"Dying Inside" by Robert Silverberg

Do true telepaths exist? And if they did, what would their lives be like? Robert Silverberg tackles this question in Dying Inside, a sci-fi book from 1972 about a middle-aged neurotic Jewish man living in New York City who has had the power his entire life to read minds… but who is finding the power diminishing as he gets older.

David Selig has spent his entire life as a god walking among mortals. By projecting his mind into others, he can see their innermost thoughts. But whereas some might use this power to take advantage of others, Selig squanders it, finding himself bound by a sense of morality that prohibits him from using his gift for more than simple voyeurism. He doesn’t mind using his gift as a trick so that he can seduce a woman or gain a quick insight into others’ experiences, but he never uses it for and major evil… or any major good.

And that’s what makes this book such an interesting read. Silverberg tells the story from Selig’s point of view as he realizes that his gift is finally waning, that he is becoming telepathically impotent, and that his entire life has been a waste. As Selig’s present-day narrative shows the pitiful outcome of his decisions, he reflects back on many periods of his life, and how he was able to use his power to help himself… or hurt himself. There’s the story of a lost love, Kitty, the one person he was unable to read. There’s the story of another telepath, Nyquist, who ultimately betrayed Selig because he lacked morality. There’s the story of an acid trip gone bad that allowed another girlfriend, Toni, to briefly connect with Selig and to see the horror of his soul. There’s the story of Selig’s relationship with his sister, Judith, and the hatred she developed as she realized she had no thoughts that were private from him.

The content of the book is a bit mature — Silverberg tends to write gratuitous sex scenes into his books, but in this case, they actually fit. The story is about a man who can penetrate the minds of others, and the juxtoposition with sexual experiences is interesting and relevant. Sex is one of the few times when Selig feels like his connection with others is a two-way street. It’s also one of the few times when his mental probing proves ineffective, since the intense feelings associated with it can sever the mental bond. At the same time, Selig’s fascination with examining the sexual experiences of others shows how much he’s squandering his gift — he’s little more than a peeping Tom at times, something which defines his character.

The writing is good, and very interesting. It’s definitely one of Silverberg’s best books, and it’s very accessible even to non-science fiction readers. I’d actually say it’s closer in tone to magical realism, since the cause of telepathy is never explained nor justified. Unlike a lot of Silverberg books, this one actually has an ending, though I’m still on the fence as to whether or not it’s satisfying. It’s certainly interesting, if nothing else. You know when you pick up a book called Dying Inside that it’s going to have a dark, melancholy quality about it, and the tragic figure of David Selig is pathetic and unremarkable in the real world, despite his extraordinary gift. Fear prevents him from sharing what he really is with others, and he spends his entire life trying to blend in rather than trying to stand out. It’s sad, but real.

I’ve heard it said that this book is one of the most literary science fiction novels ever written. I’d certainly agree; Silverberg plays with various writing styles to suit the moods of the character, and uses the character’s background as a writer and English major to make allusions to classic works and to justify unusual narrative styles. There are some great lines in the book that play on the pretentiousness of the character. But there’s also a wonderful element of self-deprecation that gives the narrator some plausibility. He sounds like a Jewish man living in New York, and there are times where, in the reading, you can hear his voice, his accent, his inflections. It’s a masterful use of character, which is something you don’t often see in science fiction.

I find that a lot of my science fiction-reading friends aren’t familiar with Robert Silverberg, and that’s a shame. I’ll review several of his books this week for good measure. I had the good fortune of working with him on a graphic adaptation of one of his novellas, and I have enormous respect for him. He’s written novels for 55 years and is still putting out new work in his advanced years. He’s really fallen off the map as far as contemporary readers go, but he’s still well-known among sci-fi writers for his strong storytelling ability.

GENRE: Magical Realism / Sci-Fi
STORY: ****
CHARACTERS: ****
CONCEPT: ****
RE-READABILITY: ****

"The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death" by Daniel Manus Pinkwater

NOTE: Today’s book is also available as a free audiobook download that’s read by the author himself. It’s really funny. Get it here.

Daniel Manus Pinkwater (a.k.a. D.M. Pinkwater or Daniel Pinkwater — he likes to change it up to confuse librarians) is a fantastic writer. He’s also a fantastic storyteller. But where I mean the first use of “fantastic” as an adjective describing the QUALITY of his work, I mean the second use as an adjective describing the STYLE of his work. More than anyone I’ve ever read, Pinkwater is able to take fairly normal people and propel them into the purest realms of fantasy. He’s not writing about knights and wizards and dragons, though he could be if he wanted to. But his works take the reader into places unknown, places that have a certain magical quality about them, and which seem to be built partially on memory and partially on dreams.

And maybe “dreamlike” is the best way to describe The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death, because it begins as a simple story about a boy named Walter Galt who is bored with his high school. Walter is a misfit, an intelligent person among a bunch of dullards. His only friend is a similar misfit named Winston Bongo, the inventor of “snarking out” — sneaking out in the middle of the night, riding a bus into Baconburg and watching movies at an old theater called The Snark. Snarking out helps Walter manage the tedium of high school and the insanity of his family — his mother is a terrible cook who believes communists are lurking around every corner, and his father is obsessed with avocados.

Winston and Walter eventually befriend a girl they call “Rat,” and they discover that snarking out is something that many people do, including Rat’s uncle, Flipping Hades Terwilliger, who never misses a show. But when Uncle Flipping goes missing (something he’s prone to do), the boys put their snarkout plans to the side and go on a quest to travel through the underworld of Baconburg (not necessarily a seedy place, but rather, a literal street underneath a street) searching for Uncle Flipping… and find themselves tangled up in an international criminal caper that revolves around a specially-bred avocado that can think like a computer.

OK, so the book’s a little bit weird. But it’s a good kind of weird, and well-written. It’s an adventure into places that no other writer will ever take you, with characters who could only exist in a Pinkwater book. There’s a sense of nostalgia to the book, a longing for old things and simple pleasures. The sequel, The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror, is also quite good, and though it’s a little more aware of how weird it is, it’s also worth a read. (As a child, I read the sequel first, and thus preferred it, but many people feel that the original is the better of the two books.)

Though this is a book you’d find the Young Adult section, it’s a great light read, for three reasons:

1) It’s unique. I don’t use that word often, but it applies here. I’ve never read a book like it.
2) It’s never boring. Even though the book starts to get a little farcical towards the end, it still moves along at a brisk clip, and the ebb and flow of characters makes for interesting reading.
3) It doesn’t talk down to its audience. Part of the reason I can read this book as an adult and enjoy it so much is because it’s written for an intelligent audience. Pinkwater never talks down to kids, even in his picture books. That’s one of the reasons I liked them so much as a kid; they didn’t demean me.

If I have one complaint about this book, it’s that the story turns into a mystery two thirds of the way in that is not developed or compelling. The Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson-esque characters, while amusing, wear on you after awhile because they have everything figured out already and take dozens of pages to fill in all the backstory. You also feel no real satisfaction at seeing the master criminal, Wallace Nussbaum, brought to justice at the end because he never threatens the characters in any way.

This is a great collection, and well worth owning.

But don’t let that dissuade you from reading it. It’s fantastic, and you can buy it in a collection with four other great books:

• Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars
• Slaves of Spiegel
• The Last Guru
• Young Adult Novel

Give it a try. If you like the weird, you won’t be disappointed.

GENRE: Magical Realism / Fantasy
STORY: *** 1/2
CHARACTERS: ****
CONCEPT: ****
RE-READABILITY: ****

"The Neddiad" by Daniel Manus Pinkwater

I don’t know too many kids who grew up reading the way I did. Most of the kids I knew struggled to read, and most of what they read was pretty trashy stuff. Thriller books, ghost stories, books about high school kids having sex and getting killed by serial killers, and so forth.

But not me. Nope. I was reading the works of Daniel Manus Pinkwater, an author whose surreal, fantastic novels were the closest thing to a drug trip my mind could endure without actually abusing some kind of chemical.

Pinkwater wrote a lot of strange children’s novels in the ’70s and ’80s. I’ll touch on some of them in other reviews. But for now, I want to discuss a recent title of his, The Neddiad: How Neddie Took the Train, Went to Hollywood, and Saved Civilization.

It’s hard to describe a Pinkwater book without first explaining that the plot itself is inconsequential. That might sound like a slam, but it’s really not. Pinkwater seems to start his books with some vague idea of where they’re going, and he occasionally remembers to use techniques like foreshadowing and plot structure to pull you along. But sometimes, he just gets lost in his own wackiness and lets things go crazy. This was definitely true in some of my favorite novels of his, like The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death and Borgel.

The Neddiad starts off with a young boy writing about moving to LA in the 1950s, and quickly gets derailed into the realm of the weird when young Neddie is accidentally left behind at a train station. He befriends the son of a famous actor, meets a phantom bellboy, and has a bizarre encounter with a shaman named Melvin who gives him a little stone turtle to take care of. Neddie’s adventures veer off into tangents, and there’s not much of a sense of purpose behind the plot until the last third of the book, when the villain is finally introduced and things rapidly move towards a climax. In the meantime, the reader is treated to some really wonderful scenes and characters that seem like they were thrown in simply because they were interesting to Pinkwater at the time. One such character, Yggdrasil (also known as Iggy), serves very little purpose in the story aside from being the smart female companion to Neddie and his friend Seaumus in the second half of the book. (She’s the main character in the sequel, so I’m assuming her limited role was included for introductions’ sake. But it’s hard to tell with Pinkwater.)

Though this is a children’s book geared at the advanced chapter book kids, I found it readable and rewarding as an adult as well. I’ve never had a problem picking up a book marked “Young Adult” and reading it for pleasure. Sometimes, those books are the most imaginative, and it’s refreshing to read a book where hammy love stories aren’t being forced in and awkward sex scenes don’t have to be skipped over. Plus, Pinkwater’s books tend to feature overweight characters who are interested in mundane things and who don’t mind getting themselves into odd adventures. I love that.

One scene with this book will stick with me for awhile. Neddie and Seamus make friends with a boy whose father owns a circus, and the children watch as an old horse is taken out to pasture and shot dead by circus handlers. The boys are surprised, but the son of the circus owner explains, “Well, the lions have to eat something…”. It’s a chilling scene, and one of those moments where the book leaves the safe confines of fantasy and edges into reality. Most writers couldn’t pull it off, but Pinkwater’s good enough that the darkness is contained by some truly wacky moments elsewhere in the novel.

I’d recommend this book to anyone who needs a light, humorous read with a hint of fantasy to it. Fans of Norse mythology will also get a kick out of some of the allusions in this title, though they’re not too pronounced.

GENRE: Magical Realism / Fantasy
STORY: *** 1/2
CHARACTERS: ****
CONCEPT: ****
RE-READABILITY: ****

First of all, I loved this episode. It really provoked me to think a lot about what we’ve seen until now. I know I’ll spend the next nine months really chewing on this, but here are my thoughts fresh after watching.

The episode opens with Jacob and Jacob’s Enemy, who a lot of the fans are calling “Silas” or “Esau.” Whoever he is, he looks a LOT like the quick flash of a character we saw way back in “Cabin Fever.” The circle of ash around the cabin suggests a barrier used to contain a demon, and the fact that it was broken suggests that the demon escaped. Illana was not looking in the cabin for Jacob — she was looking for his enemy. She knew the enemy was heading for Jacob, and that’s why she ordered the place torched. She understood it was an evil place. Ironically enough, while season 3 suggested that Horace built the place, it looks an awful lot like the hut Rose and Bernard had built for themselves. But since the blueprint was in Horace’s pocket, this is probably just a coincidence.

The dog painting in the cabin suggests that the inhabitant (the Enemy) is the Cerberus — also known as the smoke monster. The various apparitions that have manifested have been the Enemy trying to manipulate events forward to create the “loophole.” The Enemy poses as things that have died on the island, because it is a creature that is somehow involved in death (hence the picture of Anubis and the monster in the temple). The reason the monster allowed Ben to live was so it could manipulate him into killing Jacob. For some reason that has yet to be explained, Ben is able to break the rules that the monster cannot.

When we first see the Enemy in the opening scene, he comes to the beach to see the ship that is coming in. That is yet another clue that he is the monster — the defense system for the island. We know that the ship is the Black Rock, and that it’s probably captained by Magnus Hanso. I suspect that this adversary influences the Hanso  to go back into the real world, create the legacy that becomes the Hanso Foundation / Dharma Initiative, and initiate the situations that will lead to the conflict.

You see, these two have been playing this game for some time now. Jacob and the Monster have been playing a giant game of Backgammon since the beginning of the show. John Locke explained to Walt in the first season that it’s an old game, the oldest game, of good versus evil. As Desmond explains in season 5, all of the people on the island are just pawns in this game. In the past, Jacob visited those he would send back in time when flight 316 came in. He was monitoring the lives of his pieces, and ensuring that they would fulfill their destiny. The finale in season 3 included these same players. Jack, Kate and Sawyer were taken to Hyrda Island, Hurley was sent back to the camp to tell the others what had happened, and Sayid, Jin and Sun were on a rescue mission. Juliet was the only player in this final drama who was not visited by Jacob — but since she lived as an Other, it’s likely that she was influenced and monitored directly.

We should also consider that when the resurrected John Locke made Alpert speak to the time-traveling John Locke, he told John that he would have to die. This bit of knowledge was convenient… for the Enemy, which clearly needed Locke to be dead so it could impersonate him. Alpert was apprehensive about this, but didn’t realize that he was speaking to the Enemy, so he went along with it. All in all, Alpert doesn’t seem like a very smart guy. He even played a hand in helping Locke become the leader of the Others by helping Locke find a means to kill his “father.” Alpert is acting on Locke’s claim from 1954 that he is meant to be the leader, not Jacob’s guidance.

All in all, I like where things are going. The mythology of the show is finally beginning to unravel, and we’re beginning to see that the conflict here is between a force of good and a force of evil. But there are still some questions that will require pondering:

Why did Jacob disregard Ben? It’s clear now that the “Others” are followers and protectors of Jacob, and that Alpert is one of Jacob’s devoted followers. But why was Ben placed in charge of the Others if he was such a great pawn of the enemy? Was Jacob trying to keep his friends close, and his enemies closer? Was Ben the least threatening when he was distracted with leadership? Jacob must have given Ben the same kind of gift of eternal life that Charles Widmore and Richard Alpert seem to have. (Ben indicated that Widmore couldn’t be killed, and Alpert seems to never age). I also suspect that Illana is older than she looks since she has no idea who Benjamin Linus is when Sayid asks her on the plane, but knows her way around the island.

Still, it’s unclear why Jacob is so cold to Ben, knowing that Ben will kill him if he doesn’t explain himself. Maybe it’s because he knows he’s already won, and doesn’t want to give his Enemy the satisfaction. Or maybe it’s because Ben is not in a position to understand.

What is Jacob’s purpose on the island? Jacob seems to be immortal, unaging, and powerful. He is not Egyptian himself, but he seems to be at home with all of the Egyptian ruins on the island. He indicates that he has had the time to weave a complex tapestry by hand, and he doesn’t seem to have a sense of urgency in anything. He can leave the island if he wishes, and he is aware of the events in the lives of his “pawns.” Clearly, he’s intruding on the island (since the monster wants to kill him), but some mechanism is in place to make him unkillable. It’s an intriguing mystery!

Why did the scene with Juliet getting yanked down the pipe so closely resemble the Monster trying to pull Kate into a hole in season 1? Was this foreshadowing, or is the monster trying to recreate events that have already occurred on the island? Maybe the monster was trying to make Kate hesitate down the road so Juliet would die?

What did Juliet’s setting off the bomb accomplish? Fans are already saying that the discharge propels the Losties into 2007, and that when Jacob says, “they’re coming,” he’s referring to Jack and crew. I’m not so sure about this myself. Why should the Enemy be afraid of them? But since the last electromagnetic discharge we saw (in season 2’s finale) made the sky change colors, yanked Oceanic 815 out of the air, and sent Desmond traveling in time, we should assume that something unusual is going to happen. As it happens, the events of the finale coincide with future events, so it’s hard to believe that the past can be changed. The tunnel into Ben’s future Dharma house is opened, Pierre Chang’s arm is injured, Radzinsky causes the Incident, and the non-essential Dharma personnel leave the island (including Miles and Charlotte).  So, if the bomb changes history, none of these things should have ever happened in the first place.

Whose eye opened at the end of the teaser during the credits? Good question. The eye was green, though. Since the producers have said that the time-traveling will end in the sixth season, we can assume that wherever the Losties have wound up, it’s somewhere (or somewhen?) where everyone will be reunited at last… and where the final conflict between Jacob and the Enemy will be fought. It’s going to be a long 9 months….

“It’s been a lifelong dream of mine to get into the comic book industry. So, how can I do it?”

It’s a big question. And unfortunately, I don’t have a straightforward answer to it for most people, because it really depends on what you’re trying to do. But what I can offer are some general guidelines that should help those who have this question burning in their brains to start finding some answers.

Let’s start out with the obvious point: there is no one “way” into the comic book industry. Everyone’s path is different. Most ways in require a large amount of patience and persistence, but some people do get lucky.

My way in was unique, but not so different from many other stories I’ve heard. My first “gig” in the comic book industry came as the result of a writing contest an artist was holding for a Christian-themed comic book called “The Devil’s Keeper.” He’d written a screenplay, and wanted to adapt it into a comic. He asked for submissions, and many people sent them in. I didn’t want to waste my time, so I sent an email requesting more information about the story — I wanted to make sure it was something I cared to work on first. That got his attention. And since I had the writing ability to back up my attitude, I was a good fit for what he wanted to accomplish.

Through this artist, I made many other contacts within the industry, and I was able to put my skills as a Public Relations manager, editor and writer to use in many capacities. Since I was working with startups and independent publishers, I did it all part-time. I probably could have made a full-time gig out of it, if I’d been willing to take the risk, but I never saw an opportunity that was worth it. (Even now, as I run my own publishing company, I have a day job in marketing research to make sure my bills get paid. That gives me the freedom to make sure my projects are top-notch; I’m not pressured to ship an inferior product just so I can get some quick cash.)

My way in involved having a variety of skills, a range of contacts, and a willingness to look for opportunities. I got to do some really neat work, and I was able to work with some big-name fantasy authors whose books I’d read when I was a kid. I even got to see my wife start her own comic book writing career adapting the first few Anita Blake comics. I might not have had a chance to become a famous comic book writer, but I at least enjoyed the experience. I also got to see enough of the ugly side of the industry to set up a solid business plan and start my own company.

Clearly, I was in the right place at the right time several times over. But what you must understand is that I was able to be in the right place at the right time because I was constantly making myself available to expand upon what I was doing. People sought me out to ask for my advice on marketing. Creators brought me their work and asked for a critique. Friends in the industry would send things over for me to ghost edit. I didn’t get paid for most of this work, nor did I even ask for payment. For one thing, I knew most of these folks didn’t have a lot of money to offer. And for another, I knew that it was more to my benefit for them to remember my act of kindness down the road when an opportunity suited to my skills came along and they needed someone to recommend for the gig.

And that’s the general piece of advice I would give to anyone wanting to get into the comic book industry — even if you can write, edit, pencil, ink, color or letter really well, you should take the time to learn some other skills, because the more you’re able to do yourself, the more marketable you’ll make yourself within the industry.

I also recommend spending a little bit of time honestly answering the following seven questions:

1) What do I want to do in the comic book industry, exactly? Be specific. Say, “I want to write Spider-Man for Marvel,” or, “I want to create my own series.” I’m not saying that you will do these things, but it’s important to know what you’re shooting for. After all, there’s a world of difference between trying to get a very specific job on a popular book and trying to go the route of an independent creator.

2) What skills do I have that I can offer to a publisher beyond a standard comic book position? So, you’re a wannabe writer. That’s great. But can you write press releases and website posts, too? Or, maybe you’re an aspiring pencil aritst. Cool. But are you able to do some conceptual art that can define the style of a prospective series? Can you color your own work at a professional level? Believe it or not, publishers are also looking for people willing to fill roles like these.  They may lack the glamor of working on a book, but they’re a way to develop a relationship.

3) What sets me apart? I wish more people would spend time grappling with this question. Too many would-be writers and artists out there are derivative of whatever’s popular. Most can’t define what makes their style their own, and most are all too aware of their influences. My own rule of thumb is that if I can spot a writer or artist’s primary influence within five minutes, I won’t consider them for a project. But the flip side of that is that if I sense the writer or artist is too married to a particular genre or style, I won’t consider them, either. There’s such a thing as being too distinctive — and it often means the person is difficult to work with.

4) Can I work at a professional level? Here’s another question that needs to be asked more often. I get a lot of email from people who want to launch comics, but who have no business trying to get into the industry, because their work is extremely unprofessional in quality. If you can’t match what people are doing at Marvel or DC, you need to spend time developing your skills so you can work at that high level. If you’re a writer, you’d better be able to tell a short story that’s heavy on action and light on words. You’d also better be able to pace things properly and string readers along from issue to issue. If you’re an artist, you’d better be able to draw backgrounds, and you’d better be a master of facial expressions, anatomy, and action poses.

5) Can I work on a tight deadline (even if it’s not my fault things got behind)? It’s amazing how many professionals there are in the industry who can’t say “yes” to this question. A comic book deadline is pretty simple — books come out every month, so writers have to turn in a script every 30 days and pencil artists have to turn in 5-6 pages a week, plus a cover every month. Colorists and letterers often work on several books per month, and thus generally turn around one book every week. This is all good and well… until someone’s late, or revisions are requested. Inevitably, however, someone screws up, and everything falls apart. The deadlines remain, but the workload gets heavier. Pencil artists find themselves scrambling to get 7-8 pages done over three weeks, and colorists and letterers are given a weekend to get a book turned around. It’d be nice if these things didn’t happened, but they do, and rather frequently, at that.

6) Can I handle being told I suck? I have yet to meet a creative person who has not been told, at some point in his or her career, how awful he or she is. Rejection is common in the world of publishing, and editors and art directors aren’t known for mincing words. If you can’t deal with a bad review from a website,  some harsh words from a fan, or an angry phone call from an unhappy editor, you should stay away from the comic book industry, because you’re going to fall apart when you see how much rejection you have to endure.

7) Am I kidding myself? This last question is not something you should assess by yourself. Rather, you should put together a portfolio of your best work, come up with a pitch for what you want to do, and ask a variety of people whom you know and trust to answer it for you once they see what you’ve got to show. I’d say you should show at least ten people of varied backgrounds, ages, occupations and relationships to you (as opposed to, say, just your friends and family). If they’re not persuaded, chances are good that editors won’t be, either. And if they offer you feedback, you’d be wise to listen to it — they might not understand comic books exactly, but their “outsider” perspective might be more valuable than any “insider” advice you’ll find.

Once you’ve chewed on these seven questions, and you’ve determined that you are indeed ready to look for work in the comic book industry, here are some general pointers for working your way in.

Writers: Do not - I repeat, DO NOT - contact people in the industry and ask them to look at your scripts. This is the kiss of death as far as most editors are concerned. Your best bet is to find ways to make personal contacts with editors and publishers (say, offering to be their gopher for an afternoon during a convention, or meeting them for a drink later in the evening) so that you’re top-of-mind when it comes time to hire writers. I do not recommend doing weird, stalkerish things like adding editors to your Facebook or Myspace profile or sending them messages at their personal email accounts unless you have taken the time to make friends with these people first.

If you must send query letters, make sure they’re short and sweet, well-edited, and that they list your full range of professional skills, not just some sob story about how it’s your dream to write comics.  There are far, far more writers out there than jobs available, so make sure you mention the fact that you can write press releases, catalog capsules, website content, and other forms of copy, provided that you actually can. Always include a link to a website or PDF where editors can review your clips quickly and conveniently. Don’t attach it — let them make the choice to download it themselves. Do not include ANY unpublished fictional work in your clips unless you absolutely must — this represents a conflict of interest for editors and they will generally stop reading to absolve themselves of any legal responsibilities.

Artists: Before you approach anyone, you need to set up an online gallery where editors can go to check out your portfolio. Most of the time, artists are hired by responding to requests for submissions, either formal or informal. You can always show your work to an editor at a convention or via the web in the hopes that they have a good match for you, but chances are good they’ll forget your work unless it really, really impresses them. Many referrals come through contacts with other artists, so get connected via social networks and web forums and keep your ear to the rail. The more you share your work and ask for input from your peers, the better known you’ll be when an opportunity suited to your style becomes available.

Paper submission packets should be creative and feature your best work. They should never be delivered to an editor unsolicited, because they will probably be thrown away. In my experience, editors do not like artists to submit clips in email submission packets unless they are requested or specifically tailored to the inquiry. You should also avoid applying for jobs that are outside your stylistic area of interest. If you want to do mature-themed books and the editor is looking for artists who can draw kid-friendly characters, you’re not a good fit, and shouldn’t waste your time, or the editor’s, by submitting.

If you go to a convention, avoid the temptation to sit in Artist’s Alley. Editors perceive this as being the realm of amateurs. Some editors do wander through and look for talent, but very few legitimate offers are made. If you’ve heard someone got a big gig through being in Artist’s Alley, chances are good it’s with a publisher that’s small press or less than reputable. Save your money and focus instead on scheduling portfolio reviews with editors from publishers you’re actually interested in working for.

If you can color, ink, paint or letter, be sure you mention this any time you’re talking to a publisher. Those positions are much harder to fill than the writer and pencil artist positions, and they’re often a smart way to get an “in” with a publisher and build up your professional portfolio.

I’ve got plenty more advice I can offer, but I think what I’ve mentioned in this post is enough to start with. If you have specific questions, please post them below, or email me at sean at seanjjordan dot com. Good luck!

But if eBay’s so great, why is it struggling to convince everyone it’s still relevant?

I ran across an article in Business Week last month that’s got me thinking that eBay is not only starting to become irrelevant, but that it’s a sign of the changes in the way people are using the Internet. It’s bad news for eBay, honestly, because if I’m correct, there’s really no way out for them. They’re going to have to let their core business shrink and focus on other business units if they want to survive. According to the article, eBay has already realized that its side businesses, like Skype and Paypal, have the potential to be profitable on their own.

But chances are good those businesses are going to go down with the lumbering dinosaur that has become eBay unless changes happen, and fast.

You know we’re in an unusual time when a relatively new company has already shown signs of burning out just a few years after becoming known by the general public. And eBay’s even one of the smart companies — a firm that’s often used in case studies and profiled in business journals for its smart and savvy practices.

When eBay first began to get popular ten years ago, it was a novelty — the internet was still pretty new to most people, and the idea of being connected to millions of people at once was mind-blowing to many users. Social networking websites were still on the horizon, and chat rooms and instant messaging software still seemed like a neat idea. What these early users really needed was a spectacle — something to fix their attention on while they got their bearings, something that helped them to understand the good and bad aspects of the internet, something that went beyond surfing homepages and that really brought people together.

eBay filled that need by essentially becoming the world’s largest garage sale. The site operated on the theory that there was a buyer for virtually every product. By helping individual users to market individual transactions, eBay could operate with no inventory, low overhead, and little liability. Users enjoyed the auction process, and many thrived on the good feelings associated with winning a heated bidding war.

Fast forward to 2009, and we see that eBay’s auction service is struggling while its fixed-price business, half.com, is attracting more users. Consumers seem to be less interested in online auctions overall, and eBay’s foolish decision to try to cling to its position of leadership in a declining market has hurt the company badly over the last few years. But what happened? Did people just get tired of eBay, or was there something else at work here?

I’d argue that the rise and decline of eBay is tied into the customer adoption process. Here’s how it works. Imagine that for a product, you’ve got two groups of people: the folks who are going to latch onto a product before it reaches its critical mass and the folks who are going to latch onto it after it’s established and popular. Half of the users fall into the early majority, and half of the users fall into the latter majority. Now, within that early majority, you’ve got three groups: the innovators, who represent a very small number of people (about 1%), the early adopters, who represent about 14%, and the remainder of the early majority, who represent about 35%. On the other side, you’ve got the late majority, who represent about 35%, and the people who wait until things are winding down — the laggards — who represent about 15%.

Now, apply this process to eBay. 10 years ago, the internet was primarily populated by people who were innovators and early adopters — people who weren’t afraid to try new things, and who were seeking novel experiences and fun applications of technology. The innovators were the folks who tended to try everything, generally keeping on the cutting edge of new advancements. They were the ones who got interested in eBay initially, and who helped it to get onto the radar of other users. The early adopters picked up on the site and began using it as well, presumably using it to empty the junk out of their homes and then buy other junk they didn’t really need, but desperately wanted to have.

By the time eBay began to become a household name in 2003 or 2004, the early adopters had already given way to the early majority. Some of the early adopters were still using the site, but many had moved on. The early majority, in the meantime, swarmed the site and made it swell into the success it became. That’s also the time when you started seeing physical stores opening up and offering to sell things on eBay for people too lazy to do it themselves. It seemed like everyone was getting on eBay, so it made sense to try to list up all the junk people cared to get rid of.

But that’s where the pendulum began to swing, and I’m actually surprised that a smart and savvy company like eBay didn’t see it coming. As the early majority began to drop off and the late majority began to join the site, eBay stopped seeing the same level of growth it’d become accustomed to. This hurt the company financially, so it raised prices on the sellers, promising that it would do more marketing to bring the customers back. But what happened instead was that the site continued to decline in use, and now, it’s already becoming irrelevant. The novelty of eBay has worn off, and only the people who haven’t yet tried it — those left in the late majority and the laggards — are going to potentially become heavy users. Everyone else has figured out the pros and cons of the site already, and most people have moved on to sites like half.com and Amazon.com where purchasing is faster and more standardized.

eBay’s shortsightedness is caused by two major errors. First of all, the company viewed itself as offering a service instead of a product. After all, why should it think of what is quite obviously a service in any other terms? But sellers think of eBay as being a product that helps them to market their wares, not a service that assists them in selling. Likewise, buyers think of eBay as being a product that helps them to find items they’re looking for, not a service that makes their buying easier. Despite the fact that eBay lacks the tangibility normally associated with a product, the fact that it exists as a physical website that must be accessed for any action makes it feel like a product to the user. At best, eBay is a hybrid service product, but even in that case, the company has failed to understand the implications where consumers are concerned.

Second, eBay has done a poor job of understanding its customers. The company continues to talk about “changing tastes,” but what it doesn’t seem to realize is that the change in tastes is the end result of being an eBay user. Bidding on auctions is fun for awhile, but once users become accustomed to instant purchasing, they don’t want to wait around for an auction to resolve. They want to know what price they’re paying and when the item will arrive before they commit to buy. They also prefer a standardized description of what they’re getting instead of a spotty paragraph written in capital letters that lacks the critical details.  This is entirely due to their moving through the customer adoption process; their decision to stop being customers is predicated not on their changing tastes, but rather on their lack of patience for eBay’s many flaws once the novelty has worn off. eBay cannot turn this around, and they are going to have to pump their money into services like Skype, Paypal and half.com if they want to survive, because their core business is never going to make a comeback unless the company can drastically reinvent the experience and make it seem new and exciting again.

There’s a more important implication here, too, that anyone engaged in e-business should take away: don’t take growth for granted. In bricks-and-mortar business, the customer adoption process begins anew every time a new location is opened. People have to actually go to the trouble of physically visiting the store, and the store can only service so many customers in a year. E-tailers expect the same sort of growth patterns for their own websites, but unless they’re constantly opening new sites that can draw in different users, this sort of thinking is unrealistic. Sites like Amazon.com are surviving not because they are continuing to draw in waves of new customers, but rather because they continue to expand their service offerings and product offerings so they can retain the customers they’ve already got. Retention is the only strategy that makes any sense for an e-tailer to apply once the customer adoption process reaches its critical point.

I used to be a frequent eBayer myself, but I’ve come to realize that unless I’m searching for something particularly hard to find, I can generally get a better price by simply shopping around on sites like Amazon and Half. But then, I was an early adopter when it came to using eBay, so I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.

I was taken aback by the question — do I really want to explain that the latest season is about those who were rescued trying to get back to the island? — but it led me to think about why this show continues to be so compelling to so many people despite the many twists and turns it’s taken into the realm of science fiction. And then suddenly, the answer hit me.

LOST is religion.

Don’t misunderstand me here — I’m not saying the show is a religion. I’m saying that it’s a metaphor, a thorough look at the ideas of mysticism and the supernatural, but through a lens that doesn’t require a Bible, a priest, or even a church.

I’m going to talk about things that may be spoilers if you haven’t been keeping up with the show, so if you want to continue to be surprised, don’t read the rest of this article until you’ve got yourself caught up. (But since you can watch the entire run for free on ABC.com, why not get started now?)

I’m pretty well-read on religion, particularly the Judeo-Christian faiths. I’m also interested in ancient Egyptian, Sumerian, and Babylonian religious mythology, and I can explain how these faiths tie in to the Judeo-Christian tradition fairly well. I would tend to argue that many of the Judeo-Christian ideas about religion come from ancient Egypt, that the pharoah Akhenaten bore some relationship to Moses, and that the book of Genesis is retelling myths from the Egyptian and Sumerian mythologies with a monotheistic twist.

Therefore, it’s no surprise to me that LOST, which takes place on an island that has ancient Egyptian temples and remnants of a statue of an Egyptian deity (probably Anubis), has a lot of religious themes, like life after death, judgment, penance and resurrection. These themes are all central to Western religious traditions because they derive from Egypt, and the Egyptians themselves were very concerned with death, and the passage to the next world.

So, let’s look at all of the Biblical elements first. The Island is a lush, beautiful place where death does not have a hold on people and where sickness and health do not exist. This ties in to two Biblical locations — the Garden of Eden and the land of Caanan, described as “a land of milk and honey.” Since Canaan is a real place out in the Middle East, it’s probably safe to assume that the Island is closer to the Garden of Eden. This is fitting, since the skeletons found in the cave in the first season are nicknamed “Adam and Eve” — a potential nod and wink from the producers.

The Island is patrolled by a defense mechanism that is unique, and possibly spiritual — a smoke monster nicknamed “the Cerberus.” In Greek mythology, the Cerberus was a three-headed dog that guarded the gates to the afterlife. More on the Greek connection in a moment. But the Bible indicates that the Garden of Eden was blocked off on the east side by the Cherubim, and that the tree of life was guarded by a flaming sword. Cherubim are angels that are a tetrad of beings, with faces both animal and man. They are mysterious creatures that often seem to change shape in the Bible. It could be that the smoke monster is a representation of the cherubim, which explains why it appears as both people and animals at different points in the show.

But the smoke monster has another tie to the Bible — in the book of Exodus, the Israelites are escorted out of Egypt by a pillar of cloud during the day, and a pillar of fire at night. It guides them at first, and then gets between them and the pursuing Egyptians so Moses can part the Red Sea. The Smoke Monster, with its cloudy appearance and its constant flashing, could be interpreted to be like this manifestation.

The Island has an exit to Tunisia, a country in the middle of the African continent, not far from the Mediterranean Sea. It’s also one of the places where Paleo-lithic humans are known to have lived. If we think of this as being an exit from the Garden of Eden, a place where the Semitic peoples described in the Bible began their lives, we can see a definite connection between the mythology of the Island and the mythology of the show.

Moving on, another major Biblical connection in the show relates to the mysterious “Jacob” and the equally mysterious “Christian Shepherd.” In the Old Testament, Jacob is the name of Abraham’s grandson, the man who literally wrestles with God and becomes known as Israel. Jacob is the man who sees a literal ladder to heaven, with angels ascending and descending on it. He is also the father of the twelve tribes of Israel, the last of which is Benjamin.

The Biblical Jacob is an interesting character — he begins life fighting his brother Esau in the womb, and while his brother grows up to be a mighty hunter, covered in red hair, Jacob is slender and cunning, with a smooth face and (it is traditionally believed) black hair. Jacob deceives his father, Isaac, to gain a birthright that rightfully belongs to Esau, and is forced to leave before he is killed. This story actually alludes to two places in ancient Egpyt — the “Red Land” and the “Black Land” — but it also plays an important role in religious tradition. In the Bible, Jacob goes on to be repaid for his bad decisions in life; his uncle deceives him and costs him seven years’ labor, and his favortism towards his son Jospeh results in ten of his sons faking Jospeh’s death and selling the boy into slavery. But God is faithful to the covenant made with Abraham, and takes care of Jacob and his family through Joseph. Thus while Jacob is not the best role model in the Jewish Torah, he is an important character whose struggles with God characterize the nation.

On the Island, we can see that Jacob’s people clearly consider themselves set apart from everyone else, and they follow his ways and his traditions without question. In the Bible, from the time of Moses and Aaron, the people of Israel needed a mouthpiece so they could speak to God directly, and assigned their leaders to do just that. Though the priests and the politcal leaders were supposed to serve different functions, the desire to be a nation like all others led to putting some really terrible kings in power who essentially led the people of Israel into idolatry and eventual exile. The Benjaminites, in particular, were responsible for some pretty heinous atrocities. (See Judges 19 for more.)

And yet we also have Christian Shepherd (notice the name!) appearing on the Island and guiding people. Christian was not a good person in life — he was an adulterer and a drunk, emotionally distant from his son and in a constant state of lying and denial. Somehow, he has been resurrected into a being with great power and presence, seeming wisdom and knowledge. This relates to the Christian idea of baptism — Christian’s sins died with his body, but he has been brought back from the dead in a perfect form, following some higher path. He interacts with Jacob, and perhaps has the same goals in mind as Jacob. But he is different as well, and seems to also have some relationship with the Smoke Monster. By the same token, Christianity and Judaism have many similar goals, but only Christianity teaches that the dead are resurrected now; Judaism teaches that the dead will be resurrected later, in the end. Christianity is concerned with the perfection of heaven; Judaism is concerned with the struggles in the present world.

The concept of judgment at the hand of the smoke monster has been a central theme of two episodes. It appears that the monster seeks repentence, and that it cannot tolerate those who sin in the name of self-preservation. This is very much in line with the Biblical sense of judgment, and it explains why Mr. Eko is destroyed by the Smoke Monster, but the coniving Benjamin Linus is not. Several times in the Jewish scriptures, the “Angel of the Lord” administers judgment and slaughters those who are being punished by God.

LOST has recently turned around the relationships of several characters, making Jack a follower instead of a leader, Sawyer a man of the law instead of a man of crime, and Juliet a willing inhabitant of the Island instead of an unwilling one. This could just be the writers sensing the fun in irony, but it also relates to the book of Matthew, chapter 19, where Peter asks Jesus what reward the disciples will receive. Jesus replies that eventually, those who follow him will be rewarded in heaven, but that “many of the first will be last, and the last will be first.” This also echoes the beatitudes in Matthew 5, just before the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus teaches a theology of opposites, where the meek will inherit the Earth.

How appropriate that this theme should arise in season 5, when the “messiah” character, John Locke, is resurrected! And the relationship between John and Ben is also interesting, as it mirrors the relationship between Jesus and Satan to some extent. Ben is a liar who makes false promises, and who ultimately is concerned only for himself. Even he is not more powerful than Jacob, but he often breaks the rules. John is not entirely Christlike (he is imperfect and makes mistakes), but his faith is in the pattern of Christ as he gradually realizes who he is meant to be. I would argue that John represents the RELIGION of Christianity better than he represents the PERSON of Christ.

I mentioned that I would return to the Greek mythology connection, and I think it’s important to bring up the point that the DHARMA initiative has been tied into several Greek mythological concepts. We’ve had the DHARMA people who nicknamed the smoke monster the “Cerberus,” we’ve had a Cyclops (Mikhail) in a DHARMA uniform, we’ve had a station called “the Hydra” on “Hydra island,” and we’ve had a shipwrecked sailor in the pattern of Odysseus (Desmond) with a girlfriend named Penelope. DHARMA also includes ideas from Eastern Religion (its name, DHARMA, and its greeting, “Namaste”) and allusions to literature (such as the Looking Glass station). Simply put, DHARMA represents the religious traditions of the rest of the world, primarily those of the Hellenized world (an empire that extended from Europe to India) and the Romanized world (which also included the British Isles). Once again, there is a Biblical connection here, since the book of Daniel describes empires that will rise and full, culminating in a beast with seven horns. Rome was known as the city of the seven hills, and its impact upon the world has been huge. Christianity itself is a religion that could not have existed without the influences of several other religions, including Greek mythology and Zoroastrian ideas.

This Greek connection is also evidenced by the fact that the DHARMA initiative engages in logical and philosophical experiments and that it does not view the island in a mystical way, but a scientific way. This is a very typical approach for one with a classical upbringing. DHARMA represents not just religion and mythology, but Western culture.

So, where does that leave us with LOST? The story is wrapping up, and it’s fairly apparent that the Island has been a part of history. The literal truths about it are sure to be far less high-minded than the themes around the Island. But it will be interesting to see if these Biblical and religious connections continue until the end… or if they will be replaced by something far less metaphysical when the show is over.

As a kid, I was always drawn to video arcades, and I have fond memories of standing in Aladdin’s Castle in the mall, armed with a plastic baggie full of tokens and trying out as many games as possible until my money ran out. Another place that got quite a bit of my money was the arcade just outside the B/X on the military base where we lived — a great place to hang out while my mom was shopping for boring stuff, like clothes and household supplies. These were the days when arcade machines were everywhere, when Chuck-E-Cheese and Showbiz Pizza ruled supreme, when game magazines actually covered arcade games in their regular coverage. After all, arcade machines were a much better value proposition than the home systems — they had better graphics, more satisfying games and custom-built controls. Most only cost a quarter or two to play, and they didn’t tie up your family’s lone television set. I suspect, in the long run, I spent about as much on arcade gaming as I would have spent on a Nintendo Entertainment System with a small library of games. But whereas my Nintendo would have grown outdated and would be worth very little to me today, the memories of hanging around arcades discovering new games with my friends and my brothers are still with me.

As it happens, I live about three blocks from a fairgrounds where one of the largest arcade auctions in the Midwest is held. It happens every quarter (whether or not that’s intentional, it’s hilarious), and it involves people carting in retired arcade machines, pinball machines, air hockey tables and other amusement machines and putting them up for auction.

My wife would murder me if I brought one of these things home, so I have to settle for the next-best thing: the precious hours when they turn on all the machines and let people play them.

The first time I went to the arcade show, I was managing an EB Games retail store, and one of my regular customers told me about his quest to get a Centipede arcade machine. If you’ve played a home version of Centipede, or if you’ve played it on MAME, chances are good you’ve wondered what all the fuss is about — the game doesn’t play well with a joystick, and its gameplay is rather simplistic. That’s because the original arcade version of Centipede didn’t use a joystick — you moved your shooter around with a trackball, firing frantically as you jammed on the button. I caught my friend both at the earlier show and this recent show trying out the Centpede machines that were there — unfortunately, none of them were in good enough repair to deliver a truly authentic experience.

The previous show I’d been to in 2007 had a giant room full of machines, so I was hoping that this show, in 2009, would have a bunch as well. Sadly, the show has turned into a shadow of its former glory, no doubt due to the poor economy and the limited availability of coin-op machines. But as it happens, I was still able to find some great titles to play while I was there.

Probably the best find the entire room was a copy of the Konami game, The Simpsons. The game came out not long after The Simpsons moved off the Tracy Ullman show and into prime time, and it shows — the game makes many references to the first season, and Matt Groening’s Life in Hell characters are included to help round out the cast. The game was very similar to Konami’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game, one of the first arcade games I ever saw that looked and played like a high-quality cartoon. The Simpsons was a fairly simplistic beat ‘em up, but it had some neat secrets and extremely fluid animation. Though I’ve played it on MAME in recent years, having the opportunity to stand at a coin-up and experience the game in its intended form was a real treat. (I don’t know what the cabinet went for at the end of the auction, but I’m sure it was a few thousand dollars, since it was in great condition!)

One of my friends challenged me to a round of Donkey Kong, and I was happy to oblige. On a gamepad, I have no problems with Donkey Kong — it’s a fairly simple game once you get the timing down. But what I often forget about Donkey Kong is that the original machine has a fairly short joystick that isn’t exactly precise. It’s very easy to start climbing a ladder without meaning to, or to run past one and wind up getting smooshed by an oncoming barrel. Just beating the first level felt like a major accomplishment.

We also decided to play a round of Frogger, but since there were no original machines around, we had to play it on a retrocade machine. I’m not a big fan of these — they’re refurbished coin-op systems that have something like a MAME box installed in them so they can offer a wide variety of games (of the 1-button and 2-button variety). I guess if you wanted a machine at home that could play the old classics, it’d be a good investment, but for nostalgic purposes, it doesn’t feel right. For one thing, the action on the controller is much more responsive than the classic controllers tended to be, and for another, the cabinet is missing all of the neat artwork and display cards that gave these machines so much character.

When I got bored with Frogger, I tried out a baseball game I’d never seen before called World Series Baseball by Sega. This game was based on the NAOMI board (essentially, the arcade version of the Dreamcast hardware), and looked an awful lot like World Series Baseball 2k1 on the Sega Dreamcast. Given that the Dreamcast game was panned pretty badly for its terrible controls and lack of outfielding ability, I’m guessing it’s the same game. As it happens, the arcade version actually plays very nicely, and it even has a unique analog controller that looks like a bat that you use to swing. Once I got the technique down, I was slamming home runs with ease. I can only assume the home version was ported with very little added, and the lack of this neat controller made the home version much less fun to play. (They made up for it in WSB 2K2, one of the finest sports games on the Dreamcast.)

On the other side of the room, I had a chance to play Soul Calibur II, Tekken 5 and Tekken TAG Tournament on big-screen displays that would have been lovely for home use. Sadly, I didn’t see any Capcom fighters or any of the Virtua Fighter games there, but it’s probably for the best — someone told me that at one of the previous auctions, a working cabinet of Street Fighter Alpha 3 went for $75, so I likely would have tried to bid on a good Capcom cabinet. The Namco cabinets are nice, but the home versions of the games are identical to the arcade versions, so there’s really no reason to own one.

I was very annoyed that I didn’t get a chance to play the Star Wars Trilogy Arcade machine because a 10-year-old boy monopolized it for the 3 hours I was there, and his dad stood there giving the evil eye to anyone who tried to insist upon a turn. That was one of those games that came out when arcade machines were getting too expensive to be worth my time, and I never got a chance to really play through it. Ah well.

There were several “gimmick” games on display, like a skiing game, a 3D helmet game (like Beachcomber 2000, but a different title) and some Area 51 and Maximum Force machines. Sadly, they didn’t have any of the Time Crisis or Crisis Force games, nor any of the Silent Scope games. My friends and I did discover a really unique game, however — Rolling Extreme: Street Luge. It’s a game where you lie in a sled and rock side to side as you roll downhill. You can clobber your opponents Road Rash-style, and the game has some truly insane stuff going on in the background. At one point, I rolled past a T-Rex and under a Pterodactyl.

I really wanted to give the pinball games a try, since there were many I’d never seen before. I was talking to an arcade collector about my fond memories of the arcade/pinball hybrid Baby Pac-Man, and he pointed out that there were two hybrid machines at the show — Star Wars Episode I and Revenge From Mars. The Star Wars game had you helping Qui-Gon Jin in his lightsaber battle with Darth Maul, while Mars had you blowing up alien ships. Both looked pretty awkward to play. The lines were long enough that I didn’t get much of a chance.

All in all, the show was a neat experience, and it allowed me to remember some of the best times I had as a kid, wandering around video game arcades with a handful of quarters or tokens, hoping to find an exciting new game. I’ll post some pictures later to give you an idea of what I got to see.

Allow me to explain… though it will take me more than 140 characters, I’m afraid.

For those who don’t know, Twitter is a social network where users are limited to 140-character “tweets,” which are similar to the status updates one might see on Facebook. Twitter is very much about the here and now — people get on there and post trivial details about every moment of their life, like “Sean is brushing his teeth,” or “Sean is sipping a cup of tea,” or “Sean is going to the movies, if you want to join him.” The appeal of Twitter is that it can be updated from a mobile phone as easily as from an Internet-capable device, so people can have a place to post their comings and goings online, in real time, for the rest of the world to see. Users can also follow other members’ Twitter accounts to get a real-time “news feed” that tells them what their friends are doing.

Now, I completely understand why Twitter is popular with younger people — when I was a teenager, I often announced where I was going and what I was doing to my online friends, with very little discretion. My friends did the same thing. We didn’t have Twitter, so we used our away messages. It made me feel connected to other people to share these mundane details and to presume they were interested. I also enjoyed the idea that my friends who were local could see that I was out at the mall, head over, and find me if they wanted to hang out. We didn’t have cell phones at the time either, so seeing them was generally a nice surprise. (Believe it or not, this was just 10 years ago… I’m not as old as I sound!)

But while I’m sympathetic, I’m also concerned about the dependence that I’ve seen many young people develop towards Twitter (and Myspace and Facebook, for that matter). For some of them, Twitter is a crutch — the moment they feel bored with life, they’re checking Twitter on their mobile phones and looking to see if anyone else is having a good time. Instead of having real experiences, they’re living vicariously through their friends, which I would suggest is a pretty dull way to spend your youth. For others, Twitter is a competition — they go out and do crazy things so they can make their lives sound like they’re fresh and exciting and full of parties. Some of them even lie in their tweets so they can sound more exciting than they really are. They tweet so they can get attention, because even though they’re presumably having all this fun, it’s no good unless the world is watching.

And then there are the worst of the bunch — the twitter-marketers. Now, keep in mind — I am a marketing professional, and I’m working on my Master of Marketing Research degree. I love marketing. But I absolutely hate it when people pose as my friend because they want to try to rope me in to their multi-level marketing scheme or push some crummy website on me. I hate it when companies want me to follow their tweets so I can give them feedback about their products and a forum to advertise other products. I also hate it when my friends get their accounts hijacked and their accounts begin bombarding me with ads for porn sites, pharmaceutical sales sites and scam sites.

Many of my friends who use Twitter are also intereted in following celebrity tweets, blogger tweets, and fictional character tweets. I really scratch my head in these situations, because it just don’t make any sense to me. I suppose being connected on Twitter makes normal people feel closer to these personalities, and gives them some sort of sense of ownership or empowerment. Maybe it’s like being part of an exclusive club. I don’t know — it has very little appeal to me, because I don’t see the point of knowing every little detail about the life of someone who craves the attention of the public. I find it much easier to admire and respect people when I don’t bring myself into contact with their foibles and their flaws. Twitter makes it very hard for me to avoid those things.

So, there you have it — Twitter’s just not for me. But beyond that, let me ask a more important question that I’m sure I’ll never receive a satisfactory answer to — is it really, truly helpful to anyone? Your comments are welcome.

And before you bring up the situation where Stephen Fry was trapped in an elevator and Twittered his way out, just remember — he had a mobile phone, and didn’t need Twitter to secure help. Twitter was just a way to pass the time while he waited for it to arrive.

Here’s the problem I’m having — it’s all a colossal waste of time, and it’s causing me to form a lot of shallow relationships that don’t matter instead of pursuing real ones that do. It’s also taking up a large amount of my free time that could be spent doing things I actually want to do, like contributing to my blog here, working on one of my many writing projects, or developing my relationships with others.

So, I’ve decided that I’m going to take some time off from commenting on forums and playing around on social networks and attempt to gain some sense of perspective. Even though a lot of the stuff I publish on this blog is rather trivial and unimportant, I’ve decided it’s not chatter, because its my primary purpose in posting is to keep myself writing so my skills can stay sharp. I suppose writing in a private journal would have then same effect, but I benefit from believing that people might actually learn something from whatever I say.

I also will allow myself to comment on a forum if a) the content is original and b) I am interacting with the author in a manner that is exchanging ideas, not chatter.

While I realize that this might seem preachy, it’s not intended to be; putting this down in writing is meant to keep me accountable.

Now if I could only find a way to get so fired up about the massive amounts of time I waste on online video…