Archive for the 'Weblogs' Category

Litblogs vs. book reviews, wrongheaded again

paperhaus May 2nd, 2007

Wow, I do love that the New York Times is thinking about liblogs, but why they set them up in opposition to books reviews is baffling. Newspaper book review sections are suffering cutbacks because newspapers are suffering cutbacks.

Why do publishers want to cut the book pages? Are there not enough ads? Do they have ad managers to work with publishers? Are publishers not buying ads because they don’t sell enough books? Why don’t people buy enough books?

I haven’t had my coffee yet, but it seems clear to me that litblogs are part of the solution, not the problem.

Speaking of delicious goodness in the litblog world, please check out the LBC, where we’re discussing Cottagers by Marshall Klimasewiski this week.

Tod Goldberg reads the Sunday paper - naked!

paperhaus April 29th, 2007

Welcome to the LitBlog Session at the LA Times Festival of Books. Oops - I began this post while we were doing the Q&A, but they had to shoo us out. So here’s one Q and 4 As.

David Kipen asked which of our posts brought us the most traffic — and why?

Me: at LAist, a picture of a car. bafflingly, a huge hit.

Tod Goldberg: The sad tale of Mister Teriyaki, documenting a Big Famous Author’s unselfconscious, ugly prejudice.

Andrew Keen: An article about sex ads on craigslist. Sex. Duh.

Galleycat: James Frey, other big news items. But the biggest: a very early Judith Reagan post.

It was very cool that litblogs found a place at the Festival of Books this year. I only wish we hadn’t focused so much on “litblogs — good or bad?” — I think litblogs are good for books and readers and authors. I don’t want to waste space arguing about it — heck, even the NNBC is coming around.

Instead I would have loved to have a topic like: “litblogs — what’s good, what’s bad, what’s next?” I know what I’d like to do more of (I think it’s a congenital blogger condition to be cursing oneself for not fill-in-the-blank), but I want the bigger picture. What does it take for a litblog to be successful - voice? genre? regular posting? Have we made any big mistakes (like engaging n+1 in an argument over an article critical of litblogs — an article they never put online)? What exciting, fun things are happening in the litblog world? I would have loved to hear what Tod and Ron and the audience thought.

Most everyone in the audience raised their hands when asked “who blogs?” Including LA litbloggers John Fox and Callie Miller. I hope they’ll blog their takes soon.

Panel in action photo! From the left: the back of Tod Goldberg’s head, Andrew Keen, and Ron Hogan.

At LAist and Ames

paperhaus February 20th, 2006

I had a tough week over at LAist, where something I posted caused a riot of comments (many of which ran in the "you’re an idiot" vein). See, we LAist contributors get an e-mail each time someone comments. So I’d open my inbox and see yet another stack of comments about "Is the San Fernando Valley Not Los Angeles?" and cringe before opening. Idiot, idiot, not idiot, idiot. Ugh. A local LA blogger accused me of "not getting" the complicated relationship between LA and the Valley, and he’s dead wrong. But he doesn’t have comments on his site, so I can’t respond to the accusation. Well, I know why he doesn’t have the comments function; nobody wants to see idiot, idiot, idiot…

Another post, about a long-ago LA murder got no response at all, even though it was pretty cool. At least lots of people have checked out the grisly 1929 murder scene photo that went with it.

But aside from all that, today I’ll be talking to Jonathan Ames; he’s in LA for a week or so. His Pasadena appearance was a lot like his appearance in San Francisco, with nervous asides about his material being inappropriate for kids (brought about here by Vroman’s children’s book section being near its reading area). Hopefully, kids will steer clear of us this afternoon.

My little feet

paperhaus December 12th, 2005

Today we announced that over at LAist I am stepping up as editor. It’s a great blog about our fair city with a dozen contributors, part of the Gothamist network. I will be writing tons and doing all that other stuff editors do: keeping track of things, making plans, putting my feet up on the desk.

I’m excited! But I must duck back under the transom now.