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Thursday, March 12, 2009

Cyberland


Once upon a time you wrote a book and then you put it out there and did some readings, some media, then hoped for the best. Those days are long gone. The cyber author is a twenty-four-seven author. You have to always be blogging, twittering, facebooking, texting, writing, skyping, inquiring, answering, expanding, linking, digging, buzzing, posting, releasing, and it never never stops. You could chain yourself to your computer twenty-four-seven and still never get it all done. Basically you are spitting into the wind. There are now a million hotdog stands and you have to make your stand different. It is not that the world will come to an end if you don't promote your book it is the nagging feeling that after all this time and effort you really should give it your best shot. Besides, EVERYONE ELSE IS DOING IT. This more than anything else puts the bags under your eyes, burns your retinas, and makes you wish for a world before a cathode ray ever burned upon the land. Computers are empowerment but they are also slave drivers. It is the stock you just cant check enough, the email that will never cease to tantalize--why my life could change with one email! It might, but it probably wont. It doesn't matter. It is that possibility over the far horizon that pulls us back to the screen. A funny thing is that if you put a computer in a field, then it just becomes a piece of plastic: a glorified communicator in the Star Trek mode. The reality is that the cyber landscape has nothing to do with the physical world. It may codify, initiate, create, but eventually some human with some thing will have to work on the bits and bytes or it is worthless. Someone will have to deliver your groceries, deliver your car, publish your book. Without the person on the far end then the computer is just a sophisticated game playing you the user. If you really break it down the cyber world is television for creatures who get bored very quickly. Hmm..the office, home is boring...I wonder what the rest of the world is doing in CYBERLAND. The sad question is certainly one we all deal with when we emerge from our homes or offices and see a beautiful sunset or a frozen pond or the peace of a sunrise--what did I miss while I was away?

Books by William Hazelgrove