By Daniel B. Kline
The tears came without warning the next morning while alone in my car. I wasn’t sobbing and my expression was somewhere between a grin and disbelief, but tears were trickling down my cheeks.
Only on television did people quit their jobs because they felt unfulfilled as an artist and have it actually work out. Most people who walk away from paying gigs to become singers, artists, or in my case, writers, end up penniless and begging for their old job back after learning that they weren’t quite as good as they thought they were.
Eighteen hours or so before, my writing partner Jason and I had sat in a meeting with a publishing company interested in our book proposal. We’d been in this position before and have had fawning executives tell us how great our idea was on one hand, while never calling us again on the other.
And, while unlike most authors, we have actually had a book published by a major publisher, we have also had our share of stinging rejection. Mostly, though, the rejections were of the subtle, “hey, how come that girl tells me how much she wants to get together whenever we bump into each other, but she never returns my calls?” variety.
Book publishing works too slowly for the pain to be acute because usually, by the time you actually get told no, you have given up hope of being told anything. The constant waiting for bad news had led me away from hopes of publishing another book, but a desire to write something long-form and have it actually have a chance of being read led me back to the process once more.
This time, though, Jason and I set simple rules. We would only work with people who actually wanted to work with us. We’re not new at this so we didn’t want promises of Oprah bookings or massive promotional campaigns. We wanted an editor who believed in the project at a company that would design a nice looking book, get it into stores and be supportive of our efforts to get people to buy it.
Modest goals perhaps, but very few prospective authors – even those with good ideas – ever sell a book, let alone sell one to someone they want to work with. Perhaps, that’s why when faced with the astounding fact that three companies wanted our book, we took the smallest offer.
The difference was in a simple sentence in an email where our possible future editor, asked “if we would come to New York so she could pitch us.” The upfront money was small she explained, but she loved our idea and her company “got behind” each of its projects and worked hard to design nice looking books.
Frankly, she had us the moment she returned my email taking her up on the offer of pitching us a few minutes later. The time spent a few days later around a makeshift conference table where she showed us other books in the line and we compared promotion ideas, just validated that we’d found not just someone willing to publish our book, but the right people to do it.
I never expect to make a living from writing books (freelance public relations and editing have taken care of that). And even though I quit a job I loved to do it, I was never confident that I would ever sell this particular project.
That’s why it’s hard to stop crying as I type this and harder still to resist the urge to throw my arms in the air and scream at the top of my lungs. “Worst Ideas Ever” by Daniel B. Kline and Jason Tomaszewski Spring 2011 in bookstores everywhere.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com. See new content daily at WorstIdeasEver.com and follow Kline on Twitter at @WorstIdeas.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Despite World Cup mania, soccer too dull for America
By Daniel B. Kline
A good showing in the World Cup by the United States will not launch soccer as a major sport in the United States anymore than the 1980s “Miracle On Ice” Olympic hockey gold medal made ice hockey mainstream. If the American team gets out of the first round, it will increase interest in the World Cup, but that will not lead to all that many people becoming Major League Soccer fans.
Soccer will stay a sport played at some point by most kids, but one that remains a fringe TV property at best. This is, of course, because soccer, no matter how much you sell it or how well you know the game, is essentially boring.
Americans already have baseball, our own slow-moving technical sport where long periods of nothing much are offset by short bursts of activity. Baseball games at least offer the possibility of high scoring and being down 2-0 does not represent a nearly insurmountable lead.
Admittedly, the World Cup transcends soccer. It’s exciting to root for the United States in a sport where we don’t dominate. That’s why we all watch Americans in the Olympics, but none of us attend local pole vaults or luge races.
The World Cup offers a story line that makes the game matter even though the actual games are mostly dull. That’s probably why the Europeans who seem to love soccer gather to watch it in pubs where there’s beer and other libations that turn a 0-0 tie from “dull” to captivating.
I also find the argument absurd that Americans don’t become soccer fanatics because we don’t understand the game. As a former high school soccer goalie, I understand the game just fine. I also understand that it’s fun to play, but not fun to watch.
High level soccer involves almost no scoring and very few shots on goal. Most of the “action” involves passing, long kicks and the ball going out of bounds. There’s limited physical contact (at least compared to football) and the giant field makes following the action – even on HDTVs – a bit of a challenge.
As each World Cup comes around – at least the ones where the United States qualifies – the American media does the same lazy stories about how perhaps a good showing by the U.S. side will ignite the sport in this country. They usually couple this stories about how Major League Soccer hopes to capitalize on this interest and how youth leagues are bracing for an explosion of new players.
The same thing happens every four years during the Olympic hockey tournament yet hockey, like soccer, remains a marginal sport. Singular televised events like the World Cup do not change overall behaviors of the public at large.
Would we see a huge explosion in horse racing fans if we got a highly viewed Triple Crown winner? Did Lance Armstrong’s unprecedented wins at the Tour de France ignite a U.S. passion for competitive cycling?
Of course not and we should not expect differently. Enjoy the World Cup. Cheer on our boys and hope we can shock the world, but, please, stop the media hype on soccer. We won’t like it more once we get exposed to it. We’ll like it exactly the same and maybe a few more kids will play the game.
The United States will never be Brazil or Italy where the fortunes of the national soccer team set the tone for nation. Soccer won’t ever be bigger than baseball or football, in fact, it won’t ever be bigger than hockey or Ultimate Fighting. The sport might catch Arena Football or get more popular than the Winter X Games, but that’s as far as it will go.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
A good showing in the World Cup by the United States will not launch soccer as a major sport in the United States anymore than the 1980s “Miracle On Ice” Olympic hockey gold medal made ice hockey mainstream. If the American team gets out of the first round, it will increase interest in the World Cup, but that will not lead to all that many people becoming Major League Soccer fans.
Soccer will stay a sport played at some point by most kids, but one that remains a fringe TV property at best. This is, of course, because soccer, no matter how much you sell it or how well you know the game, is essentially boring.
Americans already have baseball, our own slow-moving technical sport where long periods of nothing much are offset by short bursts of activity. Baseball games at least offer the possibility of high scoring and being down 2-0 does not represent a nearly insurmountable lead.
Admittedly, the World Cup transcends soccer. It’s exciting to root for the United States in a sport where we don’t dominate. That’s why we all watch Americans in the Olympics, but none of us attend local pole vaults or luge races.
The World Cup offers a story line that makes the game matter even though the actual games are mostly dull. That’s probably why the Europeans who seem to love soccer gather to watch it in pubs where there’s beer and other libations that turn a 0-0 tie from “dull” to captivating.
I also find the argument absurd that Americans don’t become soccer fanatics because we don’t understand the game. As a former high school soccer goalie, I understand the game just fine. I also understand that it’s fun to play, but not fun to watch.
High level soccer involves almost no scoring and very few shots on goal. Most of the “action” involves passing, long kicks and the ball going out of bounds. There’s limited physical contact (at least compared to football) and the giant field makes following the action – even on HDTVs – a bit of a challenge.
As each World Cup comes around – at least the ones where the United States qualifies – the American media does the same lazy stories about how perhaps a good showing by the U.S. side will ignite the sport in this country. They usually couple this stories about how Major League Soccer hopes to capitalize on this interest and how youth leagues are bracing for an explosion of new players.
The same thing happens every four years during the Olympic hockey tournament yet hockey, like soccer, remains a marginal sport. Singular televised events like the World Cup do not change overall behaviors of the public at large.
Would we see a huge explosion in horse racing fans if we got a highly viewed Triple Crown winner? Did Lance Armstrong’s unprecedented wins at the Tour de France ignite a U.S. passion for competitive cycling?
Of course not and we should not expect differently. Enjoy the World Cup. Cheer on our boys and hope we can shock the world, but, please, stop the media hype on soccer. We won’t like it more once we get exposed to it. We’ll like it exactly the same and maybe a few more kids will play the game.
The United States will never be Brazil or Italy where the fortunes of the national soccer team set the tone for nation. Soccer won’t ever be bigger than baseball or football, in fact, it won’t ever be bigger than hockey or Ultimate Fighting. The sport might catch Arena Football or get more popular than the Winter X Games, but that’s as far as it will go.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Editors and publishers, not the Internet, are to blame
By Daniel B. Kline
It's not the Internet that’s killing newspapers. It's the arrogance of editors and publishers who insist on clinging to the failures of the past that has brought on the slow demise of traditional media companies. It's not that people don't read, it's that the people in charge of what goes into your paper – be it in print or on the Internet – have used their view of what used to work to make choices that no longer ring true with readers.
In the community I live in, I have watched a well-intentioned owner buy the local paper and proceed to make every mistake possible. First, he fired the innovative young editor and replaced him with a crusty veteran – someone who looks good in the seat, but hardly a man in touch with how people consume news now.
The crusty veteran has his place. He could have been brought in to serve as the public face of the paper to reassure its decaying elderly readership that things would stay the course (even as they change). He may even be a good editor, but he's hardly the person to lead a paper into the future – one where readers actively create the news, and where Twitter, Facebook and technologies not yet in the mainstream shape how we “read” the news.
I watched this owner – a man I respect for his desire to save the two local dailies he bought – mostly drop coverage of the middle class suburb I live in, but add a Polish language page to serve the barely breathing never-managed-to-learn-English crowd in the fairly poor city that houses the paper. This owner presides over a paper with more editors than reporters and a news hole riddled with wire copy that anyone with a computer or a cell phone would not have any need to buy.
While the owner has his heart in the right place, he has created a newspaper that might have worked in 1975. He has a tabloid format, but the lead story never gets more compelling than what happened at the Board of Education meeting. There's no service journalism, no interaction with readers and a stubborn desire to cling to the idea that covering meetings and writing about events after the fact makes you compelling.
I'm a failure at plenty of things (like my roast that tastes like a boot and my business plan for a company that makes absorbent, pizza-shaped paper towels strictly for grease removal) but I'm the uncrowned champion of local newspaper editors. My papers – like my columns -- might make you angry and they might make you laugh, but they will make you respond.
If I sat in the editor's chair for this well-meaning, but fast on his way to bleeding-to-death owner, I would sacrifice the reader of old for the reader of today. I'd build around young families and recognize that the medium they read in – be it print, Web, iPad or hologram to the brain – matters little compared to the quality of the content.
My paper would have no wire because nobody under the age of 70 reads a local daily for national or world news. I'd mix traditional news coverage with useful service articles built from local sources. My advertisers would be active partners in the content – not in a puff piece advertorial sort of way -- but in an acknowledgment that ads pay the bills and editors have lived behind their ridiculous “church and state” wall for far too long.
My “paper” in its print and its Web editions would find columnists who say things that inspire, enrage and most importantly get readers to respond. Under my leadership, the owner’s bland op-ed page full of wire columnists and columns written by editors from other papers in the state who write serious (read boring) columns would become a place of controversy and passion
(In full disclosure, the paper I'm referring to used to run this column, but now runs a bunch of crap from the wire.)
The public still wants news, but they want it in a way that breaks all the rules the wire junky/meeting loving “traditional” editors have clung to for so long. A place exists for local media, but the people who survive will be the ones who throw out the old thinking and sacrifice the reader of yesterday to embrace the reader of today.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
It's not the Internet that’s killing newspapers. It's the arrogance of editors and publishers who insist on clinging to the failures of the past that has brought on the slow demise of traditional media companies. It's not that people don't read, it's that the people in charge of what goes into your paper – be it in print or on the Internet – have used their view of what used to work to make choices that no longer ring true with readers.
In the community I live in, I have watched a well-intentioned owner buy the local paper and proceed to make every mistake possible. First, he fired the innovative young editor and replaced him with a crusty veteran – someone who looks good in the seat, but hardly a man in touch with how people consume news now.
The crusty veteran has his place. He could have been brought in to serve as the public face of the paper to reassure its decaying elderly readership that things would stay the course (even as they change). He may even be a good editor, but he's hardly the person to lead a paper into the future – one where readers actively create the news, and where Twitter, Facebook and technologies not yet in the mainstream shape how we “read” the news.
I watched this owner – a man I respect for his desire to save the two local dailies he bought – mostly drop coverage of the middle class suburb I live in, but add a Polish language page to serve the barely breathing never-managed-to-learn-English crowd in the fairly poor city that houses the paper. This owner presides over a paper with more editors than reporters and a news hole riddled with wire copy that anyone with a computer or a cell phone would not have any need to buy.
While the owner has his heart in the right place, he has created a newspaper that might have worked in 1975. He has a tabloid format, but the lead story never gets more compelling than what happened at the Board of Education meeting. There's no service journalism, no interaction with readers and a stubborn desire to cling to the idea that covering meetings and writing about events after the fact makes you compelling.
I'm a failure at plenty of things (like my roast that tastes like a boot and my business plan for a company that makes absorbent, pizza-shaped paper towels strictly for grease removal) but I'm the uncrowned champion of local newspaper editors. My papers – like my columns -- might make you angry and they might make you laugh, but they will make you respond.
If I sat in the editor's chair for this well-meaning, but fast on his way to bleeding-to-death owner, I would sacrifice the reader of old for the reader of today. I'd build around young families and recognize that the medium they read in – be it print, Web, iPad or hologram to the brain – matters little compared to the quality of the content.
My paper would have no wire because nobody under the age of 70 reads a local daily for national or world news. I'd mix traditional news coverage with useful service articles built from local sources. My advertisers would be active partners in the content – not in a puff piece advertorial sort of way -- but in an acknowledgment that ads pay the bills and editors have lived behind their ridiculous “church and state” wall for far too long.
My “paper” in its print and its Web editions would find columnists who say things that inspire, enrage and most importantly get readers to respond. Under my leadership, the owner’s bland op-ed page full of wire columnists and columns written by editors from other papers in the state who write serious (read boring) columns would become a place of controversy and passion
(In full disclosure, the paper I'm referring to used to run this column, but now runs a bunch of crap from the wire.)
The public still wants news, but they want it in a way that breaks all the rules the wire junky/meeting loving “traditional” editors have clung to for so long. A place exists for local media, but the people who survive will be the ones who throw out the old thinking and sacrifice the reader of yesterday to embrace the reader of today.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Complacency, not incumbency is the problem
By Daniel B. Kline
Due to frustrations about the endless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as the country’s continued bleak economic situation, being an incumbent officeholder has become a dicey proposition. No matter what you stand for, if you’re currently a governor or a Congressperson, you’re in trouble because you’re an insider and thereby part of the problem.
Office-seekers use this anti-incumbency fever to paint their foes as “fat cats” who know nothing of the plight of the common man. Of course, no matter how rich or privileged these wannabe senators, representatives and governors are, they are not already in office, so they claim, they must be better than those who are.
Those seeking office using the incumbents stink argument always pledge to “clean things up,” “end patronage,” “reduce government waste” and do things entirely differently. If only we put them in the power seat then they would be free to correct the many wrongs which their opponents were entirely responsible for.
The exact same sentiment hit a few years ago due to anger with then President George W. Bush. The anti-incumbency fever resulted in a bunch of Republicans getting swept out and a bunch of Democrats getting voted in.
And, as we have seen, this “new” batch of legislators, governors and eventually, a new president have changed exactly nothing. Incumbent or not, the people we keep voting into office all come from the same cloth and simply changing the party in control of any one branch of the government does little to actually change anything.
If we want change, then as voters, we must stop getting swept up in the mania of anti-incumbency fever and party loyalty. Instead, we should look at each legislator, governor and presidential candidate and consider their actions, not merely their words.
It’s easy to talk about change and say you are different, but as voters we should be smart enough to look beyond a 30 second campaign commercial. If a candidate’s ad says he supports creating jobs in America, but the company he runs has shifted jobs overseas, then, well, we should be able to recognize a fraud for a fraud.
Campaign staff, media experts and poll results can tell a candidate what to say. It’s not hard to deliver the right message – in fact a candidate would have to be a fool to not know exactly what message the public wants to hear – but words should not mask past actions.
As voters, we get what we deserve, because we allow soundbites, headlines and campaign commercials to shape our opinions. Even when learning the truth would take minimal digging, we prefer to simply keep rearranging the deck chairs as our ship sinks and somehow we are surprised when we get wet.
We have many good members of Congress and a number of good governors. It’s foolish to toss the baby out with the bath water simply because we have decided that incumbency invalidates whatever record an office-holder has built.
In looking at incumbents and potential office-holders, the voting public must consider whether the person attempts to actually do what they say. No one man can make Congress bend to his will (though many have tried) but there’s a major difference between not being able to get your agenda through and abandoning your ideals.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
Due to frustrations about the endless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as the country’s continued bleak economic situation, being an incumbent officeholder has become a dicey proposition. No matter what you stand for, if you’re currently a governor or a Congressperson, you’re in trouble because you’re an insider and thereby part of the problem.
Office-seekers use this anti-incumbency fever to paint their foes as “fat cats” who know nothing of the plight of the common man. Of course, no matter how rich or privileged these wannabe senators, representatives and governors are, they are not already in office, so they claim, they must be better than those who are.
Those seeking office using the incumbents stink argument always pledge to “clean things up,” “end patronage,” “reduce government waste” and do things entirely differently. If only we put them in the power seat then they would be free to correct the many wrongs which their opponents were entirely responsible for.
The exact same sentiment hit a few years ago due to anger with then President George W. Bush. The anti-incumbency fever resulted in a bunch of Republicans getting swept out and a bunch of Democrats getting voted in.
And, as we have seen, this “new” batch of legislators, governors and eventually, a new president have changed exactly nothing. Incumbent or not, the people we keep voting into office all come from the same cloth and simply changing the party in control of any one branch of the government does little to actually change anything.
If we want change, then as voters, we must stop getting swept up in the mania of anti-incumbency fever and party loyalty. Instead, we should look at each legislator, governor and presidential candidate and consider their actions, not merely their words.
It’s easy to talk about change and say you are different, but as voters we should be smart enough to look beyond a 30 second campaign commercial. If a candidate’s ad says he supports creating jobs in America, but the company he runs has shifted jobs overseas, then, well, we should be able to recognize a fraud for a fraud.
Campaign staff, media experts and poll results can tell a candidate what to say. It’s not hard to deliver the right message – in fact a candidate would have to be a fool to not know exactly what message the public wants to hear – but words should not mask past actions.
As voters, we get what we deserve, because we allow soundbites, headlines and campaign commercials to shape our opinions. Even when learning the truth would take minimal digging, we prefer to simply keep rearranging the deck chairs as our ship sinks and somehow we are surprised when we get wet.
We have many good members of Congress and a number of good governors. It’s foolish to toss the baby out with the bath water simply because we have decided that incumbency invalidates whatever record an office-holder has built.
In looking at incumbents and potential office-holders, the voting public must consider whether the person attempts to actually do what they say. No one man can make Congress bend to his will (though many have tried) but there’s a major difference between not being able to get your agenda through and abandoning your ideals.
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Follow me in 140 characters or less
By Daniel B. Kline
No matter how many times I click “unfollow,” Twitter insists on subscribing me to the feed of “Diddy.” Though I’ll always think of him as “Puff Daddy,” or perhaps “Puffy,” I prefer not to think of the rapper/producer/huckster all that often and I most certainly don’t need to know what he’s doing on a minute-by-minute basis.
Mr. Diddy, through his @Diddy Twitter feed mixes inane bragging about his whereabouts “heading to the party with @SouljaBoy,” with ridiculous attempts at promoting his many, many projects, “New Bad Boy barbecue sauce and lawn furniture drop Tuesday at Costco.” Throw in some fortune cookie platitudes “Every new day is a chance to start again” and the occasional completely random uttering “You can never own too many hats” and you get a very unwanted and unnecessary glimpse into the cavernous mind of the man who was once known as Sean Combs.
Following Puffy’s tweets does make me wonder if he actually types these things out on a Blackberry or if he employs an underling to follow him around capturing his every thought. Like that guy who turned carrying P. Diddy’s umbrella into an actual career, perhaps this Twitter butler will someday emerge from the shadows of the Internet to write a 140 character tell-all book about the experience.
At least Diddy is famous and while nobody needs to know about his comings and goings in such exhausting (albeit poorly spelled) detail, interesting things do happen to him. I know that I’m never going to Sonic with 50 Cent or attending a party with Ke$ha while wearing a white tuxedo, so there’s at least sometimes a mildly entertaining quality to Puff’s tweets.
The same cannot be said, however, for the vast majority of other Tweeters. As a basic rule, only comedians make a real effort to entertain. Comics need fans to buy actual tickets, so they use Twitter to endlessly prove their value as comedians.
Actors and regular people though, bring little value to their Tweets. I might have liked your guest appearance on an episode of “Moesha” 15 years ago, but I don’t care what you had for breakfast or what you think about Jesus.
I’m also not sure that the news was meant to be limited to 140 characters or less. I mean, “president shot” or “space shuttle explodes” might be reasonably well conveyed via Twitter, but most news stories require at least a little more explanation.
Twitter is essentially a news and information medium for people who found skimming through Google News and checking their friends’ status updates on Facebook too taxing. It’s the absolute bare minimum one can do to be informed, entertained and appear vaguely interested in the lives of their friends.
Since, of course, I aim to entertain on all fields of reality, I also have succumbed to Twitter. When I post to my blog it now updates both my Facebook and my Twitter feed (@worstideas). This makes it possible for people who want to follow me – but only in 140 character chunks – to remain up-to-date on my latest comedic efforts.
So, if you like my work, but don’t like it enough to actually read it, I now have the perfect solution for you. Follow me on Twitter and you’ll get the first sentence or so of my daily blog posting. That may not give you the punchline, or even the whole setup, but it will give you the gist. And what more could a writer hope for?
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
No matter how many times I click “unfollow,” Twitter insists on subscribing me to the feed of “Diddy.” Though I’ll always think of him as “Puff Daddy,” or perhaps “Puffy,” I prefer not to think of the rapper/producer/huckster all that often and I most certainly don’t need to know what he’s doing on a minute-by-minute basis.
Mr. Diddy, through his @Diddy Twitter feed mixes inane bragging about his whereabouts “heading to the party with @SouljaBoy,” with ridiculous attempts at promoting his many, many projects, “New Bad Boy barbecue sauce and lawn furniture drop Tuesday at Costco.” Throw in some fortune cookie platitudes “Every new day is a chance to start again” and the occasional completely random uttering “You can never own too many hats” and you get a very unwanted and unnecessary glimpse into the cavernous mind of the man who was once known as Sean Combs.
Following Puffy’s tweets does make me wonder if he actually types these things out on a Blackberry or if he employs an underling to follow him around capturing his every thought. Like that guy who turned carrying P. Diddy’s umbrella into an actual career, perhaps this Twitter butler will someday emerge from the shadows of the Internet to write a 140 character tell-all book about the experience.
At least Diddy is famous and while nobody needs to know about his comings and goings in such exhausting (albeit poorly spelled) detail, interesting things do happen to him. I know that I’m never going to Sonic with 50 Cent or attending a party with Ke$ha while wearing a white tuxedo, so there’s at least sometimes a mildly entertaining quality to Puff’s tweets.
The same cannot be said, however, for the vast majority of other Tweeters. As a basic rule, only comedians make a real effort to entertain. Comics need fans to buy actual tickets, so they use Twitter to endlessly prove their value as comedians.
Actors and regular people though, bring little value to their Tweets. I might have liked your guest appearance on an episode of “Moesha” 15 years ago, but I don’t care what you had for breakfast or what you think about Jesus.
I’m also not sure that the news was meant to be limited to 140 characters or less. I mean, “president shot” or “space shuttle explodes” might be reasonably well conveyed via Twitter, but most news stories require at least a little more explanation.
Twitter is essentially a news and information medium for people who found skimming through Google News and checking their friends’ status updates on Facebook too taxing. It’s the absolute bare minimum one can do to be informed, entertained and appear vaguely interested in the lives of their friends.
Since, of course, I aim to entertain on all fields of reality, I also have succumbed to Twitter. When I post to my blog it now updates both my Facebook and my Twitter feed (@worstideas). This makes it possible for people who want to follow me – but only in 140 character chunks – to remain up-to-date on my latest comedic efforts.
So, if you like my work, but don’t like it enough to actually read it, I now have the perfect solution for you. Follow me on Twitter and you’ll get the first sentence or so of my daily blog posting. That may not give you the punchline, or even the whole setup, but it will give you the gist. And what more could a writer hope for?
Daniel B. Kline's work appears in over 100 papers weekly. He can be reached at dan@notastep.com or you can see his archive at dbkline.com or befriend him at facebook.com/dankline. Follow him on Twitter, @worstideas.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
