Tag: Blog
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Scaling the Cliff: Submitting to Literary Journals for the First Time
A friend asked me today about getting published in literary journals and magazines, and I want to share my response with all of you. I love helping people get started with getting published, and talk about it often with my friends, so this blog post almost feels past-due. Luckily, the friend who reached out to…
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Writing Prompt #46
Hullo fabulous folks! Grab a pen and a notebook! To celebrate the resuscitation of this blog, Prompt #46 is going to be all about rebirth, rejuvenation, and recovery. When was the last time you sat down and thought about something you overcame in life—college application statements don’t count! It’s time to do a little appreciation…
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I’m Back!
Hey folks! I’m back! First, allow me to apologize for the lengthy and sudden absence–I was, unfortunately, too ambitious with my original posting schedule for this blog. Juggling grad school, work, planning for my career, life, and daily blog posts was simply beyond my capabilities. However, I love this blog, and am excited to be…
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Advertising Revenue is Dying
The key findings of a Tow Report written by Elizabeth Anne Watkins say it all, but there is one in particular that gets to the crux of the matter. “The hyperefficient market for programmatic display ads has driven down their prices, reducing revenue for publishers.” This, combined with the way ads impact the user experience, is killing…
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Content Matters, So Let’s Change the Structural Convention
“[T]he way we structure content says a lot about the values we share.” One argument I have made for many years is that language matters. In an article for The Think Company, Dave Thomas illustrates clearly why. Using The New York Times as an example, Thomas talks about conventions specifically surrounding gender. If we learn to expect that a woman’s…
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SEO Versus Quality Control: Where is the line between optimization and staying afloat?
In the Boston Globe article Confessions of a professional clickbait writer, Ben Kissam touches on some of the controversy surrounding the different approaches to driving traffic. “I’m not paid to write beautiful prose; I’m paid to grab eyeballs.” The article as a whole has a light, almost sarcastic tone. Kissam seems to both criticize the lack…
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Online Communities
Instead of the normal Tuesday Review, you lovely folks get to enjoy a class assignment examining online communities—kind of like what I’m trying to build here. What makes a community? According to Merriam-Webster: “a unified body of individuals[.]” These individuals may gather because of common interests, geographic location, shared characteristics, and other such similarities. Are…
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Workshop Best Practices
Workshops can be tricky! Despite their usefulness, it is very easy for them to become something that writers dread. I have been in workshops wherein my peers made me cry. I have also been in workshops that were incredibly validating, but too praise-heavy to be useful. So how do we find a balance? Some of…
Nic Job 