Recently, a bunch of people have been asking me about how to blog. Or rather, how to build a big readership of blog readers.

While a quick google search will reveal all sorts of tips and tricks and so on, for me, I think that the key element comes through voice. You gotta find your voice.

The truth is, building a blog takes time, effort and persistence. I’ve been blogging now for two solid years. (Really, it’s like my 2 year ann of starting my blog this week.) I used to blog 7 days a week for the first 6 months – now I crank out about 4 or 5 posts per week. Me, being a writer, makes it feel like a duck-in-water type of situation, though. I love doing it and keeping up with my blog is not anything like “work” to me at all. It’s fun. It’s energizing. It stretches me in ways I like. And let’s be honest, not everyone is made from this weird writer fabric where they get their kicks out of banging away at a keyboard as much as I do.

As with all writing, blogging forces me to think about what I really think… and therein I find the personal reward of blogging. Sure I goof around and embed fart jokes whenever I can – cause they’re a gas (get it, a gas? Oh so immature!) but blogging is equivalent to mental exercise for me. As mentioned, it keeps me sharp… and current. (Puts fart jokes in a whole new light, no?). Like most work, I think you have to find some sort of internal reward in doing the work if you are going to produce decent work.

So the answer is that for most folks, to build a blog where you get a decent sized readership, well… it’s gonna take a while and it’s gonna take the creation of a lot of content. And that content has got to come at people from an angle. It needs to have a voice. I don’t think having a “product” (i.e. my books and such) really drives my blog and/or brings readers. It’s that I have found a blogging voice which is my own… goofy and irreverent as it may be.

And if you are going to “be a blogger” you’ve got to find yours.

So if you want to build a blog you have to start writing and writing and writing and then see where it leads you personally. Once you find your own voice I think you will also find more and more readers.

There are no shortcuts these days – especially with so many people blogging. But there is always room for good, interesting, valuable content. (As a reader, I dig reading people that “move” me in some way… and I’d read you if you hit that bar.) Create that kind of blog and you will find an audience.

My best advice is to be persistent, be fearless and be honest. Trying to please others is a recipe for being boring and inauthentic… and who wants to read that?

Thus fart jokes. They may stink, but they are never boring.

I just went to the Kindle App to buy a copy of the book THE WESTING GAME, a YA award-winner which I wanted to start reading tonight.

Except the Kindle Store didn’t have a copy of the book THE WESTING GAME. However, the iBooks store did.

15 seconds and $5.99 later I was on Chapter 1, Sunset Towers.

I found this funny though because the Kindle Store is supposed to trump the iBook store by about a ba-zillion more titles. Yet the one I wanted wasn’t there.

And then I realized, “Do I care?”

Really, do I care?

Nope, I got my book, that’s what mattered. To me, there’s no real discernible difference between the Kindle App and the iBook app. I mean they are different, but not so much that I give a real poop.

What I wanted was the content.

Did I care who won the VHS vs BETA fight?
Do I care who wins the HD DVD vs BLU RAY battle?
Hasn’t the PC vs Apple battle already given me enough headaches in my life? And now Google with Android is gonna come chime in? Great. Just great.

As a customer, I don’t care. I just want the content. I don’t care if Sony Pictures or Warner Bros makes the movie at the local theater… I just care about the movie. I don’t care if Little Brown or Hachette publishes the latest Michael Lewis book… I just want the Michael Lewis book.

Yes, I really dig Apple products because of the way they allow me to interface with content. Their stuff is beautiful. But I don’t own an iPhone because in Los Angeles I need a phone to be able to make a phone call and ATT drops about 50 ba-zillion iPhone calls a day near where I live.

When will these people get it? I don’t care who provides the material for me. I just want the material.

When I really think about it, corporate loyalty is dead, almost a sucker’s play. Direct TV would sell me out as a customer in a heartbeat if a sweet buyout opp. came along for their shareholders, even if it meant I’d be relegated to going back to using rabbit ears on my TV.

And in schools, forget it. Only a fool stays loyal to a company right now. Buy the best product, the tool that best meets your academic needs.

Spend 48 minutes on hold with Blue Cross or see how faceless you are to Bank America when your online banking goes down if you doubt me.

Airlines, chain restaurants, car rental agencies… they pay for propaganda that sells the idea of “we’re loyal like your family” but they are not.

All I wanted was THE WESTING GAME. What I got was real insight. Maybe that’s why it won the Newberry?

The idea of using Kindles in classrooms across the country is already starting to manifest itself. And I gotta say, I think the kids are going to laugh the device out of the room.

Can we build a webquest on it?
No.
Can I hit up Google Lit Trip to get a better sense of the setting of the text?
No.
How do I download apps onto it?
Kid, I think you need to lower your expectations of this device a little bit.
Okay, can I even go online with it?
Depends what you mean by “go online”.
Can I access my email, send txt messages and stay socially networked with it?
You can shop in the Amazon bookstore with it.
What actually does this device do?
It allows you to read ebooks. You read off of it.
But I can see any of the graphs.
The technology is still evolving.
But I can barely use the keyboard to annotate the text the way I want or make flashcards to create a core bank of important ideas.
The technology is still evolving.
Why did you even give this thing to me?
Because schools have gone high tech… and you now have a kindle. Just read the PDF of the textbook that we bought pre-loaded and consider yourself cutting edge. You know how many schools are jealous of us right now?

Let me tell you something… buying schools Kindles is a pretty short-sighted, if not awful idea. Netbooks, laptops, iPads (my personal fave) that makes sense to me.

But Kindles?

The device just doesn’t do what our kids today can do with the power of technology in their hands… and to pretend that we are empowering them with the latest and greatest piece of educational technology when it’s not really represents a HUGE swing and a miss to me.

Is the Kindle cool for a reading device? Yep… I like the e-ink screen. But can kids “do” things with it – and do the types of amazing PBL type of things that kids today have the power to do when they have access to technology in their hands that runs commensurate with their skills?

It’s like handing students a landline rotary phone in the age of the Blackberry. And don’t be surprised when we discover that those Kindle recipients are 1) Underwhelmed 2) ungrateful and 3) thinking that we don’t know our elbow from our butt in terms of technology when we make this purchase for them.

Here ya go, Kids… it’s an Underwhelming Kindle – You are now a Digital School.

Be prepared for laughs.

In a world where so many gadgets can do, the Kindle just doesn’t. That’s fine for adults who are readers but for students who need to be readers, composers, researchers and synthesizers… the Kindle falls short.

I really like Jeff Bezos, too. 2 years ago this product was cutting edge. Now… it’s already almost obsolete. Wow, things change fast, no?

As an author, I am both terrified and thrilled by e-books.

I think the reason I am most terrified by e-books is because I saw the piracy that rampaged the music industry. I mean my students, most teens today (yep, I’ll stand by that statement; not all but many) just don’t view music as something the really ought to pay for. Sure, some of them buy music through iTunes and the such, but most of them just use Limewire (or something like it). And then they pass along the song to a friend and voila… off they go.

I am not even sure if they view this as an entirely illegal activity. To them, it’s, at worst, like jaywalking on a street that has no traffic. Are they really expected to follow the letter of the law when no one else is doing it and there is no real enforcement of the law anyway?

Paying, when it’s free, is for suckers.

Movies, too. Piracy has plucked billions from the people who make movies. A new release is available the same day it hits theaters. (Yep, Limewire, again; why can’t they shut them down?) And a DVD is available on the streets of L.A. before lunchtime on the day of a new release for five bucks. Movie tickets cost almost triple that for one person… a DVD in the living room can provide entertainment for 1, 3, 8 or 80… no problem!

And so, why not my books? I mean google already plans to scan them all anyway and post them online. (Not sure how they got the right to do with; the argument of being an online library seems frail to me… I mean libraries are not “for profit” companies that make money off of my content. They buy my book and then they loan it out. Google hasn’t bought a copy of my book and even if they buy one, why do they get to loan out 10 zillion at the same time? If a library wants to loan out 10 zillion copies, they have to re-lend the same book 10 zillion times. Google can do it simultaneously. Good thing I have agents and lawyers… though there’s supposedly a mass settlement, I think it’s gonna be in the courts for years.)

So e-books freak me out because my work can be so easily stolen… and the market to whom I am trying to sell my books has very little stigma about the illegal downloading of copyrighted materials.

Do that math and it’s a bit scary.

On the other hand, e-books mean more ways to access my books. And with more channels of distribution, there are greater potential audiences. People thought TV was going to kill movies and now TV has proven to be a a huge subsidiary revenue stream for movies to be re-sold once their run in theaters is done. Between HBO, DVD’s and Netflix, movies have so many additional streams of income – and so many more potential viewers of movies – that what was once feared as an enemy is now considered a great friend.

Perhaps this will be true of e-books for me as well? Perhaps piracy will not win the day in the e-book market and e-books will prove to be my best financial friend in ways I still can’t even see right now.

Do I see my books in paper form disappearing? Certainly not for quite some time. (And I mean QUITE some time!) Do I see my e-book sales growing? Well, considering that none of my books are yet available in e-book format there’s really only one way sales can go: up! (Note: My agency has been holding back the rights for a few years – for many of their clients – in order to make us a fair deal… one that doesn’t leave us screwed in a way like the writers in Hollywood got screwed when they signed away VHS tape rights for practically no royalties because, at the time, no one ever thought that VCRs would ever really be a factor in the world of film-making. A boffo misjudgment that cost Hollywood writers hundreds of millions in royalties over the subsequent decades.)

So yes, I am spooked but yes, I am thrilled. E-book sales might one day pay for my daughter’s college tuition. Or, they might also be the college tuition that couldda, wouldda, shouldda been paid but due to piracy, never became a check written to me.

Like I said at the start, as an author, I am both terrified and thrilled by e-books. Here’s hoping the thrills win out.

How can anyone be expected to manage a situation that they do not really understand?

And how can anyone really understand a situation unless they are actually in that situation?

It is for this reason that I believe ALL school administrators should be required to teach at least one class in K-12 schools.

Yep, the Principal needs to teach a class.
The Vice Principals need to teach a class.
The Superintendent and their cabinet of decision-makers need to teach a class.
The School Board personnel need to teach a class.

If they can, that is.

And by “if they can” I don’t mean “if they can carve out the time in their schedule to do so.” School meets with clockwork regularity. (Most start by 8:15 a.m. I am not even sure if half the people on the aforementioned list are actually working by this hour.) By 9:30 or so they’ll be done and the insight they’ll gain from actually being in a room with real kids — ones they are responsible for “academically elevating” — will trump any study they could ever hope to not read. (Come on, we all know they have people summarize this stuff for them in mono-syllabic terms.)

BTW, I am not even sure if all of these people I mention even hold a teaching credential. Hmm, what does it say about people who sit in positions of policy making power when they do not even have the certification to legally give them the right to do the job over which they lord.

Come on, slum with the plebeians. Let’ em all teach 1 period. Why not?

Are they too busy?
Are they unable to perform?
Are they scared?

And just because they “used to do it” 17 years ago doesn’t mean they can do it now. It’s an iPod, google, hit me on the cellie with a txt message world and these folks think that just because they stood at a chalkboard when Ronald Reagan was president they can still strap it up and deliver real results?

Ba-hum-bug-bullshit!

Make ‘em do what they mandate us to do and watch what they mandate morph.

Cuz ya know that when you have to eat the food that you are cooking, the meal always becomes more palatable.

How in the world can we expect all students to show the same amount of enthusiasm for all subject areas on their schedule? I am not sure we can.

And if you agree we can’t — read on. (If you think we can, then this post is probably not for you.)

I think about my own experience in school. For me, science class was always something I endured more than I enjoyed whereas creative writing was an after school club for me that I choose to join which had me up til late in the night working for no real academic credit other than the pure pleasure of the discipline back when I was in high school. And my grades reflected my interests. In the humanities, I smoked it, in math, I was a decent student, but certainly not exceptional, and in science, I was a “let me just do the least amount of work to get me over the hump” type of kid.

And high school for me was a long, long time ago. Before google, email, AOL, cell phones and DVD players. (I know for some people on this board, it was also before the invention of the wheel but hey, I’m just making a point here… no need to compare long-in-the-tooth tales.)

So why do we still mandate our curricular offerings as conceptualized from the perspective of pre-designed, non-differentiated, one-size-fits-all educational packages for today’s kids? (Well, for the most part, we do.)

I mean in middle and high school you’re forced to take X amount of math, Y amount of history, Z amount of science and K amount of language arts. (I ran out of algebraic characters… shucks!). Unless you show deficiency in math or the language arts, that is. Then you’ll take 2X of those (cause we know the subjects in which you do poorly are the ones where you want to spend double the amount of time, right? Geesh, reminds me of the old game show prize joke — 1rst prize is one week in the city of Detroit; 2nd prize is two weeks).

Is there not a link between choice and performance?

Is there not a link between allowing kids to be more self-directive about their learning and a connection to an improved dropout rate, higher grades, better attendance, more motivation to succeed and a sense of perceived relevance between a school’s curriculum and a person’s own life?

In an iTunes world where we no longer have to buy the whole record in order to buy the song we want to own, how come our schools are not doing more to accomodate for today’s kids by reinventing our curricular offerings as conceived through this type of ‘iTunes” philosophy?

Why? Because I guess it’s like mom always said when I got too smart-mouthed and logical about matters and she just had to get back to running the darn house and didn’t have time to discuss it any more with me.

Why? Because I said so, that’s why!

And at the end of the day, no matter how intelligent my point — or poignant or thoughtful — Mom always won when it came to aruments like this.

iTunes… when will your brilliance more speedily bleed over?