Happy Wednesday! I hope everyone who attended RWA had a great time and welcome back!
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For all the authors in the Bitchery who didn’t make it to RWA, Author Earnings put their presentation online regarding Amazon revenue. I believe these are only the slides from the presentation, so you won’t get the talking points or any elaboration. But hopefully, you still find it helpful!
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So many people sent me this link! It would have been a crime not to include it. NPR did an interview with a cover model. And like usual, I wish the interview were longer:
Modeling is a side gig for Baca, who also has an office job. He says he likes the balance of the two.
“On one hand, I get this humbling job that I go into work every day, I work hard, and then I get to step into this other world where I get to be this hero,” he says. “I get to step into a studio, I get to go in there and say ‘OK, now I get to be a gladiator, now I get to be a prince, now I get to be this mountain of molten lust.'”
I’m sure I’m not the only one fascinated by the cover design process, whether it’s with models, art, etc.
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Publishers Weekly has announced that Audible will be introducing “short forum audio streaming” and I’m still trying to work out what that means:
In a move that further expands Audible Inc.’s reach beyond the audiobook market, the Amazon subsidiary has unveiled an on-demand, unlimited listening service called Channels. The ad-free service, which is free to Audible subscribers (and was rolled out to some members in beta this spring), features curated short-form audio. Non-subscribers can access the content for $4.95 a month.
Channels listeners will find a consistently updated roster of original programming and exclusive content that includes comedy, episodic programs, lectures, and narrated selections from newspapers like The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post (owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos).
It sounds like a podcast service by Audible? Those who had access to the beta, please fill me in!
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Kelly Faircloth was also at RWA to accept the 2016 Veritas Award, but she was still kicking ass over a Jezebel‘s Pictorial talking about the Smithsonian’s collection of historical cosmetics:
Like so many of us, the Smithsonian has been collecting cosmetics for decades, except out of historical interest rather than laziness and fond memories of that frosted blue eyeshadow from junior-senior. And now, you can poke through their holdings from the comfort of your own home…
Browsing allows you to watch beauty norms morph from era to era. For instance, they’ve got a razor from the 1920s specially designed for shaving your armpits, because sleeveless dresses that showed your armpits where becoming more customary. Then there’s the loop-de-loop where tanning became hugely popular in the 20th century before giving way to sunscreen and concerns about skin cancer today.
I may be in DC in October, as the Cute Boy™ is doing a marathon there. While he’s running, it’s very possibly I could sneak off to the Smithsonian.
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Don’t forget to share what super cool things you’ve seen, read, or listened to this week! And if you have anything you think we’d like to post on a future Wednesday Links, send it my way!
I would have have tried the new Audible Channels already, if it were possible to stream them through the site the way you can the audiobooks. However, Channels seems to be usable via Audible’s various apps only.
Tangential to the Smithsonian link, Besame Cosmetics at Sephora do reproductions of classic makeup colors from the 1920s-1950s. So going on my birthday list!!
If the Smithsonian does not have the ice-blue Aziza eyeshadow, it’s a travesty.
Meanwhile, linked on the NPR interview page: http://www.npr.org/2015/07/29/426731847/happy-ever-after-100-swoon-worthy-romances
I gave up on the Author Earnings presentation when they showed that ~423K is smaller than ~235K + `90K.
Saw an article about Channels in the Chicago Tribune which made it sound like mostly a curated selection of podcasts? That didn’t sound useful to me since the podcasts I want, like SBTB, I get on my iPhone for free
I have access to Channels but haven’t tried them as I have too many books I want to listen to.
Ok, so I took a peek at Channels. I had actually picked some. In the mystery channel, there were short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, Dashiell Hammett, Lawerence Block, etc. So well known mystery authors.
Comedy Mixtape has very short recordings. I listened to 2 Onion articles that were recorded. One was “A Local Woman Tragically Sucumbs to her Natural Hair Color”
There’s a “Learn Something Amazing” channel. Most of these recordings are about 10-15 minutes long. I started listening to the clip, “How Tuberculosis Shaped Victorian Fashion”.
I’m also following Ted Talks-Our Favorites, Science This – Memory, McSweeny’s fiction, and Meditation.
They have many more options too.
I thought the most recent e-mail I received about Channels said it was out of Beta?
I was excited to try it when I got the first e-mail announcement, but I couldn’t access it that day, and by the time Channels actually hit my app, my fervor had cooled. If I weren’t already a podcast listener, I might be more intrigued, but as it is, I already have a nice pool of audio content to pull from between audiobooks.
You might find this page helpful if you’re thinking about checking it out, though. GoodEReader has a list of all of the Channels here: http://goodereader.com/blog/audiobooks/here-are-all-of-the-audible-channels-and-content-producers
(OK, scrolling through that list, I found FLOTUS Files: First Ladies in History, which looks interesting, and is only available through July. I’ll probably check it out.)
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