Liz Wagoner

1.
“Why are they still bothering with paperbacks?” This came from a coffee-shop acquaintance when he heard my book was soon to come out in paperback, nine months after its hardcover release. “Anyone who wants it half price already bought it on ebook, or Amazon.”

Interestingly, his point wasn’t the usual hardcovers-are-dead-long-live-the-hardcover knell. To his mind, what was the use of a second, cheaper paper version anymore, when anyone who wanted it cheaply had already been able to get it in so many different ways?

I would have taken issue with his foregone conclusion about the domination of ebooks over paper, but I didn’t want to spend my babysitting time down that rabbit hole. But he did get me thinking about the role of the paperback relaunch these days, and how publishers go about getting attention for this third version of a novel — fourth, if you count audiobooks.

I did what I usually do when I’m puzzling through something, which is to go back to my journalism-school days and report on it. Judging by the number of writers who asked me to share what I heard, there are a good number of novelists who don’t quite know what to do with their paperbacks, either.

Here’s what I learned, after a month of talking to editors, literary agents, publishers, and other authors: A paperback isn’t just a cheaper version of the book anymore. It’s a makeover. A facelift. And for some, a second shot.

2.
About ebooks. How much are they really cutting into print, both paperbacks and hardcovers? Putting aside the hype and the crystal ball, how do the numbers really look?

The annual Bookstats Report from the Association of American Publishers (AAP), which collects data from 1,977 publishers, is one of the most reliable measures. In the last full report — which came out July 2012 — ebooks outsold hardcovers for the first time, representing $282.3 million in sales (up 28.1%), compared to adult hardcover ($229.6 million, up 2.7%). But not paperback — which, while down 10.5%, still represented $299.8 million in sales. The next report comes out this July, and it remains to be seen whether ebook sales will exceed paper. Monthly stat-shots put out by the AAP since the last annual report show trade paperbacks up, but the group’s spokesperson cautioned against drawing conclusions from interim reports rather than year-end numbers.

Numbers aside, do we need to defend whether the paperback-following-hardcover still has relevance?

“I think that as opposed to a re-release being less important, it’s more than ever important because it gives a book a second chance with a new cover and lower cost, plus you can use all the great reviews the hardcover got,” says MJ Rose, owner of the book marketing firm Authorbuzz, as well as a bestselling author of novels including The Book of Lost Fragrances. “So many books sell 2,000 or 3,000 copies in hardcover and high-priced ebooks, but take off when they get a second wind from trade paperback and their e-book prices drop.”

What about from readers’ perspectives? Is there something unique about the paperback format that still appeals?

I put the question to booksellers, though of course as bricks-and-mortar sellers, it’s natural that they would have a bias toward paper. Yet the question isn’t paper versus digital: it’s whether they are observing interest in a paper book can be renewed after it has already been out for nine months to a year, and already available at the lower price, electronically.

“Many people still want the portability of a lighter paper copy,” said Deb Sundin, manager of Wellesley Books in Wellesley, MA. “They come in before vacation and ask, ‘What’s new in paper?’ ”

“Not everyone e-reads,” says Nathan Dunbar, a manager at Barnes & Noble in Skokie, IL. “Many customers tell us they’ll wait for the paperback savings. Also, more customers will casually pick up the paperback over hardcover.”

Then there’s the issue of what a new cover can do. “For a lot of customers the paperback is like they’re seeing it for the first time,” says Mary Cotton, owner of Newtonville Books in Newtonvillle, MA. “It gives me an excuse to point it out to people again as something fresh and new, especially if it has a new cover.”

3.
A look at a paperback’s redesign tells you a thing or two about the publisher’s mindset: namely, whether or not the house believes the book has reached its intended audience, and whether there’s another audience yet to reach. Beyond that, it’s anyone’s Rorschach. Hardcovers with muted illustrations morph into pop art, and vice versa. Geometric-patterned book covers are redesigned with nature imagery; nature imagery in hardcover becomes photography of women and children in the paperback. Meg Wolitzer, on a panel about the positioning of women authors at the recent AWP conference, drew knowing laughter for a reference to the ubiquitous covers with girls in a field or women in water. Whether or not publishers want to scream book club, they at least want to whisper it.

“It seems that almost every book these days gets a new cover for the paperback. It’s almost as if they’re doing two different books for two different audiences, with the paperback becoming the ‘book club book,’” says Melanie Benjamin, author of The Aviator’s Wife. Benjamin watched the covers of her previous books, including Mrs. Tom Thumb and Alice I Have Been, change from hardcovers that were “beautiful, and a bit brooding” to versions that were “more colorful, more whimsical.”

A mood makeover is no accident, explains Sarah Knight, a senior editor at Simon & Schuster, and can get a paperback ordered in a store that wouldn’t be inclined to carry its hardcover. “New cover art can re-ignite interest from readers who simply passed the book over in hardcover, and can sometimes help get a book displayed in an account that did not previously order the hardcover because the new art is more in line with its customer base.” Some stores, like the big-boxes and airports, also carry far more paperbacks than hardcovers. Getting into those aisles in paperback can have an astronomical effect on sales.

An unscientific look at recent relaunches shows a wide range of books that got full makeovers: Olive Kitteridge, A Visit From the Goon Squad, The Newlyweds, The Language of Flowers, The Song Remains the Same, The Age of Miracles, Arcadia, and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, as did my own this month (The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D.)

Books that stayed almost completely the same, plus or minus a review quote and accent color, include Wild, Beautiful Ruins, The Snow Child, The Weird Sisters, The Paris Wife, Maine, The Marriage Plot, The Art of Fielding, The Tiger’s Wife, Rules of Civility, and The Orchardist.

Most interesting are the books that receive the middle-ground treatment, designers flirting with variations on their iconic themes. The Night Circus, The Invisible Bridge, State of Wonder, The Lifeboat, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, Tell the Wolves I’m Home, Tigers in Red Weather, and The Buddha in the Attic are all so similar to the original in theme or execution that they’re like a wink to those in the know — and pique the memory of those who have a memory of wanting to read it the first time around.

Some writers become attached to their hardcovers and resist a new look in paperback. Others know it’s their greatest chance of coming out of the gate a second time — same race, fresh horse.

When Jenna Blum’s first novel, Those Who Save Us, came out in hardcover in 2004, Houghton Mifflin put train tracks and barbed wire on the cover. Gorgeous, haunting, and appropriate for a WWII novel, but not exactly “reader-friendly,” Blum recalls being told by one bookseller. The following year, the paperback cover — a girl in a bright red coat in front of a European bakery — telegraphed the novel’s Holocaust-era content without frightening readers away.

“The paperback cover helped save the book from the remainder bins, I suspect,” Blum says.

Armed with her paperback, Jenna went everywhere she was invited, which ended up tallying more than 800 book clubs. Three years later, her book hit the New York Times bestseller list.

“Often the hardcover is the friends-and-family edition, because that’s who buys it, in addition to collectors,” she says. “It’s imperative that a paperback give the novel a second lease on life if the hardcover didn’t reach all its intended audience, and unless you are Gillian Flynn, it probably won’t.”

There’s no hard-and-fast rule about when the paperback should ride in for that second lease. A year to paperback used to be standard, but now a paperback can release earlier — to capitalize on a moderately successful book before it’s forgotten — or later, if a hardcover is still turning a strong profit.

At issue: the moment to reissue, and the message to send.

“Some books slow down at a point, and the paperback is a great opportunity to repromote and reimagine,” says Sheila O’Shea, associate publisher for Broadway and Hogarth paperbacks at the Crown Publishing Group (including, I should add, mine). “The design of a paperback is fascinating, because you have to get it right in a different way than the hardcover. If it’s a book that relates specifically to females you want that accessibility at the table — women drawn in, wondering, Ooh, what’s that about.”

The opportunity to alter the message isn’t just for cover design, but the entire repackaging of the book — display text, reviews put on the jacket, synopses used online, and more. In this way, the paperback is not unlike the movie trailer which, when focus-grouped, can be reshaped to spotlight romantic undertones or a happy ending.

“Often by the time the paperback rolls around, both the author and publicist will have realized where the missed opportunities were for the hardcover, and have a chance to correct that,” says Simon & Schuster’s Sarah Knight. “Once your book has been focus-grouped on the biggest stage — hardcover publication — you get a sense of the qualities that resonate most with people, and maybe those were not the qualities you originally emphasized in hardcover. So you alter the flap copy, you change the cover art to reflect the best response from the ideal readership, and in many cases, the author can prepare original material to speak to that audience.”

Enter programs like P.S. (Harper Collins) and Extra Libris (Crown Trade and Hogarth), with new material in the back such as author interviews, essays, and suggested reading lists.

“We started Extra Libris last spring to create more value in the paperback, to give the author another opportunity to speak to readers. We had been doing research with booksellers and our reps and book club aficionados asking, What would you want in paperbacks? And it’s always extra content,” says Crown’s O’Shea. “Readers are accustomed to being close to the content and to the authors. It’s incumbent on us to have this product to continue the conversation.”

4.
Most of a paperback discussion centers on the tools at a publisher’s disposal, because frankly, so much of a book’s success is about what a publisher can do — from ads in trade and mainstream publications, print and online, to talking up the book in a way that pumps enthusiasm for the relaunch. But the most important piece is how, and whether, they get that stack in the store.

My literary agent Julie Barer swears the key to paperback success is physical placement. “A big piece of that is getting stores (including the increasingly important Costco and Target) to take large orders, and do major co-op. I believe one of the most important things that moves books is that big stack in the front of the store,” she says. “A lot of that piece is paid for and lobbied for by the publisher.”

Most publicists’ opportunities for reviews have come and gone with the hardcover, but not all, says Kathleen Zrelak Carter, a partner with the literary PR firm Goldberg McDuffie. “A main factor for us in deciding whether or not to get involved in a paperback relaunch is the off-the-book-page opportunities we can potentially pursue. This ranges from op-ed pieces to essays and guest blog posts,” she says. “It’s important for authors to think about all the angles in their book, their research and inspiration, but also to think about their expertise outside of being a writer, and how that can be utilized to get exposure.”

What else can authors do to support the paperback launch?

Readings have already been done in the towns where they have most connections, and bookstores don’t typically invite authors to come for a paperback relaunch. But many are, however, more than happy to have relaunching authors join forces with an author visiting for a new release, or participate in a panel of authors whose books touch on a common theme.

And just because a bookstore didn’t stock a book in hardcover doesn’t mean it won’t carry the paperback. Having a friend or fellow author bring a paperback to the attention of their local bookseller, talking up its accolades, can make a difference.

I asked folks smarter than I about branding, and they said the most useful thing for authors receiving a paperback makeover is to get on board with the new cover. That means fronting the new look everywhere: the author website, Facebook page, and Twitter. Change the stationery and business cards too if, like I did, you made them all about a cover that is no longer on the shelf.

“Sometimes a writer can feel, ‘But I liked this cover!’” says Crown’s O’Shea. “It’s important to be flexible about the approach, being open to the idea of reimagining your own work for a broader audience, and using the tools available to digitally promote the book with your publisher.”

More bluntly said, You want to sell books? Get in the game. Your hardcover might have come and gone, but in terms of your book’s rollout, it’s not even halftime yet.

“The paperback is truly a new release, and a smart author will treat it as such,” says Randy Susan Meyers, author The Murderer’s Daughters, her new novel The Comfort Of Lies, and co-author of the publishing-advice book What To Do Before Your Book Launch with book marketer and novelist M.J. Rose. “Make new bookmarks, spruce up your website, and introduce yourself to as many libraries as possible. Bookstores will welcome you, especially when you plan engaging multi-author events. There are opportunities for paperbacks that barely exist for hardcovers, including placement in stores such as Target, Costco, Walmart, and a host of others. Don’t let your paperback launch slip by. For me, as for many, it was when my book broke out.”

 

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As I mentioned in my last post, the ”Short Guide to Digital Humanities” (pages 121-136 of Digital_Humanities, by Anne Burdick, Johanna Drucker, Peter Lunenfeld, Todd Presner, and Jeffrey Schnapp, MIT Press, 2012) includes the following stricture under the heading “What Isn’t the Digital Humanities?”:

The mere use of digital tools for the purpose of humanistic research and communication does not qualify as Digital Humanities.

I’m not going to speculate on the reasons that these authors make this declaration, or on why they feel they (or anyone else) should be authorized to decide what kinds of activities do and do not “qualify” as parts of the field.

Here I want only to reflect on the potential damage done to the field by adhering to this restriction.

First, I think it raises questions about the credibility of the field. Among the strongest justifications for the existence of DH is … read the full story:

This spring, terror has a new name:

 

SCREAMING BLOOD-SOAKED LAGOMORPH RECKONING OF DOOOOOM

With everything you've come to expect from a low budget, Easter-themed horror movie! 

Including:

Idiotic, overly testosterone-laden frat boys:

 

  "There's old blood and creepy hooks hanging everywhere in this abandoned house that's miles from anywhere - so let's check out the basement! Shyah!"

 

Gratuitous nudity:

 

"OMG Jill, we should go skinny dipping!"

 

That one guy with common sense who always dies at the beginning:

"Guys, this is a really bad idea. Why don't we just get in the car and leave? It's right over there! Jill, put your clothes back on! Well, I'm leavinaaaaauuuuuugggghhhhh!!!!"

 

Those freaky long-limbed creatures that crawl on ceilings:

NOPE. Nope. Nope-nope-nope-nope!

 

And of course, creepy two-headed chicks:

 "Come play with us.

"We'll play ... chicken."

 

So this Easter, hop on over ... 

 ... FOR A KILLING.

  .... FROM A CREEPY COW/SHEEP/BUNNY ... THING.   UM.  
YEAH. 

 

 

Thanks to Geneva W., Kathleen L., John B., Michelle L., Alyssa T., Anne B., & Lisa F. for the basket case ... OF HORROR. 

(Ok, so today wasn't the best pun day. WHAT.)

Oh, those sick, twisted "gamers." How will society survive their foul stain?

On Monday, the New York Daily News' Mike Lupica reignited the ever-popular "do video games cause mass murder" debate with a story bound to send young American males into a furor of rage and spitting madness. (That is, if they weren't already in that state after their most recent weekend-long marathon session of "Call of Duty: Black Ops 2.")

Lupica quotes at length the hearsay account of an unnamed law enforcement "veteran," who seems to take special care in enunciating the word "gamer" with the hatred and disgust that one might normally employ for "child rapist" or "genocidal totalitarian dictator."

"These guns, one of them an AR-15, in the hands of a violent, insane gamer. It was like porn to a rapist. They feed on it until they go out and say, enough of the video screen. Now I’m actually going to be a hunter.

"There really was no other subject matter inside his head. Just this: Kill, kill, kill. It really was like he was lost in one of his own sick games."

Continue Reading...

Under Ohio state law, coaches are among the many school officials mandated to report crimes involving their students. And according to witness testimony and text messages introduced as evidence in the Steubenville rape trial, head football coach Reno Saccoccia knew about the rape of a 16-year-old girl by two of his players, but didn't say a word about it to school administrators or local law enforcement.

So why does he still have a job?

Deadspin editor Barry Petchesky has a theory, and it's that, much like Trent Mays and Ma'lik Richmond, "local legend" Saccoccia believed that his status as a local football celebrity put him above the law:

Continue Reading...

The brutal gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old medical student on a moving Delhi bus last December sparked a wave of protests across India, and inspired a newly-strengthened set of laws on rape, street harassment and other forms of violence against women. But ongoing reports of sexual violence, and news of yet another gang rape in the central state of Madhya Pradesh, is proof that -- in India and everywhere else -- there is no silver bullet for sexual violence.

Indian feminists have long argued that in addition to stronger laws, cultural attitudes towards women, sex and consent -- and views about the role of men in stopping violence against women -- need to change. And while the country reels from another brutal rape case, a group of men in Delhi are trying to start the shift.

As Joanna Sugden at The Wall Street Journal reports:

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If you like the idea of sushi for bentos, don’t forget to check out the detailed sushi rice or shari lesson. As long as you stay away from using raw, untreated fish, sushi is great for bentos since the vinegar, sugar and salt in the rice helps to preserve its freshness longer than plain rice.

Here’s the bento I made with the salmon chirashizushi as the main part.

The box in the back has some stewed carrot, new potato and onions, blanched spinach with sesame sauce, and boiled romanesco with wasabi sauce. Everything was made in advance, so all that needed to be done was to pack it in the box.

Plain sushi rice can be frozen and defrosted just like plain rice, so you can make it in batches if you love that sour-sweet-salty taste.

The New Jersey Senate Health Committee convened on Monday to consider a proposal outlawing the widely discredited practice of "gay conversion" therapy in the state.

Believers in reparative therapy think that being gay is a pathology, one that can be "cured" through counseling. The alleged treatment persists despite being discredited by many professional associations and other counseling groups.

As noted by The New York Times, "harsh aversion techniques" like using electric shock therapy and nausea-inducing drugs to counter "homosexual urges" have largely disappeared over the last three decades, only to be replaced by "kinder, gentler" reparative therapies that pathologize homosexuality and link same-sex attraction to emotional wounds and sexual abuse during childhood.

Jonathan Bier, an 18-year-old college student, testified to the Senate committee about his experience after he was told that he would be expelled from his yeshiva if he didn’t undergo conversion therapy.

Continue Reading...

Before Andrew "Weev" Auernheimer entered the Newark courtroom Monday to receive his sentence and begin a 41 month stint in prison, the loudmouthed hacker stood before  gathered supporters and read from Keats' The Fall of Hyperion - A Dream.

"Fanatics have their dreams, wherewith they weave A paradise for a sect; the savage too From forth the loftiest fashion of his sleep Guesses at Heaven." So begins the epic -- an appropriately grandiose reading for the hacker-come-troll to choose. Keats' poem tells a story of transcendence, in which poets and dreamers are challenged, persecuted and deified. And Auernheimer (although his tongue ever wedged in his cheek) is asking for a little deification too. He is the latest victim in the government's harsh crack down on hackers -- and he wants you to know it.

Continue Reading...

On Wonderland, Alice has had a deep trawl through the world of Etsy Star Wars posters and rounded up a collection of top choices, including the Space Cowboy by CONCEPCIONSTUDIOS (top) and Vintage Pop Art set from Posterinspired (right).

Beautiful Etsy Star Wars posters

Last summer I sat down in my backyard one evening to reflect on my life. For reasons that I can't really remember right now, I was feeling unhappy about living in Worcester, and wondering whether I should go on the job market and find my family a new place to live. Before I began to reflect on the topic, I did something I haven't done in a long time. I asked God to send me a sign.

I wanted some sort of divine finger pointing me to the direction I should take: stay or go?

I closed my eyes and meditated for a while, until I heard a rustling noise right near the bench I was sitting on. I opened my eyes and saw that a skunk was about three feet away from me, snuffling his snout through the grass and looking for grubs. I had competing impulses to jump up and run away and to continue sitting quietly and hope for the best. Since he was already so close to me without having taking any notice, I figured it best to sit tight and let him proceed on his way.

Which he did, walking directly under the bench I was sitting on and meandering his way across the yard and eventually back behind the garage. I felt a small thrill to have experienced such closeness to a wild animal in my own backyard, even if it was a pretty common and urban wild animal.

But immediately after he left, it occurred to me that such an unusual experience had to be the sign I was waiting for from God. But what did it mean?

I decided quickly that it meant I should stay. God sent me that strange encounter to remind me that wonderful and unusual encounters were available to me right here where I lived; I didn't need to go searching for excitement in my life elsewhere, when I could find it right here in my own backyard. The thrill I felt in my encounter with the wild was open to me always, if only I was willing to open my eyes and experience it.

Several weeks later, though, still feeling some dissatisfaction with Worcester, I realized that I had obviously misinterpreted the sign. While it may have been a wild animal, it was a particular wild animal: a skunk. God, with an impressive sense of humor, had sent me a very obvious message: Worcester stinks—get out as soon as possible.

It has been almost a year now since I met that brave little skunk, and I have no idea anymore what its appearance might have meant. I still can't shake the feeling that it meant something, though—nothing like it has happened to me before or since, and the fact that I asked for a sign just before he came to visit me gives me this inescapable feeling that he was sent for me. I just can't seem to settle on a definitive interpretation of the meaning of that skunk.

Which brings me to Harold Camping, whose prediction that the Rapture would occur on May 21st proved so spectacularly wrong, and who has responded to his error by acknowledging that he was wrong—and posing a definitive new date for the Rapture, on October 21st.

While I don't much believe that anything like a Rapture will take place whenever our time here in this universe has run its course, I don't have any problem with people like Harold Camping believing in such things, as long as it doesn't interfere with charitable and loving practice towards your fellow human beings. And I don't really even have a problem with people speculating about when the end of the world will take place—although, as many commentators on Camping have pointed out, Christ specifically says that nobody, except for God in heaven, knows when the end of the world will take place.

What strikes me as the real problem with Harold Camping, and the legions of others down through history who have made such predictions, is their certainty. There I think they go terribly wrong.

Most of the great ills in the world, it seems to me, are caused by people who have absolutely no doubts in the truth of their convictions. When you are fully convinced that you are right, it gives you the latitude to dismiss the views of others, to justify bad behavior on your part, and to browbeat everyone around you with your convictions. It impels you to make predictions about the end of the world and pronounce them on your radio show, inspiring millions of people to fear and hope that they will be in heaven at the end of some specific day. It leaves a lot of sad and disillusioned people, still standing here on earth, at the end of that day.

None of this means that people shouldn't have strong convictions—they should. But my strongest conviction is that you should always allow for the possibility that you are wrong. Maybe if you have a really strong conviction, you're ninety-percent convinced. But holding out that ten percent might make all the difference in the world in how you behave towards people who don't agree with you.

My experience with my smelly little friend served as a great reminder of all this for me. Whatever I believe he might have meant, or not meant, I should always hold out the possibility that my interpretation might be wrong. And so, of course, should Harold Camping and all his followers.

Maybe that's what the skunk was sent to teach me, after all.

Or maybe not.

A few weeks ago I joined some teacher friends and their class of high school students on a climb up Mount Monadnock in Jaffrey, New Hampshire.


I had attempted to climb Monadnock once before, but on that day a rainstorm blew in as we were preparing for the final push to the top, and so we turned back without reaching the summit. I was determined to succeed in my second attempt at the mountain, which tops out at 3,165 feet, and is either the most or second-most climbed mountain in the world, depending upon whose press you are reading (its competitor is Japan's Mount Fuji).

We reached the state park that surrounds the mountain and started down the trail at around 9:30 am. Although rain was predicted later that day—it would turn out to be the day when the tornadoes landed here in central Massachusetts—the morning was beautiful, with clear skies and warm temperatures.

The presence on the trails of children and teenagers and people dressed in regular workout clothes can make you forget that, even at its modest height and moderately difficult climbing terrain, Monadnock is a mountain. If you take only occasional short stops, and move along at a good clip, you can reach the top in around two hours—but those are two very hard hours. Most of the time you are either walking up steep trail or climbing, hand-over-foot, up rocky formations. I exercise four or five days a week, and consider myself to be in pretty good shape, but I still spent a lot of the climb with my heart pumping hard and my leg muscles burning.

We made it to the top around 11:30, right on schedule, and had a half-hour up there to savor the views while we ate the lunches we had brought. I had my picture snapped on the summit, and took a few of the kids up there as well.

The way down, which took around an hour, proved no less difficult than the way up. Trying to move carefully down the steep trail on jellied legs, especially when the rocks are damp, necessitated plenty of short rests, and led to a few near-slips for me and the kids.

At the bottom of the mountain, in the small store run by the state park rangers, I surveyed the selection of books about Monadnock. Since I have been reading and writing so much about religion and spirituality these days, naturally my eye was drawn to a short little book called The Heart of Monadnock, which had a picture on the cover of an angel superimposed over the mountain. I read on the back that it was by an early feminist, children's author, and mountain climber, Elizabeth Weston Timlow, and that it described the “spiritual transformation she experienced while hiking the trails” of the mountain.

That's for me, I thought. I took it home and sat on my front porch later that afternoon, reading about the mountain I had just climbed.

I wish I could recommend that everyone run out and read this strange little book, but I probably shouldn't. The story takes the form of a meandering description of the travels of an unnamed protagonist—referred to as the Mountain Lover—as he spends day after day climbing and traversing the many paths that crisscross the mountain. The vast majority of the book consists of poetic descriptions of the flora and fauna he encounters, of the views he witnesses, and of the physical and emotional sensations he experiences. They are certainly well-written descriptions . . . but there are just too many of them. I had to push myself to get through the entire thing, which is less than two hundred small pages long.

At the heart of the book, though, comes a scene which imparts its main message—and that message seemed to me one worth sharing.

The Mountain Lover comes to a point at which he has lost the trail, and can't figure out where to go next. He hears a voice, which seems to come from the mountain, that reminds him of a Latin quotation he had learned long ago: “Perge, qua via ducat.” Rough translation: “Go on, as the way will lead.” Still unsure of where to place his feet next, the Mountain Lover follows an instinct and starts moving. Within a few steps he recognizes a familiar landmark and finds his way back to the trail he had lost.

Weston opens the next chapter, after this scene, by philosophizing about his experience: “he had taken confidently that next step in life although he had seen nothing beyond. But when he had taken it, the next lay open to his view, and then the next. Perhaps for some distance only one visible at a time, although he so longed to see the whole way. It needed faith. It was not always easy to go on, just feeling the way with his feet . . . But the necessary thing was to go on—go on.”

“Have the main goal clearly in one's vision,” she concludes. “The great definite end. Then keep an unprejudiced attitude towards the route itself. Sometimes it is just a question of what Carlyle wrote: 'Do the duty that lies nearest thee; the next will already have become clearer.'”


It was easy enough to see how and why this message might come from a lover of mountain climbing. The four hours we spent on the mountain that day consisted of three and a half hours of hard slogging, and thirty minutes of spectacular views at the summit. To speak or think of mountain climbing evokes images of basking in the views of the summit; to actually climb a mountain mostly means walking up steep paths, scrabbling over rocks, sweating, grunting, watching your footing, and taking it one step at a time. Every once in a while you get a glimpse of the scenery through the trees—but only every once in a while.

And although she did not put in exactly these terms, I'm sure Weston meant to convey—and if she didn't, I mean to—that maintaining a spiritual life can feel like much the same kind of experience.

Although we might associate ideas about faith and spirituality with experiences of clarity and insight, with joy and peace, with communing with God and feeling the love of all creatures great and small, the daily experience of it can feel a lot more like slogging up the mountain. You will get your moments of spiritual transformation and inner peace, of feeling a sense of oneness with the universe, etc.--but don't expect them if you are not committed to climbing the mountain first. The daily and weekly acts of attending church services, praying, volunteering, donating to charity, forgiving those who annoy you, and coming down on the right side of the small ethical dilemmas we face every day—those acts are the real work of living with faith and spirituality.

Sometimes that work can be enjoyable and satisfying, in the way that exercise can be enjoyable and satisfying. But sometimes you just feel like sitting on the couch and forgetting about it.

The next time I feel that impulse, and am tempted to give up, I'll try to remember Weston's Mountain Lover.

One more step forward.

This past week I had an essay published in the Worcester Telegram and Gazette on a new book by David Gessner entitled My Green Manifesto. You can see the essay in the newspaper by clicking the title of this post. I have pasted it in below, though, because I want to add a thought or two to the essay in order to link it to the subject matter of this blog.

---------------------------

Protect Your Urban Wilderness

This morning I took a walk up Newton Hill, a wooded isle in the urban sea of Worcester's West Side. As I crossed the perimeter of the hill's base, and made my way up the first path, my feet crunched over broken glass. Just off the trail, a few feet into the woods, I spotted a pile of garbage, replete with beer bottles and fast-food containers and, oddly, a diaper.

I kept moving. As I came to a spot where two paths crossed, I ran into a young man and woman wearing athletic clothes, and holding discs. They were playing the disc golf course that has been set up on the hill with the help of a local advocacy organization, the Friends of Newton Hill. We exchanged a friendly greeting, and I moved my feet further up the hill as they stepped onto the next tee.

Finally I got to the top, a cleanly mowed meadow. At the hill's summit I could see a slab of concrete, and a large metal pole, decorated with graffiti. I made my way over and sat down on the slab, carefully watching my seat and feet to avoid another rash of broken glass.

I pulled out my binoculars, and found what I was looking for: blue jays. I'm not much of a bird watcher, but I've come to enjoy sitting up here and watching these beautifully colored birds. I can identify at least three separate jays on the hill, and like to watch them flit from tree to field, sometimes hanging around their home base and sometimes circling around in the sky above me.

I see other birds, too, but I'm too new at bird-watching to be able to know what they are. As usual, I've forgotten my bird identification book, so I'm content to sit here in solitude and enjoy the peace and quiet, watching the jays. The trees and wildflowers wave in the wind, and clouds are scooting by overhead. An elderly couple comes into view off the path, walking their two dogs and giving me a friendly wave.

This little glimpse of nature in my day, watching birds I know little about amidst the broken glass and sounds of the city below me, probably won't sound very enticing to your typical nature lover, or environmental activist. But it's precisely the kind of natural experience that we need more of, according to Worcester native David Gessner, author of a new book titled "My Green Manifesto."

Mr. Gessner's book describes a canoe trip he took down the Charles River - with its famously elegized "Dirty Water" - with Dan Driscoll, a state Department of Conservation and Recreation employee who has made environmental planning along the Charles his life's work.

The pair encounter nature on the Charles just as I do on Newton Hill, as they wind their way between banks dotted by trophy homes and parking lots. Amid the occasional swirl of garbage, they catch sight of turtles and hawks, herons and ospreys, and more trees and plant life than I can remember.

Mr. Gessner comes away from the trip with two arguments, both made in his book, and both of which I think are worth the consideration of those of us living in Worcester's urban habitat.

First, he challenges us to be hypocrites.

Don't throw up your hands in despair at the prospect of global warming, he says; don't worry about it if you've switched all your light bulbs to fluorescents, but you still like a long hot shower. In the face of dire predictions about the environment, we may be tempted to shut down and give up. Do what you can, Gessner says; better make some commitment than none at all.

His second argument offers a more substantial challenge to us. He offers it, once again, in the face of our potential despair at the magnitude of the problems around us: rising sea levels, polluted skies and water, a doomed Earth.

His prescription is simple: Find a natural place in your own backyard (or neighborhood, or city); fall in love with it; be willing to fight for it.

Following that prescription made Dan Driscoll's fight for the Charles River a successful one. It has also helped animate the Friends of Newton Hill, who have done much good work in cleaning up this space where I felt myself a little closer to nature this morning.

And if enough of us learn to put aside our despair, and instead take up the fight for some local space that we learn to love, it may just help us - in spite of everything - save the world.

----------------------------

So that's the essay as it appeared. Just a few final words on hypocrisy, which may be one of the worst things you can call someone in Christian circles.

But I think Gessner's point may be applicable here as well, especially with reference to so many people I know who have fallen away from religious practice, or from the religion of their childhood. They felt like they could no longer embrace that religion wholeheartedly, or accept all of its tenets, or live up to its principles. So out goes the baby and the bathwater.

It might not be the worst thing, though, to allow ourselves a little hypocrisy here as well. Even if you find yourself troubled by one thing or another, or don't feel connected to certain aspects of a religion, you may still find others which enrich your life, and which you feel comfortable practicing.

If that's the case for you, perhaps being a hypocrite may not be such a bad idea after all.

Last Sunday I found myself in a Catholic church in my old hometown, attending services with my father and brother and his family. The gospel reading for that day was the story of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes; the homily following the gospel was delivered in a long and rambling monotone that had many dozens of people in the pews around me, including my Dad, nodding off on a regular basis.

Because I talk to people for a living, I’m usually able to stay awake even through the most boring of lectures by mentally stepping back and imagining what advice I would give the speaker on improving his or her speaking skills. In the final minutes of his sermon, though, the priest got around to offering an insight into the gospel that I thought was really excellent, and that I wanted to share on this blog.

Before I make his point, let me reproduce here the gospel in question (Matthew 14: 13-21) in order to jog your memory of the story.

“On hearing about the death of John the Baptist, Jesus set out secretly by boat for a secluded place. But the people heard of it, and they followed him on foot from their towns. When Jesus went ashore, he saw the crowd gathered there and he had compassion on them. And he healed their sick.
Late in the afternoon, his disciples came to him and said, ‘We are in a lonely place and it is now late. You should send these people away, so they can go to the villages and buy something for themselves to eat.’
But Jesus replied, ‘They do not need to go away; you give them something to eat.’ They answered, ‘We have nothing here but five loaves and two fishes.’ Jesus said to them, ‘Bring them here to me.’
Then he made everyone sit down on the grass. He took the five loaves and the two fishes, raised his eyes to heaven, pronounced the blessing, broke the loaves and handed them to the disciples to distribute to the people. And they all ate, and everyone had enough; then the disciples gathered up the leftovers, filling twelve baskets. About five thousand men had eaten there besides women and children.”

In the closing minutes of his homily, the priest drew attention to a small detail in this story: Jesus performed the miracle, but it was the disciples—reluctant though they may have been—who provided the loaves and fishes, the raw materials with which Jesus performed that miracle. Jesus did not produce that bountiful harvest from nothing; he took the meager donation that his apostles made and multiplied it many times over.

The priest then described the feeling that I’m sure many of us have when we are deciding whether we should donate a few dollars to a charity, or volunteer for an hour or two, or make some small gesture of kindness: what good could such a miniscule gesture make in the face of such great need? Could my five dollar donation to a cancer fund really make any difference? Does the hour I spend sorting food at a donation center make the tiniest dent in the problem of world hunger?

The story of the loaves and fishes, the priest suggested, teaches us that while we may not be capable of working miracles with our five dollar donation, God might be. We should do what we can to provide the raw materials; maybe they will end up as only the tiniest drop in the bucket . . . but maybe they will provide the raw material that God turns into something miraculous.

With all of that in mind, I want to finish by extending my love and congratulations to Anne and Katie Lang, who are spending the week working on houses for Habitat for Humanity in Portland, Maine. I’m sure they will have their moments, looking at the small part they will play in building a house, when they wonder whether it’s worth the trouble.

I hope, in those minutes, they will remember the story of the loaves and fishes, and take comfort from the possibility that they may yet be providing the raw materials for something miraculous.

Poetry was C.S. Lewis’s first love, although his verse never caught on. He blamed his “pathological hostility to what is fashionable.” There are other explanations… more»

This photograph was taken at the northern train station in Changchun, China:

The sign reads: kāishuǐ jiān 开水间 ("water between").

We recently encountered similar signs in "Opens the waterhouse; open water rooms", where the same kāishuǐ jiān 开水间 as here was translated as "open water rooms". Since we've already fully dissected that mistranslation and explained the cultural background behind the Chinese fondness for hot water, we know that the correct translation for kāishuǐ jiān 开水间 is something like "room for boiling water".

There's not much to add on this occasion, except to say that we see increasing evidence that, as the level of English overall rises, China's netizens themselves point out such errors and make suggestions for improvement, as here, where they offer as alternatives to "water between" the following: Water Heater Room、Boiler Room、Hot Water Room.

As to how "water between" came about in the first place, the translator simply paid no attention to kāi 开 ("open; boil; start", and many other diverse meanings), while they chose the wrong meaning of jiān 間 ("between; among; within a certain space; room; separate; divide").

[Hat tip to Cheng Fangyi]

Phillip Stearns is an artist who commissions blankets and tapestries woven in the USA with glitch-art patterns he generates with broken digital cameras. They're for sale! $200+

Tapestries

Blankets

(via Kottke)

When a Sky News reporter broadcasting live from Tiananmen Square mentioned the 1989 protests, Chinese secret police swooped down on his and hustled him and his cameraman into the back of a van, and kidnapped them to a distant park where they were polite but Orwellian in their explanation for their deeds (they didn't realize he was still broadcasting, and thought it was all going to disc or tape whence it could be scrubbed):

At this point, the police do something Orwellian in its brilliance. An officer who speaks English informs Stone that they have to stop filming because they don’t have official permission. Stone disagrees, saying that they sought and received permission to film in Tiananmen Square. But the officer counters that they’re not in Tiananmen anymore. They’re in a park where the police have brought Stone against his will, and he doesn’t have permission to record in that park, so regrettably the police have no choice but to insist the camera be switched off. Who could have possibly foreseen that little complication?

The officer then takes the Orwellianism to the next level by explaining that Stone and his team are neither being detained nor are they free to go. They can do whatever they like, except that they must go sit in an empty classroom and wait for some unnamed officials to show up.

This reminds me of nothing so much as the DHS checkpoint officials who won't tell you if you're being detained, won't tell you if you're legally required to answer their questions about your citizenship, but also won't let you go.

Video: Chinese police detain British reporter, unaware he’s broadcasting live throughout [Max Fisher/Washington Post]

(via Reddit)

— 1989 Any particle physicist can have a website! 1993 Any researcher can have a website! 1995 Anybody at a university can have a website! 1996 Any company can have a website! 1997 Anybody can have a crappy website! 2001 Anybody can have a decent website if it's a blog! 2003 Tech companies can help anybody have a blog! 2005 Big media companies can have a blog so you don't have to! 2007 Tech companies can help anybody not need to have a blog! 2008 Your website doesn't work on my mobile device! 2009 Tech companies can let you have... (read more)

Further to Xeni's post from yesterday about the landmark ruling by a San Francisco district court judge that the FBI may not issue "national security letters" (NSLs), the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who fought the case, has posted a good explanation about what NSLs are and why they were so creepy:

The controversial NSL provisions EFF challenged on behalf of the unnamed client allow the FBI to issue administrative letters -- on its own authority and without court approval -- to telecommunications companies demanding information about their customers. The controversial provisions also permit the FBI to permanently gag service providers from revealing anything about the NSLs, including the fact that a demand was made, which prevents providers from notifying either their customers or the public. The limited judicial review provisions essentially write the courts out of the process.

In today's ruling, the court held that the gag order provisions of the statute violate the First Amendment and that the review procedures violate separation of powers. Because those provisions were not separable from the rest of the statute, the court declared the entire statute unconstitutional. In addressing the concerns of the service provider, the court noted: "Petitioner was adamant about its desire to speak publicly about the fact that it received the NSL at issue to further inform the ongoing public debate."

"The First Amendment prevents the government from silencing people and stopping them from criticizing its use of executive surveillance power," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "The NSL statute has long been a concern of many Americans, and this small step should help restore balance between liberty and security."

I am so proud of my friends at EFF this morning. Go team!

National Security Letters Are Unconstitutional, Federal Judge Rules

I wrote this letter to my sisters and a few friends on March 5, 2013. 



I'm writing to you in the middle of the night on my 47th birthday to let you know how grateful I am to be alive and to have you in my life.
In case you didn't know, I've been in Hawaii for the last week.  I've been staying in a house overlooking a beautiful waterfall in Kilauea, Kauai. Yesterday, I had a near-drowning experience and today, I know it's a miracle that I'm alive.  I'm having a hard time sleeping tonight, so at the moment it's a terrifying miracle; but it’s a miracle nonetheless. I'm looking forward to when that victorious, "Thank you, God" sets in. 
This week, my good friend JP Allen and I have been leading a Hawaiian Harmonica retreat.  Despite some lingering TMJ/jaw issues, it's been quite wonderful.  Coming from a locked jaw winter in Ohio, this retreat is just what I needed.
Yesterday JP, myself and two of our friends from the retreat were strolling along the hills of black lava overlooking the ocean near Kalihiwai Point.  We hiked down a steep and hidden path behind Ben Stiller's mansion to get to this other worldly place of black lava.   In the last couple days,  there had been significant improvement in my jaw pain of the last 6 weeks, so I was feeling a sense of relief and release.
At one point, the four of us stopped on a natural bridge of lava that overlooked a 15 foot round pool of turbulent water.  Kauai’s  winter ocean waves would travel down a wide canal, crash under this rocky bridge and then would explode up through the round pool like a dragon.   JP referred to this spot as the Dragon Spout.  Apparently on calm days, JP enjoys wading in the pool with seals. But on this 70 degree wintery windy day, it was very excited to watch, but in no way was it calm.
None of us sensed that we were in any danger.  We were standing on dry lava. I was taking pictures with my iPhone thinking about what I might title the photo on my next Facebook post.  Looking back to the ocean, we saw some very large swells coming our way and we stood there on that bridge awaiting the firework display of water crashing up from the dragon’s mouth
Very suddenly and unexpectedly, a huge wall of water came over the wide bridge and struck two of us full on.  Within a split second I was thrown into the turbulent pool, submerged in ocean water and I was being slurped under the bridge by the current. For an extended dream time, everything turned white and blue and I had no idea when or if  my next breath would be happening.  At some point in this unbelievable reality, my head hit a rock and I thought, "Oh yeah.. this is what happens when you're being pummled by waves and riptide. This is what it feels like to be drowning.  This is what happens before you die in the ocean." When I found the surface and struggled for air, I was quickly struck again.   I gasped for oxygen and sucked in water a couple more times as I could feel myself being pulled out into the ocean. It turns out that waves retreat just as powerfully as they strike and I remember thinking this tide has no concern that I’m Hal Walker, my dad’s Harold Walker and I have 3 sisters and a daughter that can't wait for me to get home.  For a few minutes there, I was in the belly of the dragon being sucked out into the ocean.
Finally there was a calming of the big waves and I could see JP running toward me on the rocks. I was screaming a locked jaw, TMJ kind of scream... the kind of scream that says, “What are you gonna do about this JP!!” He was calling for me to stay calm, to take off my shoes and pants and start swimming toward him.  To ease the complete exhaustion that I felt, I floated on my back for a moment.  With the current moving in a way that assured me that my swimming would make no difference, the 30 yards between JP and myself seemed unnavigable.
At this point, I was awakening to the reality that I was going to die and that Hallie was going to have to face this, her ultimate fear. I was realizing how exhausted I felt and I wondered how long it would be before I would have to give up and go under.  I sensed that it wasn't going to be a peaceful letting go like you hear about in the movies.  This would be a terrified, “Please! No!” kind of going.
Then I started swimming.  Like a little weak boy struck with courage for a moment... facing the odds that his swimming would actually make a difference... Miraculously, just at the right moment, a wave pushed me in the right direction. Within a few strokes,  I found myself hanging on to the side of a rock lava wall for my dear life -- digging my fingertips into the rocks.  Crying that locked jaw cry, “JP- save me.”   Fortunately, our friend Greg had been carrying a big strong walking stick. JP held the stick out to me and me I was able to grab it.  But to save his own he let go and I went under again grasping the stick that was my only hope for survival.
JP and I were able to connect again and he dragged me about 15 feet to the only entry spot back to dry land.  Incredibly, another wave pushed me onshore at the right moment and I found myself crashed on black lava with JP hovering over me... "Keep moving!  You’re not safe yet... there are more waves coming! You gotta move 20 more feet!"  I was plastered to the rocks with lungs choked of salt water, utterly and completely spent from shock.  I didn't have a single ounce of energy to move, but with JP's help, we dragged and scraped my body over those rocks to what seemed like safety.  Greg had called 911.  JP was whispering in my ear, "Brother, you performed a miracle today. You did it. You survived.”
It seemed like the rescue helicopter arrived fairly quickly.  When they showed up, I learned that the other guy, my new friend Ash, had not made it.  JP had seen him floating out into the ocean face down.  Our sense is that Ash was struck in the head and was made unconscious on the fall into the water hole.  Ash was a wonderful and lively 61 year old man from Singapore.  He was a smoking cessation counselor and had dreams of using the harmonica to inspire people to quit smoking.  That morning, he had given me a lessons in using a rebounder/ small trampoline to improve my health. 
I laid there in my underwear unable to move but sensing that I had survived.  I was panting in relief "Oh my God, Oh my God."  I soon become very cold and was shivering and panting for air. At one point as another huge wave approached, four big strong rescue guys gathered around to hold me down.  As the wave struck, I screamed once again in terror and it moved all four of us all several feet over the rocks.
After several windy approaches, the helicopter was directly overhead, these guys hooked me into a metal crate and I was lifted up over the cliffs.  As I was flying through the air, out of the corner of my eye, I could see a spectacular view. 
Pretty soon the ambulance guys confirmed that all my vitals looked good.  I was panting for air and they were encouraging me to take deeper breaths to clear out the salt water and to avoid pneumonia.
In the hospital, I was shivering and in shock.  I remember a very kind hawaiian nurse saying to me in a very soothing voice, “you’re very lucky.”  They took x-rays to see the water in my lungs. After several hours, the doctors felt like it was ok for me to be released.  After having had a long interview with detectives about Ash's death, JP and Greg and JP's partner, Karu arrived . I was so glad to see them. I burst into tears when they arrived.  We’ve been talking non-stop about the miracle that I made it and we’ve been grieving in disbelief that Ash is gone. 
I was quite beat up by the rocks... my whole body is covered in minor cuts and abrasions.  I am depleted beyond comfort.   I lost my glasses and my iphone in the water, but I am in one piece.   When we got back to JP's house, we could see that the helicopter's were still looking for Ash.
I am left with some very frightening images that keep playing over and over in my head.  I'm sure these will subside before too long.   We got home and JP spent a couple hours cleaning my wounds with hydrogen peroxide, tea tree oil and Noni fruit.  I'm sure hoping that my lungs and adrenal glands know how to come back from something like this.
So that's the story, friend. I travelled through the dragon's belly and it was terrifying.
I'm heading home to Ohio soon. I hope all is well with you. I'd love to catch up soon
Love, Hal


You can see a picture of me strapped into the metal basket at this link...
"The Garden Island" coverage of the tragic event

Ash offers us wonderful tools for living well on his YouTube page...
Ash's YouTube page

Yes, I am back to food gratitude:)  Sunday is my long day at school, an actual full work day, lol.  I start at 11 am and finish at 8 pm.  I have two 15 minute breaks plus a half hour break in there.  Knowing myself as I do, and how I can't go without food for more than a few hours, I always pack lunch and snacks.

After eating a bowl of oatmeal with sugar, cinnamon and bananas for breakfast, I packed the following to stave off hunger during the long day ahead:  Two small peanut butter and jam (raspberry) sandwiches, a mini strawberry yogurt, a small pack of pretzels, an apple, a small pack of peanut M & M's and a packet of instant coffee.

More than sufficient calories and tasty treats to keep me going, awake and lively during this "regular" for most people work day, but the longest day of the week for me.  I always find myself dreaming about what to cook when I get home, partial almost hunger, the other part my food obsession.  So last night it was mac & cheese.... I was thinking oh, I have some shell macaroni, can whip up a white sauce and put in that Viola brand creamy cheese (fake cheese food in a tub that taste sorta like Velveeta) and tear up some of the swiss as well.  Pop it in the oven, after I chop up some of the bit of ham I have in the fridg, bake it for a short time, while the fresh brussel sprouts I had cleaned and put over to cook finished up and.....yep, I had fresh mac & cheese with ham and brussel sprouts for dinner.  Brilliant and tasty:)

The start of a week long "Russian lent"... this pancake festival is very common and popular here in Ukraine, with such a large Orthodox population.
My flat mate and I decided to try this local one (one metro stop away from us) and it was so frigid outside we didn't last long...However, many folks were having picnics outside, bringing their own wine and vodka...

these two guys in traditional costume, eating caviar on bread were happy to pose:)

scary faceless woman in traditional clothes

the lovely chapel this festival was nearby

Not finding any traditional pancakes without a livery, meat substance, we didn't have any.  Nor were we excited about caviar, so no to that too.  We didn't stay long enough to see if there was any fistfighting, but it was fun anyhow:)

thedavidoreilly:

This is a simple motion-diagram thing I made when talking about animation to non-animators.

Hello everyone!

This morning I have mixed feelings: I am happy that we have the possibility to bring our beloved The Old Reader to a new level, and I am sad that Google Reader soon will be completely over. It was a large part of my daily internet life. We even started making The Old Reader because no one could stand my whining anymore.

News came unexpected (mind you, we are living in GMT, so it was literally the middle of the night), but we are doing out best. We tripled our user base (and still counting), and our servers are not amused so far. We will be deploying more capacity shortly, so things should get better by the end of the day. Please, be patient with us.

(The Old Reader’s team before March 13, photo by repor.to/shuvayev)

This is overwhelming. When we started this as something for us and our friends to use, we never expected so many of you to join us in our journey. Thank you very much for your kind words and support, we appreciate this.

Seeing Google Reader go, many of you are asking whether The Old Reader is going to stick around. Also, quite a lot of people would like to donate to keep our project running. We have been discussing this quite a lot recently, and we decided that paid accounts (the freemium model) are the way to go. We want to keep making a great product for our users, not cater it for advertisers’ needs.

We are going to be honest, we have not even started coding this yet. However, we would like to get this news out as soon as possible for everyone to know the way we will be going. Paid accounts will have some additional features, but the basic free accounts will still be 100% usable. We are not in this game to make money, but we want to give something special back to the people who are going to be supporting us.

We have our daily jobs, so we can’t promise that new features will be ready tomorrow or next week. We have no investors or fancy business plans, but we are open about everything we do, and we want to do it the right way.

We reworked the plans according to the news today. Creating an API for mobile clients is the number one priority in our roadmap. We would love to collaborate with any developers who were making Google Reader clients. Please, spread the word about this if you can.

For those of you who are posting feedback and creating new feature requests - please, double-check for existing items in Uservoice. We hate answering the same questions multiple times and removing duplicate requests.

Most asked questions are:
- “When will OPML import be working again?” As soon as we launch more capacity to handle this. Hopefully, later today.
- “Why are you asking for access to my Google contacts when I log in via Google account?” We don’t anymore.
- “When will you make an iOS app? How about Android?” We will start with API as soon as we can and see how it goes.
- “Why is there no way to login without Google or Facebook accounts?” We cover that one in our knowledge base, but we plan to implement own login code. The demand is high.
- “How do I rename a feed?”. Just browse the Tour page, please? 
- “Shut up and take my money!”. Will work on that, stay tuned.

We have lots of things to do, and it will probably take us several days to reply to all emails and tickets. Also, Twitter keeps reminding us about daily tweet limits, so there might be delays as well.

Some other news: last week our developer (on the left) turned 21, and we have implemented PubSubHubbub support. Many of you asked us to make feed updates faster, and PubSubHubbub makes compatible feeds refresh almost instantly. Yay!

Thank you very much for your support. We will do our best during next three months to prepare for the day Google Reader will no longer be around.

It was fun to see the faces behind some of my favorite web comics in this brief PBS documentary.

The internet has given birth to yet another new medium: web comics. Moving beyond the restrictions of print, web comic artists interact directly with audiences who share their own unique worldview, and create stories that are often embedded in innovative formats only possible online. Sometimes funny, sometimes personal, and almost always weird, web comic creators have taken the comic strip form to new, mature, and artistic heights.

Cartoonists interviewed:

Christina Xu, Breadpig

Nick Gurewitch, Perry Bible Fellowship

Sam Brown, Exploding Dog

Lucy Knisley, Stop Paying Attention

Andrew Hussie, Homestuck

Wikipedia, PDB rendering: "Complex Structure of the BRCA1 RING domain and BARD1 RING domain."

Rebecca Skloot writes about an important legal case against Utah-based biotech firm Myriad Genetics, the company that holds the patent on genes identified as markers in breast and ovarian cancer. The company forbids other doctors or companies from testing for them.

When I was first diagnosed with breast cancer, my doctors sent out blood samples to Myriad, to see if I had BRCA1 or BRCA2, the two known "breast cancer genes." They told me results would take a certain number of days, because only one single lab does this testing in all of the US. I remember thinking that it was odd that there was one, and only one lab in the US that was capable of doing this testing.

From Rebecca's piece:

This week, the ACLU, several breast cancer survivors, and professional groups representing more than 150,000 scientists, sued Myriad Genetics over their breast cancer gene patents. Those genes, mutated forms of BRCA1 and BRCA2, are responsible for most cases of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. They’re also very lucrative, because Myriad has created something of a monopoly. It charges $3,000 per test, which often isn’t covered by insurance.

No one else can offer the test, and researchers can’t develop new or cheaper ones (or new therapies for that matter) unless they get permission from Myriad and pay a steep licensing fee. So women have no choice about who performs their tests, and they can’t seek those second opinions. That is no small thing. Tests aren’t 100 percent accurate, and results sometimes come back inconclusive. Women with the BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations have a 40 to 85 percent chance of developing breast cancer, so a positive result helps them decide whether to have their breasts and ovaries removed to prevent future cancer.

But with its lawsuit, the ACLU isn’t just fighting Myriad’s patent—it hopes to end the practice of gene patenting entirely on the grounds that it’s illegal, unconstitutional, and interfering with science.

Read the whole article here: The new lawsuit that could prevent scientists from patenting genes. (thanks, Lani Horn)

Holy moly, Brian Krebs:

It’s not often that one has the opportunity to be the target of a cyber and kinetic attack at the same time. But that is exactly what’s happened to me and my Web site over the past 24 hours. On Thursday afternoon, my site was the target of a fairly massive denial of service attack. That attack was punctuated by a visit from a heavily armed local police unit that was tricked into responding to a 911 call spoofed to look like it came from my home.

Well, as one gamer enthusiast who follows me on Twitter remarked, I guess I’ve now “unlocked that level.”

Read the whole sordid tale. Image: Fairfax County Police outside Krebs' home on 3/14/13. He'd even warned police in advance of this possibility, and filed a report with Fairfax County Police in 2012 after receiving threats.

[Krebs on Security]