Month: April 2023

In today’s Journal * Social Media * The Purpose of My Bradbury Challenge * Short Story Prize Opportunity * The Writing * Of Interest Social Media Well, I established a MeWe account. Immediately it felt a lot “cleaner” than Facebook. Not sanitized by any means, but not riddled with disease and unreasoning hatred either. And MeWe doesn’t manipulate the snot out of everything the way Facebook does. All of that said, I honestly don’t know whether or how long I’ll stay on MeWe either. It isn’t that I’m not social at all, but I realized two things: One, my primary … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Welcome * Cycling Redux * Bradbury Challenge Report, and Going Back to Monday * The Writing * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “Stop worrying about your lack of sales of your five novels, take a deep breath, and go write. And remember to have fun.” Dean Wesley Smith “The question is not what you look at but what you see.” Henry David Thoreau “I experimented by turning off all my device notifications and staying in the groove for hours. The experience was like being deep in prayer at the altar … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * Social Media Alternatives Redux * Cycling * Of Interest Quote of the Day “I tell would-be writers that there are three things to forget about. First, talent. I used to worry that I had no talent, and it compelled me to work harder. Second, inspiration. Habit will serve you a lot better. And third, imagination. Don’t worry, you have it.” Octavia Butler Social Media Alternatives Redux Yesterday I asked for input from anyone who has been using any Facebook alternatives. (Nothing yet.) In today’s “Of Interest” see the article about Substack’s … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Correction * MeWe? Other Facebook Alternatives? * Bradbury Challenge Report * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “No one is discontented at not being a king except a discrowned king … unhappiness almost invariably indicates the existence of a road not taken, a talent undeveloped, a self not recognized.” Blaise Pascal “I always wanted to be someone better the next day than I was the day before.” Sidney Poitier Correction In a recent post I inadvertently omitted a link to download a free annotated copy of Heinlein’s Rules. You can get … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Turbulence * Cycling * A Reminder * My Little Baby Cat * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.” Franklin D. Roosevelt “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” Kurt Vonnegut “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Albert Einstein (Think about that before you resort to the myths to write.) “Brittney Griner to pen memoir about her 10-month … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Dealing with a Situation * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “Merely providing an AI tool with a prompt, without extending creative control over how the tool interprets the prompt and generates expressive material, will fail to meet the standard for copyright registration.” US Copyright Office Guidance, March 17, 2023 “The registrant must identify the “traditional elements of authorship” that were executed by a human author and explicitly disclaim the AI-generated content in the application.” US Copyright Office Guidance, March 17, 2023 All of that (and the other guidelines) said, one … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Taking a Book to Paper * The Bradbury Challenge * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “Challenges have this nasty habit of quickly uncovering issues in your motivation and your consistency in writing and other life issues you are dealing with.” Dean Wesley Smith “I have been known to write 90,000 word novels in days, or sometimes I just putter on various things and it takes me three weeks to write a short novel while I am doing other things.” Dean Wesley Smith on his production Taking a Book to Paper … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Welcome * Revisiting Fun in Challenges * The Bradbury Challenge * The Writing * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “People are what they do, not what they say.” James Lee Burke “[J]ust go play. Have fun. Tell yourself stories.” Dean Wesley Smith Welcome Welcome to Oleg and Thomas and all other new subscribers to this Journal. If there’s anything I can do to help with your writing, feel free to let me know. You can reach me directly at harveystanbrough@gmail.com. Be sure to check out the free, downloadable, searchable PDF … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Fun in Writing Fiction * The Writing and a Reminder * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “Never think about the final product, just the process of writing and keeping the writing fun.” Dean Wesley Smith “If you think something sucks in a story, leave it in the story, your creative voice put it there for a reason. Trust it.” Dean Wesley Smith Fun in Writing Fiction A couple days ago I wrote a bit about the “Fun-to-Work” ratio. Today, coincidentally, Dean Wesley Smith wrote “Keep the Fun.” You can see … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Newsletters and Fiction * The Writing * Of Interest Quotes of the Day “The way to succeed is to double your failure rate.” Thomas J. Watson “Dare to be bad.” Nina Kiriki Hoffman “Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what’s more than enough.” Billie Holiday “I have not failed, but found 1000 ways to not make a light bulb.” Thomas Edison “To be ignorant of situations I can do nothing about is a blessing, not a curse.” Moi Newsletters and Fiction I don’t watch or … Read more