Making Ripples: post-corporate adventures in Floyd County Virginia

Do not believe in the trap of scarcity

Scarcity is an interesting trap. If somebody makes something "scarce", it can appear more valuable than it actually is. Your attention becomes riveted on the "scarcity" rather than looking for available alternatives.

(This was written a few years ago and it is even more true today. With the current state of the Internet, the barriers to self-publishing or starting a business are significantly reduced.)

When there is the prospect of getting your CD or book published, an artificially created scarcity can keep one fixated on something that is unlikely to happen. There are saner ways to proceed.

Look at the role of scarcity in maintaining control of traditional publishing. There are millions of people who write and only a handful of publishers who have figured out the keys to getting their books in bookstores.

Well, traditional publishers used to be the only real outlets for a writer, but that is no longer the case.  There is no shortage of publishers who can print an excellent quality book and ship it to customers on demand.

With a little work, you can see your work in print and on Amazon.com. You can generate sales without having to rely on traditional publishers or bookstores.

Bookstores are another example of scarcity. There is only so much room and they must stock what their customers will buy. As an unknown, your books will only appear in a bookstore if you or your friends bring books to the store.

If you sell online and offer free shipping, why would anyone need to find your book in a bookstore?

Today there are tens of thousands of writers who write well enough to command a following of readers. The vast majority of them seem to be caught up in the maddening hamster wheel activity of writing, submission, and rejection by companies that have no way of profitably publishing their work.

I've been following the literary efforts of some dear and talented friends for some time and have wanted to whack them gently alongside their heads to get them to wake up and see the possibilities they are ignoring. Some are online, some are not, but they all are transfixed by the traditional dream of being "published".

There are some incredibly persuasive reasons to look outside the resource-limited world of traditional publishing, if your writing is more interesting and thought-provoking than most of the material you read in "mainstream" publications:

1. When you publish your own work, you gain an immense amount of real experience as to what your market is. You also get honest feedback that helps you determine what to do to get more people reading your work.

2. Blogging is the first step in becoming a self-publisher. The feedback you get in your comments and from watching website visitor logs is instant and brutally or refreshingly honest.

You can use this to good advantage in developing a public awareness of your work and a community of people who are interested in seeing that you succeed. They will buy your book and, more importantly, they will tell others about your writing because it is interesting information that they are the first to hear about.

3. There is nothing so psychologically destructive as inviting unnecessary rejection.

Applying for a job when the company cannot pay what you are worth is ludicrous. Submitting manuscripts to companies that are frantically searching for a viable business model is worse.

If a publisher is doing well, it is because it has found a customer base for whatever it is currently publishing. The only works that will interest them are clones of what they are already publishing.

4. THERE IS NO SCARCITY OF OUTLETS FOR YOUR WORK!

Get over the idea that your piece is only valuable if it appears in a traditional magazine, collection or whatever. The only value of appearing in a well-known publication is the immediate visibility. Once it is published, it becomes old news by next month. 

Traditional publishing is a zero-sum game (If someone else gets published, you don't get published). If a known author with a track record of sales has something to release, a traditional publishing house would be crazy to publish something by an unknown instead.

If you were publishing, you would do the same. With limited production capability, you would choose the popular "brand" to sell, not the "unknown" brand.

As a self-publisher, you can publish your work in small quantities as I did, or you can use a POD publisher. Either way, your work will be available for people to buy it and you will do the same promotional actions as if you had published through a main-stream publishing house. There are unlimited outlets for your writing, all you have to do is use them.

There is unbelievable satisfaction in having people say, "I heard about your new book!"

Sometimes they even say, "Where can I get one?"

If you really want people to read your work, please take a hard look at self-publishing. You owe it to yourself to do so. There is no justification for a good piece of writing to remain unpublished. I have also proved to my own satisfaction that self-publishing caused a traditional publisher to license my work after I proved that a market existed for it.

This article applies to almost every form of publishing including music on CDs or MP3 files and artistic works of all kinds. You can reach customers all over the world if you use the Internet wisely.

Phone spam

Is anyone else being bothered by phone spam? We are having to change some phone numbers in order to shut off the flow of garbage phone calls.

Over the past few months, Gretchen and I have noticed a noticeable and annoying increase in unsolicited phone calls from organizations displaying an appalling lack of understanding of basic human communication principles. These callers do not understand that some sort of interest and agreement is necessary for a meaningful conversation to take place. These phone calls are as annoying as email spam and are harder to get rid of.

If we as recipients are not interested in the subject or the caller, more calling without getting agreement from us is a waste of time. We are tired of having our time wasted by people we do not know or care to know and have taken steps to put an end to it.

Fortunately, our local phone company provides anti-telemarketing options and allows us to block specific phone numbers. This has restored our basic land line service to usefulness.

Unfortunately, our Vonage lines and our cell phone lines do not have these anti-spam features and these other phones ring at all hours of the day and night with unwanted calls.

Some of these calls are for the purpose of selling us something, others are for the purpose of collecting money from people who do not live here and never have. There are several different kinds of calls.

It is a dead giveaway when the person calling asks for "Lawrence?" "Can I speak to Lawrence? This is a confidential matter."

When told that there is no Lawrence at this number, the caller asks where Lawrence can be contacted. The conversation goes downhill from there, of course and the person eventually hangs up or we do. Then the phone rings again about an hour later and the caller ID shows it is the same caller.

There is another type of call that we have been receiving lately and it is some sort of robo-caller which only reacts if we speak into the phone, If we say, "Hello?', we get a voice saying, "Our operators are all busy. Please wait for the next operator." These may be some sort of political activity, but we have not waited for a live operator to enlighten us.

Both Vonage and our cell phone company were able to offer us relief, but it meant having to change a few phone numbers. In the process of changing our phone numbers, we discovered that many others are finding it necessary to change their phone numbers.

If this is a growing trend, how long will it take before VOIP phone services and cell phone services offer more sophisticated caller screening and blocking.

I have seen email spam blocking systems become quite efficient at blocking the 75& of my emails that are spam. I am looking forward to the time when telephone service companies provide the same cure for phone spam.

Are others experiencing this phone spam trend?
How are you dealing with it, if you are?

UPDATE:
Some of these calls may be from Indian Telemarketing companies as described on Johnnie Moore's Weblog. There are hundreds of comments from people who have received phone spam calls.
 

Here are some of the numbers involved:

179-336-0280 (India)
604-550-7000  (California)
1-447-793-3602 (said from India)
1-800-203-9783 (Ramada Plaza)
1-416-644-1155 (Ramada Plaza)

The Leningrad Cowboys - nothing succeeds like excess

Finland's answers to the Blues Brothers are still alive and rocking today.

With their extreme hair styles, bizarre glasses and pointy shoes, the Finnish rock group, the Leningrad Cowboys make a splendid contrast to the Red Army Choir as they performed together recently in a rousing rendition of "Sweet Home Alabama" to the enthusiastic applause of Russian teen-agers.

This is a seriously off-the-wall group and if you are into truly bizarre musicians, you may enjoy this video. I definitely want a pair of the glasses they are wearing.

Like the Blues Brothers, the Leningrad Cowboys are a product of a movie, in this case, "Leningrad Cowboys Go America", in which the world's worst polka band comes to America to find fame and fortune. Their dead-pan humor and relentless pursuit of success at all costs made them a cult favorite for all 10 of us who watched the movie.

Now the group is world renown. If you Google "Leningrad Cowboys images", you will find hundreds of images from their CDs and concert tours.

Thanks to old friend Gunter Leonhart for the link to http://www.tothepointnews.com/content/view/3114/85/  and to gonza.techno for the image.

UPDATE: Sippican Cottage, another woodworker/blogger has posted more performances by the Leningrad Cowboys. Visit his site for two fine videos.

Living large in Floyd...

Gretchen and I stayed at the new Hotel Floyd the other night.  It is a celebration of casual luxury and environmentally conscious design.

I have written about the hotel before as I have been impressed with the concept from the very beginning, but it is one thing to write about something and quite another to immerse oneself in the actual experience. Staying at the Hotel Floyd is a real treat.

This unique boutique hotel has been a hit with visitors and locals alike ever since it opened last year. Apparently almost every weekend is booked for the rest of the year.

The first phase has only 14 rooms and it seems to me that the phase two expansion to 40 rooms cannot come too soon.

We stayed in the Floyd Artist Suite which features the work of local artists including some of Gretchen's pastels.

The Artist’s Suite has two bedrooms and a living room, with High Definition flat screen television in every room. Locally made handcrafted furniture used throughout the suite creates a stunning effect.

Explore the Hotel Floyd website for the full story.

We really enjoyed the proximity to downtown Floyd. We were able to walk to a Chamber of Commerce After Hours Event that night and to the Blue Ridge Restaurant for breakfast the next morning.

I understand that there are plans for more apartments in downtown Floyd. I think there will be no difficulty finding tenants who want the amenities of living in the downtown area of this tiny hub of artistic activity in Southwest Virginia.

I need to visit Wills Ridge Supply more often...

This is the view from in front of Wills Ridge Supply. (click to enlarge) It makes me feels like I can see forever. If I stop and take a good look at the horizon, it helps me clear my mind on a busy day.

Good people, good service, and a wonderful view of the north end of Floyd County. They also have a statue of the Founder, Jack Gallimore standing proudly in front of the store.

They are high on a hill above Route 8 north of Floyd Virginia. You need to watch for the signs, but it is worth searching it out.

They have almost everything you need to build your house or keep it in good repair.

They also have people who know how to interpret what it is you really need when you come in, as I do, and ask for the "thingy that fits on the back of the stove"...

Don't tell them I sent you. I think they already know.

I've been backsliding - but I can still get up

It has been so long since I blogged, I knew I was slipping back into "corporate mode" where it is all work and no time for reflection.

Starting a business has that seductive quality about it where it seems that with just a little more effort, something worthwhile will be gained and a rest point will be reached.

That is not the case at all, you know, because there is always another challenge around the bend that can be surmounted with just a few more hours effort... Days go by and there has been no time for savoring life.

What brought me up short was listening to some visitors from northern Virginia discussing their lives and careers.

Their work and commuting takes 13 hours a day and they are dedicated executives who are all striving to achieve worthwhile goals in an increasingly unstable working environment. Listening to them was like opening old wounds and I experienced a sudden rush of empathy and personal weariness.

I thought, "I've been there and I've done that and I thought I'd gotten it out of my system. But here I am working 15-16 hours a day in a beautiful country environment and I'm not taking time to enjoy the sunshine and the beauty of country life."

Damn! I've fallen into the clutches of a seductive career opportunity again!

Encountering a career situation that allows you to create almost without limit is incredibly addictive. Days pass with your attention fixed on situations and designs that test you to the limit. The outside world becomes a blur of flickering images and tiny voices that attempt to distract your attention from the designs that challenge you.

Our visitors jolted me to my senses and my absence of blog posts galvanized me into a semblance of action. I'm back in action and I will try to share some of the beauty that I have been observing.

I'll leave you with two images to enjoy. This one is titled, "Elves in my Garden" and it is a new work from local artist Liz Stucki that I had the pleasure to frame.

The earlier image is a photo of the artist's storm-shattered window showing the delicate tracery of the broken safety glass after a recent storm. Liz is currently figuring out how to capture this image in another pen and ink drawing.

I am looking forward to seeing what she does with it.

(click on images to enlarge)

What does the Jacksonville Center do for Floyd County?

It helps keep Floyd green

For 13 years, the Jacksonville Center has been supporting artistic endeavors and rural creativity in our region. It is an organization of dedicated volunteers backed up by an extremely small group of paid staff members.

It serves as a focus for creating and supporting new artists and artisans. There is no other activity in Floyd that is dedicated to that activity. The public schools offer art instruction and various artists offer internships, but until recently, there were few other opportunities for artists to learn new skills and display their works locally.

Not everyone is aware that some internationally renown artists and artisans teach courses at the Jacksonville Center. Some instructors drive long distances to help students develop their skills and launch careers.

One of the outstanding aspects of the Jacksonville Center Community is the way experienced and successful artists share their hard-won knowledge with newcomers to the field of art.

Hundreds of successful artists and artisans in the region are members of the Jacksonville center and some are members of the Board or manage the Hayloft Gallery exhibitions. Their actions inspire others to contribute to the Center and to take courses.

Every year, some students choose to become artists and artisans after taking courses from the professional artists at the Jacksonville Center. These new artists become contributors to the local economy and some return to teach at the Jacksonville Center as they gain professional skills and generate their own following of fans.

There is a synergy at the Jacksonville Center that keeps it going, even though the Center is perpetually strapped for operating funds. Grant money may pay for buildings and additions, but operating expenses are supported by donations from businesses and individuals. That is why there are so many volunteers who give time and money to keep the center open. It is one of the few places in the county where you or your children can unlock your creativity and learn skills from professionals in the field of arts.

But, even after 13 years of serving Floyd County, some people still don't understand why government grant money is provided to the non-profit Jacksonville Center for the Arts in Floyd instead of "deserving individual artists".

They really don't comprehend that the Jacksonville Center IS DESERVING INDIVIDUAL ARTISTS.

They also don't understand that grants aren't "given" away. They must be won through a carefully thought-out application process and after a lot of hard work. The grants are government's way of extending government services without adding the taxpayer burden of a staff of government employees and a local government office.

The few naysayers who say "stay away from the Jacksonville Center and support local independent artists and craftspeople and their displays in privately owned galleries and studios" do not have a clue what the Jacksonville Center does and must not be talking to the many artists and gallery owners who support the Jacksonville Center and donate time to it.

If you are an artist, you want your work in as many venues as possible and you want those venues to promote you and your privately owned studio as much as possible. The Jacksonville Center does this. It is open to all artists and is a resource that this county is very fortunate to have.

The next time you find someone criticizing the Jacksonville Center for "competing" with Floyd artists in any way, you might ask them exactly "who" is being affected. You will not get any specifics, only general grumbling.

The Jacksonville Center is non-commercial and is run by local artists and other volunteers. Anyone criticizing the Jacksonville Center as being "bad for local art businesses" has a hidden agenda and deserves being investigated themselves.

We need all of the cultural incentives we can muster to inspire us to unlock our creativity. The Jacksonville Center and the artists who support it are a driving force for self-sustaining economic development in Floyd County. Selling talent will help keep Floyd green. Selling only land leads to another, and less desirable future for Floyd.

Help develop local talent in all areas and help keep Floyd green.

Enhancing the imagination with software

Some fortunate people can observe a few pieces of information and can easily envision a finished creation in extraordinary detail. Their powers of visualization are highly developed.

Others struggle to visualize relationships and results and need pictures, diagrams and even solid objects in order to grasp how things might go together to create a harmonious whole. If you have ever struggled to present a new idea to a group, you have already met these people.

Fortunately, technology and computers have come to the aid of those who have difficulty conceptualizing results from seemingly disrelated actions. Visualization software is used in architecture and in designing everything from cell phones to shopping centers.

In the custom picture framing industry, there are new varieties of Visualization Software which allow us to create multiple scenarios for matting and framing an image.

This software allows us to quickly explore what happens to the appearance of an image if we make changes to mat colors and dimensions and select different mouldings to frame the image.

For example, some people can see an artist's original painting as seen here and by glancing at a collection of mouldings and mats as seen in the next image, can synthesize a mental model of what will produce an acceptably dramatic presentation of the image.

For the rest of humanity, it helps if we can explore various "what if" scenarios and make sure that we have considered enough options to give us peace of mind in our final decision.

Computer-generated images allow us to quickly assess the effects of making changes. If we stay focused and don't let our imaginations run away with us, we can usually generate enough different solutions to satisfy us in less than 20 minutes. Since the computer stores our choices, we can review them at our leisure and even send them to friends for comment.

Some have asserted that this kind of decision-making tool extends the decision making unnecessarily. The answer is to use this kind of tool only when a client can't visualize the finished product or is not present to assist in the decision-making.

In these cases, Visualization software can save time and money. You generate a number of alternative solutions for a design problem and let the client mull them over on their own time. If you have done your work well, they will have enough alternatives to choose from and will be in control of the final result.

The trick is, of course, to provide enough alternatives to choose from, but not so many that the client is overwhelmed. This takes a certain discipline, because people who are proficient with software like to show every possible alternative that can be generated.

I have found that it is very easy to generate six to eight really interesting variations on almost any framing design, so I stifle this impulse if clients or spectators are present as it invariably overwhelms them and creates splitting headaches.

It is far better to limit myself to presenting four alternatives or less. That seems to provide plenty of choices and is capable of being easily solved for the optimum choice.

The technology is not perfect yet as the computer renditions of frames is not perfect, but if you look at the examples shown above, you can see they provide a close approximation of the final framed product shown here. This pastel was created by Gretchen St Lawrence and is currently on display at the Art Under the Sun Gallery in Floyd, Virginia.

Floyd Earth Day 2008

Come celebrate our place in the world with a focus on the topic: Water and Life in Floyd County.

The April 19 event at Floyd County High School will be free and open to the public.

Speakers, panelists, vendors of water and nature-care-related products as well as water, soils and geology professionals will be present. They will meet with interested county residents who want to learn how to help maintain both adequate quantity and quality of water in the county.

Since its inception by Senator Gaylord Nelson in 1970, Earth Day has been an annual opportunity for civic and church groups, schools and universities, municipalities and national organizations to take a fresh look at how we might work more effectively towards a healthier planet.

We may not agree on the global issues or the solutions, but we can all agree that the planet could be cleaner and healthier for the living things that reside here.

Locally, our primary concerns are water, sustainability and earth-care issues in Floyd County and the surrounding region.

Visit the website for Floyd Earth Day 2008 and get involved in the future of Floyd. Do your part to keep Floyd green.

There is a signup sheet for vendors, volunteers and those who just want to be informed of developments.

Growing wiser instead of just growing older

This was written some time ago and I feel that it still applies. Enjoy.

LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE

As we age, we have experiences that range from incredibly good to disastrous. If we survive these experiences, we have a chance to learn from them and go on to further adventures. If we get stuck in these experiences, we merely get older.

I'd like to suggest that charging into the barricades of life with guns blazing and a total determination to succeed is a winning strategy, as long as you keep track of the odds against you. If the odds against you keep rising, you have made a tactical error and need to fall back to a point of safety and regroup.

There is nothing wrong in making a few mistakes. It's making the same mistake over and over that reveals your level of insanity.

You are led into making mistakes when you have insufficient or incorrect information. Learning from mistakes allows for continuous improvement. There are some professions like design engineering and programming which are simply organized methods for learning from earlier mistakes.

If you learn from your experiences instead of repressing them or fixating on them, you will surely achieve a measure of wisdom over time. I think that is a happier course of action than avoiding life or regretting life. You become smarter over time, because your experience has turned into knowledge.

BEING STUCK IN THE PAST

Let's look at the other end of the spectrum, the people who seem to be getting older but not wiser. You will find that their attention is stuck in the past, either on their failures or more surprisingly, their successes.

Too many times, the high school football star, the Homecoming Queen, and those fortunate children who are in the right place to become real celebrities on the stage or screen, are unable to move on and duplicate that success elsewhere.

This can even happen at work. A salesperson can have an incredible season which catapults his or her company into a new operating range. If the company promotes them to a managerial position, they may never again achieve the success they once had. If they cannot change and move on, they remain a perpetual has-been in their own minds although they have as much ability as they ever did.

Let's looks at the more usual case, the disaster which changes your life. If you have really failed hard at something, whether a career, a marriage, or a business of your own, you know how hard it is to pick up the pieces and move on. Death of a loved one falls into the same category. The only thing I can tell you from my own experiences is that all of these are surmountable and you will go on to happier days with renewed love of life if you persevere.

Do not allow yourself to pine over past glories or past defeats.

The beautiful sadness of regret may look good in tragic novels, but it doesn't do much for real life. Appreciate the fact that you are still alive and continue to create your own tomorrows.

Set a goal, any goal, and work toward it using all of the experience you have gained. You will get wiser as you get older and you may enjoy life a lot more.

THE BOTTOM LINE

It is almost impossible to create a future while looking backwards

This was written some time ago and I feel that it still applies. Enjoy.

LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE

As we age, we have experiences that range from incredibly good to disastrous. If we survive these experiences, we have a chance to learn from them and go on to further adventures. If we get stuck in these experiences, we merely get older.

I'd like to suggest that charging into the barricades of life with guns blazing and a total determination to succeed is a winning strategy, as long as you keep track of the odds against you. If the odds against you keep rising, you have made a tactical error and need to fall back to a point of safety and regroup.

There is nothing wrong in making a few mistakes. It's making the same mistake over and over that reveals your level of insanity.

You are led into making mistakes when you have insufficient or incorrect information. Learning from mistakes allows for continuous improvement. There are some professions like design engineering and programming which are simply organized methods for learning from earlier mistakes.

If you learn from your experiences instead of repressing them or fixating on them, you will surely achieve a measure of wisdom over time. I think that is a happier course of action than avoiding life or regretting life. You become smarter over time, because your experience has turned into knowledge.

BEING STUCK IN THE PAST

Let's look at the other end of the spectrum, the people who seem to be getting older but not wiser. You will find that their attention is stuck in the past, either on their failures or more surprisingly, their successes.

Too many times, the high school football star, the Homecoming Queen, and those fortunate children who are in the right place to become real celebrities on the stage or screen, are unable to move on and duplicate that success elsewhere.

This can even happen at work. A salesperson can have an incredible season which catapults his or her company into a new operating range. If the company promotes them to a managerial position, they may never again achieve the success they once had. If they cannot change and move on, they remain a perpetual has-been in their own minds although they have as much ability as they ever did.

Let's looks at the more usual case, the disaster which changes your life. If you have really failed hard at something, whether a career, a marriage, or a business of your own, you know how hard it is to pick up the pieces and move on. Death of a loved one falls into the same category. The only thing I can tell you from my own experiences is that all of these are surmountable and you will go on to happier days with renewed love of life if you persevere.

Do not allow yourself to pine over past glories or past defeats.

The beautiful sadness of regret may look good in tragic novels, but it doesn't do much for real life. Appreciate the fact that you are still alive and continue to create your own tomorrows.

Set a goal, any goal, and work toward it using all of the experience you have gained. You will get wiser as you get older and you may enjoy life a lot more.

THE BOTTOM LINE

It is almost impossible to create a future while looking backwards