Lessons on professionalism, persistence and “Endurance” from artist Theresa Ortolani

Two years ago, I attended a publishing workshop hosted by Kiki Bauer, senior designer for powerHouse Books, at the powerHouse Arena in Brooklyn. Six of us attended, each eager to discuss our very specific idea for a brilliantly conceived, beautiful and riveting coffee-table book like those famously published by powerHouse. Theresa, Lori, Brad, Debra, John-Michael and I all presented our pet projects to Kiki on that day, and I’ll bet the rest of our classmates are as proud as I am to see that Theresa has persevered in seeing hers through, and getting it into print: “Endurance” published by powerHouse Books, is now available for purchase. In fact, the official launch party is happening at powerHouse Arena on Thurs., Dec. 3. More information on Theresa Ortolani, “Endurance” and this very cool upcoming event follow below. Read more

Brought to you by deep love and appreciation for local libraries

Growing up in Illinois, Tennessee, and Florida, I am extremely indebted to many local libraries and librarians who helped encourage me to learn and grow as an individual. This week’s posting is short and sweet, inviting you to visit the American Library Association’s great ilovelibraries.org site where you can learn a lot about local libraries across America and sign up for their informative newsletter, their Facebook fan page, and more. Happy learning!

Honorable Murray Silver, on Rev. Martin Luther “Daddy” King, Senior

My dear friend, the Honorable Murray Silver, Esquire, was recorded during a June 2008 presentation for students and faculty of Hilton Head Preparatory School, honoring Rev. Martin Luther “Daddy” King, Senior.  A world-famous trial lawyer, former Atlanta Municipal Court Judge and long-serving advisor to the Martin Luther King, Jr., Center for Non-Violent Social Change, Mr. Silver had a close personal friendship with Daddy King that lasted for many years, and intertwines their fates to this very day. Read more

Business ventures of your dreams…

I remember being 12 years old and being very impressed by a young guy I met, Tommy Ewasko, who at that time (1978) was well on his way to becoming a professional photographer. Tommy was the first professional creative person I ever crossed paths with, and after getting to know him a bit better, I began to see the world in a different way. Last month, my successful English entrepreneurial comrade Rob Ford of Favourite Website Awards (TheFWA.com) shared a story with his friends on Facebook where he was included in a 10steps.sg feature by Johnson Koh entitled “Interviews of Ten Accomplished Founders.” If you have not visited TheFWA.com before, I can easily imagine you having a kind of epiphany when you do, and there are other domains within Rob’s empire which are equally inspirational, including FWATheater.com and FWAPhoto.com.

To me, because his business model is original, creative, seemingly very fun, and largely self-guided, Rob represents the kind of successful entrepreneur that one only dreams of becoming. Do please read the “Interviews” article linked above to learn more about the origins of Rob’s business, and those of the other talented young gentlemen listed below. There’s enough inspiration here to change many people’s perceptions of the very nature of business… and represent new approaches to how resourceful individuals can build their own unique success stories independently.
. BuySellAds – Todd Garland
. Envato – Colliss Ta’eed
. Good Tutorials – Zach Holman
. Abduzeedo – Fabio Sasso
. Tutorial9 – David Leggett
. DeviantArt – Angelo-Sotira
. iStockPhoto – Bruce LivingStone
. Pixel2Life – Dan Richard
. SmashingMagazine – Vitaly Friedman & Sven Lennartz

A tale of two FILE Magazines…

I am a big fan of the international design industry news and discussion site QBN.com. During a visit there yesterday, I clicked my way into a discussion on the subject of FILE Magazine. What I found there impressed me with the depth of knowledge represented by the site’s membership, and two very different — and yet very cool — magazines, both named FILE. The first, which we’ll call “FILE MAGAZINE (www.file-magazine.com)” is a new DVD/print-based literary/culture/arts magazine from the UK. As someone pointed out in the thread, it features a very old-school approach, in that it is subscription-based, virtually all its contents are offline, and in order to get an issue, would-be readers will need to pick up a copy at one of many retail outlets, or otherwise rely upon the mail. While the person that brought this publication to QBN’s attention took some heat for the mag’s traditional approach, others who have gotten their hands on copies have praised the value based on the £6.50 + p&p; cover price, the high quality of the printed and DVD contents, and even made the point of how much more they’ve enjoyed experiencing the magazine than they would have if it was “just another” online mag featuring online video content.

Oddly, soon after the original announcement for “FILE MAGAZINE” appeared with its link and info, someone wrote, “Not to be confused with filemagazine.com.” This other publication, which we’ll call “FILE Magazine (www.filemagazine.com)” is (ahem) an online publication that presents its own collection of high-quality photographic images which “treat subjects in unexpected ways,” and does a great job of showcasing and appreciating its contributors. Seemingly, this FILE represents a totally different philosophy and approach to its business model — and its way of reaching, engaging and entertaining readers. To me, both projects are very much of interest, and perhaps even moreso because of the contrasting existence of the other. I thought you might enjoy checking them out yourself.

Freeload: WMIG / The FADER Present We Mix It Good Mix Vol. 7: Crookers

The filmmakers from creative production company Shilo (www.shilo.tv), together with We Make It Good’s creative director Clayton Vomero, have partnered with The FADER to release the next editions of their original mix series, and are very proud to announce the We Make It Good / Fader Mix Series Volume 7 release, featuring Italian DJ duo Crookers. As with all the past We Make It Good Mix Series releases, the artwork for the Crookers release was created by Shilo’s Evan Dennis. Enjoy!

read more | digg story

Daily inspiration from the design world’s past and present…

Talent impresses me deeply. Too often, I only become aware of some amazingly gifted individual upon reading their obituary… and I’m sorry to say that’s the case with the late graphic designer and poster artist Pierre Mendell. Back on Jan. 9, in carefully selected words from noted design critic and writer Steven Heller in the priceless blog he pens each day for PRINT magazine entitled “The Daily Heller,” and four well-chosen images, a master graphic designer and communicator was clearly revealed, and the news of his passing touchingly conveyed.

Thanks again to Mr. Heller, last year I was educated on the life, accomplishments, importance and humanity of publishing industry iconoclast Clay Felker, the co-founder of New York magazine whom Heller described in his July 8, 2008 edition as, “one of the great pioneers of American magazine publishing.” Here’s to Steven Heller for taking the time to engagingly share the fruits of his knowledge from the forefront of design criticism and education. The full archives of “The Daily Heller” are available here.

2008 ode to the magazine….

You only need to look as far as last week’s post to realize that I am a fan of the magazine, but if you’ve been here before, you may also have me pegged as one of those ‘digital influencer’ types. A new article from Michael Bush for AdAge entitled “‘Digital Influencers’ Get Info from Magazines, TV First,” confirms that my normal mode of discovering things of interest through traditional media (magazines, newspapers, TV, radio) is pretty widespread among us passionistas. So with the magazine industry in enough of a spiral descent to provide writer, singer, entertainer and ‘cinemasoloist’ Bill Dyszel with dozens of newly dead major titles to humorously pine-for in his very creative American Society of Journalists and Authors presentation below, I wanted to share some encouraging words on the future of magazine publishing.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjlvYOmXLc8]
Thanks to Ann Marie Kerwin for the heads-up on this in her 12/16 AdAge Adages item, and for letting us know, though Mr. Dyszel’s performance seems to indicate otherwise, happily, Harper’s is still kicking.

According to MediaFinder.com, over the past three years, an average of 384 new magazines have launched. Matthew Flamm of Crain’s New York Business wrote on this subject today, reporting that the numbers are down for 2008 by 13%, that the trend is toward focused, niche titles, and citing these words from Trish Hagood, president of Oxbridge Communications and owner of MediaFinder: “You still get bigger ad dollars from print than from online. If publishers can find subjects that truly interest people, then they can find the advertising.” That’s what I wanted to share. For more inspiration, check out Business Week’s ongoing series profiling fresh entrepreneurial startups from across the country. And remember, as marketing industry pundit Jack Myers has pointed out, “The Chinese word for crisis is composed of two characters: one for danger and the other for opportunity.“

Welcome to grad school for web design…

Anyone interested in website design knows that there is a wealth of easy-to-find instructional information available online — but also that great insights, tips and tricks remain priceless. Earlier this year, I posted an entry entitled “Tips from the pros to reassess your website,” which I still feel is a very good primer, and every day I discover more valuable new information. For example, yesterday I read “How-To: 15 Tips for Effective Web Design” from MarketingVOX.com, which was contributed by Mark Jackson, the chief editor of Host Review UK, and provides some excellent reminders, tips and links. I also visit sites like SmashingMagazine.com daily to keep up with other trends, ideas and techniques from the trenches, and whenever I want to “cut to the chase” and see sites widely considered to be the best of the best, I surf over to Favourite Website Awards (FWA) and sample their archive of websites deemed to be extraordinary. In this discussion on the latest in website design, I find it worth shouting from the virtual rooftops that FWA founder Rob Ford has co-edited a new book from one of my absolute ‘favourite’ publishers: Taschen Books.

“Guidelines for Online Success” just went on sale on Taschen’s website, and Rob and his fellow editor Julius Wiedemann have filled it with the knowledgeable input and insights from the designers and developers around the world who have inspired them the most. As the copy for the book states, “This book has all the advice and examples you will need to give your personal or business website an edge on its competitors and also win industry acclaim as well as respect from your peers. Your visitors will thank you.“

Publishing, digital and otherwise…

I have long considered myself to be a lover of books, and as time has moved along, I’ve realized that while books are often the beloved delivery mechanisms, my interests are actually connected to the individuals behind them… and the content they’ve created. There’s definitely something about the portability of books — and of course other printed matter like magazines, letters, etc. — which makes the connection real and personal. At the same time, I read a lot of email newsletters and other digital content that finds its way to me; well-crafted communications generally inspire me, and I’m constantly researching the latest ways that people can get their work published, packaged and out to the world, whether in printed or some digital form. In the event you may share my interests, here are a few ideas related to both personal and professional publishing which you can explore to research some of the opportunities which seem most exciting to me. Hope you find this helpful, and if you have tips to share, I look forward to hearing from you.

. Photos into books

My wife and I have used Shutterfly.com for some time for getting our digital photos printed and distributed — and for customized greeting cards. Last year, for the first time, I went through the process of making a customized photo book for my mother’s birthday, and I also made one for my kids last year commemorating their summer. It’s quite easy to upload your photos and use their templates to make books that look beautiful and are relatively affordable.

. Smart “dummies” and more…

If you’re interested in having your work published, first you have to assemble it professionally so you can show it to potential publishers, etc. While you can certainly use Adobe Acrobat for that, during an excellent powerHouse Books publishing workshop I attended last year hosted by their senior designer Kiki Bauer, I learned about two companies that are great for publishing dummies: Asuka and Blurb. Looking at the sites for both companies today, it appears that each actually offers a complete pathway to affordably creating and marketing bookstore-quality books of all types.

. Other companies for self-publishers

I have had some fairly good experiences with the company AuthorHouse, and I can report that, in my humble opinion, they offer a cost-effective means for book publishing which also includes distribution through Amazon. At the same time, my experience with their customer service and other details of their operations has led me to research other similar companies. My cousin Bart Ridings reportedly had a great experience publishing a book through Lulu.com. My own assessments have led me to strongly consider Dog Ear Publishing for my next text-based book publishing venture.

. Digital magazines…

Zinio came on the scene many years ago, and I remember downloading their reader and getting some early digital editions of magazines I subscribed to, but the experience didn’t exactly hook me. What did really attract me many years later was the first time I read an issue of Magwerk.com’s Encore magazine and the other excellent “next generation digital magazines” they offer for free on their site. It seems that there are many companies competing with Zinio now for the broad marketplace where print magazines offer digital editions, and I’ve been very impressed by the information I have read about Nxtbook Media — and also by the volume of insightful, helpful information they publish on their blog about digital publishing — including this recent entry where they compare themselves with Zinio.