Spontaneous Derivation used to be about writing. This, of course, was a great way to distract myself from actual non-blog writing, because I was still writing about writing, see? Didn’t quite work out for my temperament.
Spontaneous Derivation used to be about blogging. This worked out much better, and was a nice fit. And all was well, and got some Stumbles on a consistent basis, and that was good.
Then, someone said that the only blogs that do well are the ones about sex, blogging, and writing.
Well, I love a challenge. I love to tack into the wind, I do.
And at the same time, I realized that if I was going to write SF or Fantasy, I needed to do some research. You need, I think, to love a genre in order to write it (or sub-genre, or whatever).
And around the same time, I got a Kindle, and loved it very much. I looked around for sites about the Kindle, but mostly they were Kindle news sites and tended to repeat the same news over and over. Nowhere was a Kindle site that focused on science fiction or fantasy; or even, say, mystery; or even just the Best Mainstream Content For The Kindle. Perhaps it’s because book reviews already exist for the paper versions, and Kindle-specific content is just not as prolific—heck, that would apply for eBooks in general, not just the Kindle.
There are a few things I learned in the blogging world, and one of these was to find a niche that lets you link out, but have your blog be a unique voice in that niche. And we’re not just talking about writing style, because while that’s great, that’s also weak without the meat of content behind it. And I was always about content, not about technique.
So Spontaneous Derivation, which is not the most aptly named blog in the world for this purpose, is going to be about science fiction and fantasy content for the Kindle. Kindle news can be covered by other sites, but watching Tor, Roc, Ace, and even the more mainstream publishers as they approach the digital age and, in specific, the Kindle, is something other people are not covering.
They aren’t even covering the concerns that eBooks raise for authors—no, I’m not talking about content stealing. I’m a blogger, and that’s really old news to me; instead, I’m talking about contracts and rights; important things like the redefinition of what it means for a book to be “out of print”, at which point rights revert to the author, rather than staying indefinitely with the publisher who can claim that a digital edition left on an archive counts as “in print”. Because if I ever get published, it will be in the digital age, and it behooves me to be aware of the “new” publishing.
And, y’know, I love my Kindle.
Anyways, that’s where Sd is heading. I’m going to need a three column theme, with a widebar at the top right. I have one in mind, but it’s going to need some tweaking (all themes on this site do). Nothing like spending hours installing a theme for a special occasion.
Spontaneous ∂erivation 