Finding Your Writing Online

Use search engines to scour the Internet for plagiarism of your works, mentions of your name, blog and website and every variation of those elements. I know I've written about this practice before. However, if you do it regularly, every so often a surprise will pop up. This is because new material, like databases, come online and eventually register in search engines' indexes. The engines themselves are always changing, sometimes improving; and they begin to catch older references that had escaped notice in the past. Only a fraction of the Internet is "visible" at any given time.

Search engines also make specialized searches available. These find material that you may have not seen. The results can be slightly jarring. At least, one was for me. Crank up the Wayback Machine, Sherman: someone ran a Yahoo search for this site's domain name, linked to any educational or governmental sites. I found the resulting page in a Google Alert. The Yahoo search string looks something like this: "linkdomain:writers-edge.info AND (site:.edu OR site:.gov)". Feeds That Matter for Writing was familiar, but one from Eastern Illinois University took me by surprise.

Apparently a graduate student in an English program had researched women writing on the web. She gave mini-reviews of several women's blogs, including A Writer's Edge. I'm not certain whether to be amused or aghast at the assertion that I have "a bit dorky sense of humor". It is good, however, to discover other people's reactions to your writing, even if two years late. Shakirova's description of the blog as "a compilation of mostly reviews of the new books the author read and offering the list of websites on poetry and writing" displays where the blog has evolved from. I hope the visual description is still accurate:

The imagery and colors are appropriately arranged and make the site easy to navigate. The site, although more educational than entertaining, is targeted toward certain audience interested in books and writing.

Editing Online, on Paper

The advent of digital publishing both helps and hinders our editing processes. The automation of individual actions like checking the spelling, grammar, and some stylistic issues speeds it up. Relying on editing on the screen, however, can lead to missing more errors, simply because reading from the monitor is more difficult and tiring. Another limitation is the inability to place pages side-by-side to check for consistency.

A new disadvantage digital publishing brings is the reduction in the number of different eyes that look over texts on their way to production. Where seven or eight different types of editors, proofreaders, fact-checkers and other word workers used to read copy, the number may be down to only three or four. For online publishing and self-publishing, sadly, the number may be only one. In that case, being Number One is not good, especially if that one is also the writer.

The closer it is to the production date when mistakes are found in any length manuscript, the less likely it is that they will be corrected. In the rush to publish, we are sacrificing accuracy and quality for speed and availability. It is difficult to believe James Frey's memoir was fact-checked very well.

My advice when it comes to editing your own work is: don't. Find someone else (who knows all the elements of editing, like an English teacher) to read over your work. If you must DIY, please print out anything over, say, nine pages. Editing on paper is much less tiring, more interruptible, and provides opportunities for several passes. Yes, it takes longer to transfer the corrections to the digital copy, but imagine dealing with typewriters and carbon paper for error correction. Time is stretchy in our minds.

Keywords for Writing Websites

Did you ever wonder how many search engines scan the Internet? The search engine optimization (SEO) company Trellian claims to gather data on 36 billion searches performed on 200 search engines worldwide. Scroll down the referenced web page to see a list. Impressive, huh? Only three really matter, though, when it comes to fiddling with keywords.

If you have a website to promote yourself and/or market your writing (and every writer and book needs one), you should be concerned about keywords. They are are the text that search engine users type into the little rectangle next to the Search button. Part of the secret to raising your site's rank in search engine returns is knowing what keywords are most pertinent to your site's content.

Most new visitors to websites arrive via keyword searches. Once your site is up and running, don't take much of a break from optimizing. Frequently test your old and new keywords with the three top search engines. In July 2007, these were Google, Yahoo and MSN, according to Search Engine Watch, comprising 87% of all searches performed.

Build English Vocabulary

MSN's Encarta is bundled with my MS Word 2003 as the de facto dictionary. The Encarta website contains many useful articles and some funny quizzes. Don't try the President Bush's English Quiz, though. The links I tried went to an empty page. Oh, wait! Maybe that's the joke.

All kidding aside, I think "Ten Tips to Build English Vocabulary" is quite useful. Strategies to help memorize new words include:

• choose words you're interested in
• associate a color with each word
• use the words in your imagination
• write pieces using new words
• relate a picture to a word

It sounds a lot like advice for learning people's names--the relationships and use. Repetition is a powerful learning device. When I was learning a larger vocabulary, I bored people silly using the new polysyllabic terminology (big words) in conversations until they were cemented in my mind. The words, not people.

Speaking of MS Word, a client sent me documents in the newer .docx format. I dutifully downloaded and installed the Microsoft converters for my software version. Then I opened the client files. It worked--not so good. The process is like gestating elephants, long and difficult, at least for the computer. The results warn of format and permissions changes. I could not extract photos, at least not easily, and separate them from the documents. It's either time for me to upgrade or remember to start asking for files to be converted to my preferred format. Let's see, who's the parent here? No, scratch that. Who is in charge? What would you do or expect?

Manuscripts Going Green?

In a Publishers Weekly (requires subscription) E-Book Report blog posting E Slush Piles on the Way? David Rothman posed:

"Wouldn't it be better, for editors' sanity, not just forests, if slush [and submissions] arrived via e-mail or Web forms-as electrons rather than as unwieldy collections of atoms? Imagine, moreover, all the postage writers could save. If nothing else, publishers could regularly do word searches and even use special algorithms to help identify potential winners-for example by word-use patterns. Houses could contract with security firms to provide decent virus screening. So let's not dismiss the idea of a massive shift to e-submissions."

I have news for Rothman, a San Diego "author", Philip Parker, has elevated electronically automated book writing to, well, an art? See a video on his process, if you dare.

Going green, taken to extremes.

Google Rank Returns, Other Rises

The Google Gods restoreth PageRank to A Writer's Edge! Apparently 3 is the new 5. That's the site's ranking in Google's new scheme to weed out Pay-Per-Post/Click bloggers and websites. I have never participated in those marginally unethical practices, however, to the Google Search system my page looked suspicious enough for them to pull MY rank last fall. (No one knows what formula was used to de-rank and re-rank sites.)

When Google dropped the rank, I cast about furiously for another ranking system and found a good one at SEOmoz.com. In that service's view, the page was a 4.5 to Google's 0. I'd hoped for the covet 6. Well, I have it now with SEOmoz! So, a Google 3 = SEOmoz 6? What does it really mean? A return of advertisers, I hope -- unless that's what Google was punishing me for, not using AdSense on the front page, but displaying ads from others. Call me cynical, but do call.

Blog Brags Worth Writing About

Google has finally restored PageRank to this website, back to the #3 rating it had dropped to late last year (from 5). SEO Moz, on the other hand, upped their estimate to a full 5.0 (see badge at the top of the left column), and I breezed through another blog valuation site last night that gave us a 5.5. Strangely, Google also lists almost a thousand back links!

Sweeter, though, was the email received yesterday from Amy Liu at Blogged because she said:

Our editors recently reviewed your blog and have given it an 8.2 score out of (10) in the Entertainment category of Blogged.com.

This is quite an achievement!...

We evaluated your blog based on the following criteria: Frequency of Updates, Relevance of Content, Site Design, and Writing Style.

After carefully reviewing each of these criteria, your site was given its 8.2 score.

We’ve also created Blogged.com score badges with your score prominently displayed. Simply visit your website’s summary page on Blogged.com:

... Please accept my congratulations on a blog well-done!!

You can see the listing and add comments or a review and help make this blog a full 10.

This must be my week, because I also learned that A Writer's Edge is now listed on the Publish-L web page of Subscriber Links, vetted by the list mom (owner), Pat Gundry. It's an honor to be included, and I thank Pat profusely for all her good work managing this most informative mailing list.

All this comes on top of last week's coveted "Recommended" status in the Preditors & Editors guides to services for writers. Combine all these heady accolades with an overflow of work flooding my way (feast or famine), and I'm falling off my rolling desk chair. One of these jobs may become a steady blogging gig, so stay tuned for further announcements.

Writing Free Books

Last month, did you snatch your copy of Suze Orman's Women & Money: Owning the Power to Control Your Destiny ($24.95 retail price for the hardcover)? I got mine, thanks to a Florida friend, Bonnie Boots. The book was available only for a day, but word-of-mouth spread across the 'net faster than fall flames in southern California. By day's end, more than a million electronic versions were downloaded.

According to the NY Times, HarperCollins is offering a limited selection of free downloadable books on its website, although I was unable to find such a listing to link.

Tara at ResearchBuzz offers tips on how to search for free books from university presses:

... try this search on Google or Yahoo along with your favorite keywords: “university press” free download site:edu .... You’ll get some irrelevant stuff, but you’ll also get pointers to small university presses which are making their books available online for free.

To get other general overviews of what’s available, try site:edu free book downloads “university press” oxford yale harvard.... try free books download “university press” inurl:2008 (The inurl: portion is because many blogs archive by date, and inurl:2008 is an easy way to find recent entries.)

New Features at AWE

Allow me to direct your attention to the right column on this blog's web page. First you find a gold box asking you to vote for A Writer's Edge in the 2008 Writer's Digest 101 Best Websites for Writers competition (just click on it to open an outgoing email message to WD). Many thanks.

Below that is a nifty feature by which you can subscribe via FeedBlitz to receive posts automatically by email. I must admit, I'm seeing how many people might be interested in receiving writing help this way. I'm still contemplating starting a newsletter. Signing up for the email feed won't, however, automatically put you on any mailing list.

The third box in the right column is something new. I finally wrestled Yahoo!'s intricate code into a search box that barely fits in the column. Click on the Yahoo! logo and enter a keyword or phrase, then click on the grey Search button. Yahoo! wanted it to take up 300 pixels. I wanted no more than 175. I win, for now! Better yet, it works much better on this website than the leading search engine. I discovered Yahoo!'s more thorough indexing as I searched for all my posts on Writer's Block and Creativity. Soon I hope to have them gathered into an eBook to add to the others. It just seems to me to be a natural companion volume to Be a Successful Writer.

Defeat Content Thieves

Sigh! I'd hoped the "plagiarism"/copy stealing might be over for a while, but when I happened into the Technorati listings for this blog, I found my post on searching yourself partially scraped (probably from the RSS feed) and posted at an ambiguous site aptly named "spiderspro.com". A spider is an automated computer program that crawls around web pages, seeking whom it can devour.

This blog-style website is new and maybe thrown together by an amateur. Its illogical blogroll leads to an endless train of identical blogs that lead to the same. Maybe the whole thing is automated. Anyhoo, it reminded me of this super article sent in from the folks at Virtual Hosting: Take it Back! 100 Tips to Defeat Content Thieves. Especially important is the section on what to do once you've found the jerks stealing your stuff "Going in for the kill".

I'll also be perusing the white paper for leads on preventing Google and Yahoo's image searchers from accessing the graphics on my website. I'm tired of seeing all the top hits being people looking to swipe others' art. I'd rather know what writing topics people are searching for when they come to A Writer's Edge. That way, I can better serve readers' needs.

eBook Reader Review

Much of the buzz about reading books revolves these days around "readers", the electronic devices that can store books available in an electronic format. Readers, of course, want to know about them (and argue). Writers want to know if: they should be considering releasing their books in an electronic format, what about the rights, how must should one cost? And publishers want to know if people will buy these products (reading devices and ebooks). Visionaries are all over the spectrum as to whether or not ebooks and readers will replace tree books. Some of us see a place for both in the future. The trick is to make both forms economically attractive. I've asked Sam Warren, owner of San Diego WriteWay to comment on his experiences with a reader:

I love my eBook Reader

This editor recently bought an eBookwise Reader on the Internet for $120 and fell in love with it. Previously, I was too busy to read for recreation. Now I read at the bus stop, coffeehouses, doctor's offices, etc. There are better ones such as a Palm Pilot PDF, Amazon Kindle, Sony & Borders, iPod, and various cell phones. But they cost a lot more, and I am perfectly happy with my simple eBookwise Reader. In addition to all the best sellers, there are the thousand of free out of copyright ebooks, ebooks of the classics.

Self-publishing guru Dan Poynter told me that he reads ebooks on his PDF while flying from one speaking engagement to another. Many Luddites knock them, saying that they prefer the feel of a real book; but then, they haven't tried the convenience of having multiple books and a dictionary at their finger tips, plus the easy-to-read backlight and the adjustable font size.

— Sam Warren

Read more on Sam's page about ebooks.

More Widgets for Writers

About a month has passed since Liz Cohen wrote to tell me about the Answers.com Widget Gallery. Although I almost immediately adopted the Word of the Day widget for this remodeled site, time to blog about the new gizzies escaped me. I love that they are customizable for a wide variety of platforms. That saves tinkering time and is mandatory for people who don't know how to modify HTML or XML code. The widgets available include two feeds from WikiAnswersTM, Answer Boxes and Tips, and four "of the day" services: word, birthdays, quote and history. Beaucoup info is available describing and illustrating each device and its installation.


As long as we're on widgets today--Amazon Widgets now have more features such as the option to shuffle products each time they're displayed, forcing a default term in the Search widget, and the ability to designate custom identification numbers for each widget. Amazon has also made it easier to get rid of unused widgets on your My Widgets page. You can learn more about them at Amazon. I'd love to be able to use these inside posts. Maybe I'll widgetize my Wishlist.

SmartLinks Amazing Technology for Writers

A new-to-me company, Adaptive Blue, is offering "smart links" and SmartLink Widgets to enhance blogs and websites. They come in a variety of flavors (stocks, music, wine, movies), but we'll focus on the one for books. SmartLinks for Books shows an example (image to the right) of the results of clicking on a blue arrow (like this one ) embedded in your text, using the widget to:

* Get a preview of the cover and description
* Choose from book sites like Amazon, B&N, etc.
* Find it in the local library via WorldCat
* Bookmark using a favorite service
* Post book link to Facebook or Twitter
* Access the best reviews from around the web
* Find similar books by subject and customer picks
* Find more books by the same author
* Lookup author's bio and web links

If you scroll down to the lower part of the page, you'll see a visual of a different type of book widget and a link to the widget page itself. Prepare yourself to be amazed, confused, and perhaps overwhelmed at first. The versatility of this technology blows me away! Two other resources on using this tool are the BlueBlog and the Book Widget Gallery.

To Fraser, whomever you are, thanks for the email introducing me to this amazing service.

If any of you readers are already using a SmartLinks widget to enhance your online writing, please let us know about your experiences and implementation.

Writers Falling Behind

The life of a freelancer strongly resembles the cliche about feast or famine. Jobs seems to come in packs of three and similarly problems arrive in duplicates. When both coincide, a kind of madness ensues. I know I'm behind in harvesting the goodies from my email box. Please be patient Fraser from Adaptive Blue, Alexander at Freelance Writing Career, Liz at Answers.com's new Widget Factory (see one down in the right column, delivering a word of the day ... see the new right column!) I'll write about all of your services soon.

Today I wanted to direct readers' attentions to a new but hidden feature at A Writer's Edge. In the Profile at the page top is a much reduced navigation menu for the site. One selection says "Subscribe". Clicking on the link takes you to a sign-up page at FeedBurner, a service that delivers an RSS feed modified to your particular feed reader. (You can also just sign up at your reader service for "http://feeds.feedburner.com/writers-edge/EElx".

Even more exciting, and I blush to reveal I was unaware of this, FeedBlitz also makes this blog available by email. I discovered this when I scoured a sample of the FeedBurner version of a post and found a link that says "Subscribe by email", which took me to this page where you can also sign up to receive posts by Skype, AOL and Twitter! I think I am supposed to put a sign-up on the main page ... something else I'm behind in doing.

Writing on the Bloggy Knol

Last month Udi Manber, VP Engineering for Google, revealed in the company's official blog a new project aimed at authors. Still in beta, and apparently nonpaying, the megatech is Encouraging people to contribute knowledge in the form of articles on their specialties. Clicking on the image below takes viewers to an example of a "knol". It's only an image, however, so don't bother clicking on anything that looks like a link. The very hush-hush beta testing is also by invitation only.

At the heart, a knol is just a web page; we use the word "knol" as the name of the project and as an instance of an article interchangeably. It is well-organized, nicely presented, and has a distinct look and feel, but it is still just a web page. Google will provide easy-to-use tools for writing, editing, and so on, and it will provide free hosting of the content. Writers only need to write; we'll do the rest.

Exactly which sector of the Internet this new project threatens is unclear and a matter of great speculation among industry watchers. One theory is that the company's "Pages" project is flagging, and "Knol" will simply prop it up with more tools a la Blogger. After all, a web page is just a web page. Or perhaps Blogger is losing out to Word Press, which offers more plug ins and flexibility in blog design as well as easier integration into complete websites.

Dubious Blogger Awards

A shady practice may have begun long before The Blog Fairy started handing out her lovely Blue Ribbon Blogger awards:
and then suddenly (to some of us) passed on into the fairy heavens:Since the time that Blog Fairy anonymously tapped me through MyBlogLog, A Writer's Edge or I have received a few more awards from people I know, ones I call my "Internet Friends". Suspicion crept in, however, when I began to receive ones with instructions to link back to the givers, and sometimes to an originator, as well as to a certain amount of new awardees. I bristled, as always, at being told what to do. I can think for myself, thank you very much!

Perhaps I was naive from the get-go, but I think I've watched this formerly generous and meaningful practice degenerate into just another shallow attempt to obtain link backs (obviated by Google's revision of the PageRank algorithm). It's a silly, blatant form of viral marketing that reached the ultimate (I hope) this holiday with bloggers passing around growing lists of blogs ostensibly as seasonal greetings. Call me Grinch, but I refused to participate.

Yes, I suppose the same process occurred with the "top women blogging on writing" or whatever that list was. I recall the moment I quit following those links and realized people were just passing on someone else's recommendations without personally evaluating the writers or the blogs. It was nice to be included at the beginning of the pyramid (it's always good to be near the top!) But like any pyramid scheme, it turns into a valueless scam very quickly. And I don't think it fools any half-savvy readers.

Am I hot or what?

Scan Your Fingers

You know how Google is trying to become a repository for the universe's knowledge? Take a look at how Book scans reveal Google's handiwork at Stuff.co.nz.

GIVING THE FINGER: Google's book scanning project has inadvertantly captured the fingers of people scanning the books.

Google Screws With Blogger

Can you just imagine what their offspring would look like? Oh, sorry, wrong joke--Google already owns Blogger. Today I automatically logged into my account, noting the confusing notice about Blogger instituting use of OpenID for commenting, acknowledging some snafu about URLs and generally wreaking havoc in my little brain.

A few readers have protested the unavailability of anonymous commenting on this blog. That's fine if you object. I have my reasons, and although I don't moderate comments, I do see them almost as soon as they are posted. I can hit "delete" with the best of 'em! So, I went to enable this new system, hoping it would coax more comments, which have fallen off during their testing period. I couldn't. I couldn't do anything with my own blog that I was logged in to, unless I logged in again!

First they call my blog crap and drive away advertisers by demoting the PageRank to zero; then they don't respond to my request for explanation, re-evaluation; now they're driving participants away by screwing with the comments process.

Eventually I was able to change the comments to this new OpenID system. I have no idea what that does. Will some kind soul please use it, and tell me (in a comment, if you can) if it is good for you? So far Google Screws have not been good for me.

Use Yahoo! Search

I've tossed the Google Search Box--at least until this site's good PageRank is restored--in favor of a Yahoo! Search Box. See the feature at the top of the page, just to the right of the header. It took a bit of finagling to force it to work correctly and in both Firefox and Internet Explorer. Apparently the Yahoo! version can't be created to fit into a 150 pixels-width sidebar. This step is the second in protest of Google's unfair demotion of this site to PageRank zero. Even the "Posting Create" page in Blogger has a rank of 6! Boycott Google! Use Yahoo! Search! Avoid AdSense and AdWords!

Writers Can Sell Themselves via Technology

Several newish marketing or promotion notions:

Stamps. Put yourself, logo or book cover on a U.S. postage stamp. Services like zazzle.com, photo.stamps.com, and yourstamps.com can do the trick (thanks to Jim Cox's Midwest Book Review newsletter).

Radio interviews. Ah, but this isn't your grandparents' radio: try the new satellite and Internet radio services like Sirius, Blogtalk, WritersFM, live and recorded MP3s.

If you have a book coming out, be sure to badger your publisher to hook it up to book clubs as suggested in Publishers Seek to Mine Book Circles - New York Times. Several new Web 2.0 social networking sites exist for reading groups.

Combat Plagiarism by Tracking Content

Chances are that if you're reading this article, you are probably an Internet publisher too. Do you have questions like these:

* Who is copying my content?
* How can I get links that drive traffic?
* Which of my articles or images are being used most?
* How original or exclusive is my content?

You could Google and hunt down the answers, or subscribe to Attributor, a tracking service. They offer a free white paper and a free report on where your material appears. I found the issues addressed in the blog especially pertinent. With clients like the Associated Press and Rueters, this business must be a winner.

Top 1000 Blogs in Blogline

We pause now for a completely geeky moment. The literati may want to avert their eyes.

Ready? Last Friday the blog feed aggregater service Bloglines announced its Top 1000. Top at what, I'm not certain, but probably in number of subscribers through Bloglines. It features the top decliners and rising stars and blogs new to the listing (how hard is that, given that it just began?) I suppose you're all expecting me to announce that A Writer's Edge is #XXX or even #XXXX on the list, but alas, I can find no way to search it! I don't see any way to export the listings, either.

What? Who's on top? Oh, the usual suspects that you know from the Technorati top 100. Big surprise there: Slashdot, Dilbert, Engadget, Wired Top Stories, Boing Boing, etc. BBC and CNN are also in the top ten. Guess it's true what "they" are saying about newspaper readership shifting to the Internet.

Maukie Makes Her Mark

I had a smaller version of this widget recently, then found the home page for Widgetbox > Maukie - the virtual cat web widget. When I swiped her previously, I didn't know she purred! Turn on your ears! Their description:

Maukie - the virtual cat

Icon Maukie is the fiercest, cutest cat ever to terrorize your mouse pointer. Move your cursor and Maukie will follow. Scratch her head, and she'll meow. Rub her tummy, and she'll purr. All the while, she's breathing in and out, and watch the tail. She may even try to swat the cursor. The creator of this entertaining feline is unknown.

Subscribe to Comments Feature

Ever make a comment on a post and wonder if anyone followed up on what you said? Or what other's thought and perhaps commented? Can't remember which post it was? (The latter is my problem!) Some Blogger white hat rides to out rescue with a new Subscribe to Comments feature. It works with a verified Google Account. You can have several Google identities, reserving just one for commenting. The comment subscription feature allows readers of a blog to receive an email each time a comment is made to a particular post. You can subscribe to a post's comments by clicking the "Email" link next to "Subscribe to comments" on the post page.

Virtual Book Touring How-To

Several times I've written about virtual books, signings and tours, even hosted a touring guest recently. However, I've neglected to direct your attention to a great resource on how to arrange a virtual book tour. Book Authors Tour the World with Virtual Book Tours by Cheryl Kaye Tardif, author of Whale Song, in John Kremer's blog about marketing bestsellers explained the process. Tardif provided multiple links to services, sites and other resources to assist the neophyte virtual traveler. She offered detailed, step-by-step instructions -- way too much to even try to recap here.

The author prepared this article after completing a successful one-month virtual book tour. She wrote from first-hand experience. In a reply to an anonymous skeptical comment, Tardif said, "I found that it was a wonderful way to connect with readers, and I tried to make my VBT exciting and fun for everyone."