing now because coming from me it’s just going to be perceived as so much feather-fluffing. But just wait until you read it, then you’ll see.
Anyway - thank you to Steve and Byron for allowing me to be part of this experience. Wow, what a ride!

I was checking on our blog book page on Amazon.com (similar to googling yourself, I’ve been amazoning my self, including Clip-n-Seal) and noticed that Amazon thinks we’re “better together.” How nice and agreed! As we’ve been saying, Scoble and Shel wrote the why in Naked Conversations and we’re just about to publish the how with Publish & Prosper: blogging for your business.

For more on Publish & Prosper, see our blog book blog. We’re in pre-sale mode now and in stores this May!

Byron has posted it over at the Publish and Prosper blog.

Byron has been toiling tirelessly in the code mines for quite some time now to produce our Blog Book Blog about the forthcoming book, Publish and Prosper from Peachpit, which will be in stores this May.

Yes, we’re thumping our chests a bit when we talk about this book. But we’ve got a right to be proud. It’s been an all-consuming project that turned into a great book and Steve & Byron in particular deserve to be very proud of themselves.

There are a lot of blog books out there, but Publish and Prosper is the one you’ll reach for when you’re ready to jump out of the realm of blogging theory and into business reality.

I should mention that our publisher Peachpit is offering a presale on the book. Hooray!

Just as we’re finishing our book, the ongoing death of publishing is a popular blog topic

• Jason Fried proclaims himself the new publishing sheriff in town with 1700 downloads of their Get Real ebook. Note the “how you like me now,” diss of pronouncing their success against the publishing industry, while running ads from publishers on their site!
• Steve Baker posts, if book publishing is dying, have I made a bad mistake? and the economics of books are being debated

I remember during the dotcoms that Bill Gates predicted that ebooks would eclipse hard copies in a few years. Books haven’t died and neither has Apple, despite being declared dead 48 times since April 1995. Doc Searls posted on the usual death of books in 2003 and The Observer observed last year that it’s the death of the book again and “delivery systems evolve.”

Delivery does evolve and not too long ago, the Gutenberg press was da bomb. Considering this topic more, I keep coming back to the NYTimes article on the 30 second spot remover and this quote

I think technology is going to wreak havoc on the agency business.

What Greenberg, the creative force of R/GA, is saying is that traditional approaches in the agency business are going to continue to be less effective as technologies like iPods emerge and the millennials consume media in ways we don’t and pretty much tune out ads. Replace the word agency in that sentence with publishing, or PR, and the same criticism applies. Readers are going to want content on demand and while late to the online party, publishing is offering delivery systems like Rough Cuts.

For publishers, it’s like debating global warming while the ice caps melt. The world is changing under their feet and they’re wondering what pair of shoes they should wear. Finally, it seems, they’ve figured out the appropriate footwear and are pulling up their bootstraps.

Want a publisher offers is distribution. Google Publish and Prosper: Blogging for Your Business to see all the resellers, many of whom I’d never heard of, that are ready to sell our book. Now, to 37Signals credit, they’ve got a gazillion readers and can do well self-publishing. For us, we want that book to carpet bomb the blogoshere beyond our blog with good how-to practical advice.

Finally, no mention of new sheriffs in towns can go without a Blazing Saddles quote. I’ll have to ask Jason at SXSW

Is that a ten-gallon hat, or are you just enjoying the show?

As our blog book nears completion and will be in stores this May, Peachpit, is offering a presale discount of 35% off plus free shipping. That’s a great deal and is [available now on their site](http://www.peachpit.com/title/0321395387). Just enter this code when you checkout: PP-234P-LKMS.

It’s rewarding to see all of the hard writing work payoff. In a few weeks, we’ll launch a new blog just for the book with podcasts, a giganto blog roll, excerpts, more. Peachpit has also put together [a nice flyer](/media/publish_prosper_flyer.pdf) I’ll be handing out during my lectures at our [Seminar in LA on March 16th](http://blogbusinesssummit.com/seminars/) and at [SXSW](http://2006.sxsw.com/interactive/) where I’ll moderate a panel with [Eric Rice](http://ericrice.com/), [Zeldman](http://zeldman.com), [Inman](http://www.shauninman.com/), and [Phoebe Espiritu](http://simplifierlab.com/).

Buy today, save, and “learn how to use blogging to talk with your customers, to build your brand, and sell your products!”

I haven’t had a carpal tunnel flare since 1999, when I was hand-coding html for some dotcom with a ridiculous business plan; well, make that a dotcom with NO business plan. Yesterday, my arms started to hurt and I realized I’d been typing nonstop for two days about business blogging for our book. During that pain flare, I also fantasized that [Catherine Zeta Jones](http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/catherinezetajones/) was narrating the chapters instead of the voice in my head, which is getting rather annoying (for the sidebars in the chapter, I’d like that booming CNN voice to read them). Dear readers, when you get the book, please substitute your voice for mine!

A blog lineup

We’re working hard to include more than the usual suspects in our book and much of what I’ve been writing about includes blogs like

* [CleverChimp](http://cleverchimp.com/)
* [Left Brain/Right Brain](http://www.kevinleitch.co.uk/wp/home.php)
* [New West Snow Blog](http://www.newwest.net/index.php/snow_blog/main/C458/L41)

After a short break to stretch my arms and observe sideways rain which has been pouring from the skies nonstop here in Seattle, I’m back to writing . . .

From [Normblog](http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/) via [Popbitch](http://www.popbitch.com/) comes a list of [writers writing about books](http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2005/08/writers_choice__2.html). Also see [Bookslut](http://www.bookslut.com/blog/).

Not a day goes by that I don’t read about an [iPod](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?link_code=as2&path=ASIN/B000BQR2EA&tag=texturadesign-20&camp=1789&creative=9325) killer from Microsoft, a Korean manufacture, or creative Zen. Today it’s the [Mustek PVR-H160](http://www.mustek.com/) — suggest a better name like, Musk-Tech’s Musky 3000. We just finished the design chapter of [Publish & Prosper](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?link_code=as2&path=ASIN/0321395387&tag=texturadesign-20&camp=1789&creative=9325) and used the success of the iPod as an example of why design matters. “The iPod is a device with great features, utilizing a highly approachable interface, presented in a form that is visually appealing,” and that’s why it is the dominant player. If the would-be iPod killers designed a better player, it’d sell and in droves.