Authonomy.com

While this blog entry might be considered self-serving (then again, what blog isn’t?) I need to tell you about an interesting Web site I found. It is interesting both for authors and for people who like the read. Those of you who cannot read probably aren’t reading this post anyway.

Harper Collins, one of the mega publishing houses with many imprints, has finally caved to the constant bitch-slapping it received about printing the same five books over and over again. They created a Web site which lets authors post some/all of their work for public review and comment. Book readers can communicate directly with the authors. If they like a book they can choose to “back” the book on the site. There is a convoluted formula to calculate ranking with. The site welcomes regular readers. Actually, it encourages the regular readers to join. It’s all free. Yes, the site has some technical problems, but those are mostly for authors trying to upload things.

What does HC get out of this? Well, periodically it takes the top N ranked books and forces their in-house editors to review them (along with the user feedback) for possible publishing contract. Of course, we have those who shouldn’t be writing out there trying to play ranking games to keep their book on the editor’s desk, but I could care less about that. I posted the promotional version of Infinite Exposure on the site mainly to get the feedback from readers. I’m not going to change anything in the book since I have it finalized for printing, but I will attempt to incorporate the comments into anything new I write.

http://www.authonomy.com/ViewBook.aspx?bookid=13804

So far the only major drawback I find with the site is that there is no manner of reading off-line. I don’t currently have a net-book (and until they get the battery life up to seven days instead of 70 minutes, I don’t want one). This means I have to read sitting at my desk, or lugging my laptop with power cable, into bed. This has become a regular occurrence for much of the business world it appears. Rather than fix the battery problem, the hard drive problem, and the software problem, a new product is created to make all of those problems more bearable.

http://www.brookstone.com/home-office-computer-accessories_e-pad-laptop-lap-desk.html?bkiid=categoryLandingPage_Home_Home_Office|C4CategoryProdList1FDT|6905345

Oh well. If you like being able to read books before they are published, and in many cases helping to shape their content or helping them to actually get published, you should check out http://www.authonomy.com.