Podcasts, Projects

Ditch Diggers #50: Your Value

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:18:13 — 77.0MB)

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  • Matt and Mur come to you live from Morgan Freeman’s Decommissioned Disney Vault for this, their 50th episode!
  • Mur doesn’t get Matt’s cultural references, but she does bring the audience up-to-date on what she’s been working on while in the dreaded “waiting” zone of being a freelance writer.
  • Matt is choosing professional optimism and creating a shiny cocoon of success around which the whole world can burn for all he cares.
  • A bizarre and hilarious digression involving Top Gun slash fic, Patreon, and Beyonce.
  • The Ditch Diggers finally arrive at the topic of the episode, which is knowing your value as a writer.
  • Matt and Mur discuss the mass firings and sale of LA Weekly, how the new owners are despicably attempting to replace professional journalist with unpaid amateur contributors, and what writers and readers can do about it.
  • Working remotely in the publishing industry, the need to structure more entry level roles that can be performed without living in NYC, and how all of that affects writers.
  • Suggested by James Sutter, Matt and Mur discuss when and why to leave a project, partnership, or genre in which you’re heavily invested (Mur lyrically explains the “sunken cost fallacy”).
  • Twitter and email Q&A! Topics include when/how to utilize Patreon, pitching standalone books vs. pitching series, and licensing and incorporating as a freelance writer.
  • The customary shilling, including info on how to party live in person with Matt on December 9th!
  • James L. Sutter’s website
Podcasts, Projects

Ditch Diggers #49: Happiness in darkness

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:09:31 — 49.3MB)

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  • Mur and Matt come to you live from Morgan Freeman’s iPhone 7 BlueTooth Headphone store.
  • Matt didn’t know before he bought one that the iPhone 7 has no headphone jack and he is unhappy about it. Loudly.
  • Mur cites a study she read comparing apps that make people happy to apps that don’t and how much time we spend using both, and the results led her down a path of several writing career related epiphanies.
  • Matt recaps the week in professional writers getting screwed, particularly the wake of DNAinfo and Gothamist being shuttered by billionaire Joe Ricketts after both writing staffs voted to unionize.
  • The Ditch Diggers discuss what about the current online market and publishing models need to be changed and how writers have to react to begin bringing about that change.
  • Twitter Q&A! Topics include agents requesting marketing plans from querying authors, how much editing/rewriting is too much, and consuming drugs and alcohol while writing.
  • The apps and happiness study cited by Mur in this episode: http://www.timewellspent.io/app-ratings/
Podcasts, Projects

ISBW #386: NaNo Primer 2 // Grant Faulkner Interview

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 54:06 — 42.8MB)

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Grant Faulkner QuoteIt’s time to really prep for NaNoWriMo! We then talk to Grant Faulkner about time hunts, his new book, and how to kill writer’s block.

Remember to send me your NaNo username to add you as a friend and to enter a drawing to win BOTH Pep Talks for Writers AND I Should Be Writing!