Category: Creator Confidential
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The database stance
Early into my career, I worked as an apprentice with Ryan Leslie. He saw social media algorithms shrink organic reach, he observed how every tour he went on required a press run, and he decided there was a better way. In marketing, these practices are known as renting an audience. He resolved to build direct…
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Good editing means trusting yourself
While editing certainly involves a lot of hard skills—structuring a piece, making it flow, continuing to draw the eye onward—it equally requires understanding what the author is trying to do. It means listening closely to them, helping them see their options, and advising them on making the best decisions. It doesn’t always look like that,…
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Get rich or die tryin’
It’s good to be willing to take the leap, to step up. Most people won’t. Sometimes though, when you’re willing to take drastic action, you can also get in your own way. Shane Parrish writes in Clear Thinking, “When you are well positioned, there are many paths to victory. If you are poorly positioned, there…
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What AI won’t change in art
Google launched 25 years ago. While it has become one of the biggest, most powerful companies in the world, it hasn’t changed everything about us. For example, while we search a lot, we still ask each other questions. (Partially because Google search has deteriorated.) We still meet up at events, ask for coffees, and sign…
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A 20 year detour
When Ke Huy Quan was 12 years old, he made his film debut starring in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Millions of viewers would know his character, Short Round. Yet as he got older and decided he wanted to act for a living, he saw fewer opportunities to act. He couldn’t see a…
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Practicing vs. pushing
Practice is about getting better, and pushing is about exerting greater force. While sometimes people may want you to push yourself to practice harder—and while yes, sometimes, the need is there!—many times the two aren’t necessarily connected together. Pushing too hard, or too often, can actually ruin a practice, because it creates too much pressure…
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Find spaces to talk about your ideas
Promoting your work actually makes an impact. Anne Trubek notes, after publishing 90 books, “I can trace a pretty, if not completely, clear line between an author’s marketing prowess and effort and sales.” There are a lot of people who would probably want to learn more—as soon as they are aware of it and can…
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Notes on promotion, at the book fair
Printed Matter’s New York Art Book Fair is made up of 36,000 square feet of books and the people who print and publish them. If you like books, or art, it’s a great place to be. Events are great temporary spaces and occasions to bring a group of people together (known in marketing as activation).…
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What can you point to?
In Studs Terkel’s Working, a steel mill worker named Mike Lefevre says, “Picasso can point to a painting. What can I point to? A writer can point to a book. Everybody should have something to point to.” Sometimes, the work isn’t as concrete as a building. If your contribution was suggesting a change in direction…
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Stopping
Yesterday, I wrote a response to the question, “How do you do it all?” and this is one of Seth Godin’s techniques that I am still learning: he stops. Even when there’s every reason not to stop. A couple of years ago, Seth Godin stopped working on his podcast, Akimbo. He says, “I stopped not…