Theo Jansen’s “strandbeest” creatures captured my imagination. If you like these eldritch and fascinating machines you can copy his plans and make one yourself. Which makes me wonder: are we creating them, or serving them? Theo Jansen is an inventive Dutch artist who builds creatures called strandbeests (calling them “kinetic sculptures” doesn’t do them justice) out…
I blogged every weekday for 6 months (150 posts). I got lots of advice and didn’t listen to it. I did popular posts on writing, politics, social media, and corporate doubletalk. And damned if I didn’t create an identity for myself. My friends told me that I shouldn’t use bad words. They said daily blogging was…
Am I a failure? Let’s look at the evidence. I went to a state university and left after three years. I dropped out of graduate school. My first marriage lasted less than five years and ended in divorce. I was left with nothing. My first job was writing software manuals. I’ve never joined a company…
The estimable Ben Kunz recently blogged about Modeling the Human Projection of Bullshit. He has a three-part framework, and I think it provides a good way to think about things. Here’s the main idea, from his blog: So why does everyone, including me, craft levels of BS? My suggested framework for bullshit has three vectors: Level…
Thanks to all of you who responded to my post about seeking a publisher or self-publishing Writing Without Bullshit. I’ve made a decision, and many of you were very helpful in that choice. Justin McCullough asked me what my goal was. That’s the right question. My goal is to reach as many people as possible with…
I need to decide how to publish my upcoming book Writing Without Bullshit. Here’s what I want from a publishing model: everything. I’m not going to get it, of course. But you can help me figure out which imperfect model is best. So far I don’t have a book, I have an outline. I’ll finish the manuscript by December….
Today, I unveil the plan for my book. I’ll be pitching it to publishers soon. Here’s the title, subtitle, and table of contents. I took a shot at the flap copy, too. I’m avidly interested in your reaction. (I wrote the title, subtitle, and flap copy as they would appear on the book. I enhanced the…
Jon Stewart inspires me. In my moments of absolute fantasy I imagine I am in some small way contributing to the work he began. So it gives me great pleasure that he devoted the final moments of his final show to the theme “Bullshit is everywhere.” He cites, for example: The bullshit of infinite possibility:…
I’ll be in Boston Thursday, July 23 at 6PM. Come see me present the Without Bullshit ideas for the first time in any public setting. I’d like to see you there, listen, and answer your questions.