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Wednesday, 12 November, 2008:
- Steve loses his hard drive—and his mind.
- School News: Prices to increase
- Featured Courses
- Cool Web Site
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RANT 'O THE WEEK: by WritersCollege.com Director Steve Morrill
I have so many rants this week that I hardly know where to start. But I guess I'll start with an apology and an explanation to all of you.
Last month was mostly wasted for me. First I went off on a press tour, something I rarely do as the benefits (learning more about something, some area so I can write about it) are outweighed by the liability of being away from my desk and unable to function at more than ten percent on a laptop. But that was not the worst thing. The worst thing was a hard drive crash.
This happened to my new iMac shortly after my return to the office. It's only my second hard drive crash in 24 years of writing and using computers, so I suppose that's not so bad. Interestingly, both were on new machines. I think that's what happens. I think a computer that runs OK for the first 3-6 months is likely to run OK forever; it's in that startup period that any failures happen.
I had backups of most documents but lost all my unanswered emails. If you have sent me an email, to which I have not responded, send it again. Stop waiting for me to answer that last one.
The programs, and I use a lot of them, were more of a problem. I had not backed those up as I have the originals in boxes and my backup hard drive was too small for all of them anyway. But reinstalling all of those proved far more of a nuisance than I had assumed it would be and took weeks. Likewise reestablishing all my web site links (I manage a half-dozen web sites). I spent so much time on the phone to tech support people in Bombay that I felt entitled to honorary Indian citizenship.
The local Apple Store swapped out hard drives in a commendable one day and I bought a two-terabyte backup drive to attach to it to replace the old one that was too small to back up the programs as well as the documents. Now the computer backs up everything, programs too, every hour.
Totally unrelated to the hard drive problem but sort of amusing too, my secondary monitor failed two days ago. The iMac is its own monitor, a 24-inch screen with the computer built into it. But I had also plugged in a spare 20-inch monitor I had from the previous computer and was happy with this arrangement. Between the main and side monitors, and the iMac's ability to support up to 16 open screens simultaneously (you cannot use them all at once, but you can swap between them in an instant) I can see 32 screens—16 X two monitors—but only if I have eyeballs like a gecko.
(Who the heck needs six hard drives at one time? Beats me but they accumulate. I have: the new iMac, the old Mac slaved in as a standby, the old hard drive backup used as a photo archive, the new hard drive backing up everything, one thumb drive I use to download suspicious email attachments, and a MobileMe "cloud" drive that I have yet to figure out a use for other than that my iPhone can talk to it.)
Reduced to only a single monitor, even a 24-incher, I was devastated. Well, OK, I was mildly annoyed. I had grown accustomed to the ability to read several open documents even using different programs, all in front of me at once. I hied myself to four stores that sold monitors and found, in Best Buy an actual on-sale best buy. Came home with a 22-inch wide-screen and now I'm happy again.
When I started writing in 1982 I used a portable electric typewriter that cost maybe $25. That worked well for me for two years before I became one of the first writers to buy those newfangled computer things. Today I look around me and I have about $8,000 of equipment sitting here. Wish I could say that my writing was now 320 times better than it was in 1982.
SCHOOL
NEWS: Sign up between now and the end of the year to beat the price increase. Students already signed up for courses, even if those courses do not start until after the price increase, pay the current prices. You may register now, in other words, for a course that you wish to start in January. I'll extend this offer only to the month of January, 2009.
On January 1 of 2009 I plan to increase prices. I realize that in a downturned economy this is hardly the time to do this, but my fine teachers have been waiting a looong time for a raise and they deserve it. And we're 'way underpriced as it is.
Prices will increase from the present $25/week (i.e. a four-week course costs $100) to $30 per week. So prices would increase as follows:
Course Length |
Current Prices |
New Prices |
4-week course |
standard course $100
extended version* $125 |
standard course $120
extended version* $150 |
6-week course |
standard course $150
extended version*$188 |
standard course $180
extended version* $225 |
8-week course |
standard course $200
extended version* $250 |
standard course $240
extended version* $300 |
* Extended courses merely have twice as many weeks to do the lessons and homework. There's no extra material offered but our students are busy adults with real lives too, and so we make available the option.
FEATURED
COURSES:
| Promotional Writing |
Learn the basics of writing promotional materials for businesses and professionals including press releases, flyers, slogans/mottos, sales letters, brochures, three piece mailer, layout/graphics, marketing, and pricing. |
| Quizzes That Sizzle (the 4-week course) |
No, we’re not talking about boring school tests or those nasty “pop quizzes” we all hated. These are the quizzes in magazines and in the Sunday section of your newspaper most of us can’t resist taking. They are fast to write—and fun to take. The two main types of quizzes – lifestyle and “fast factual” will be covered. |
| Researching and Interviewing |
Learn to to find information, locate and interview experts, learn how to apply the rules of rigorous scholarship to your findings, and learn how to stay out of legal trouble while doing all this. |
Romance Novel Writing |
Learn everything from coming up with a story idea to preparing a completed manuscript for sale in this popular genre. |
Seniors Do Write! |
An introductory course for mature students who want to explore their writing potential. We will fuel the fire already smoldering within your own life experiences. |
COOL WEB SITE: The Poynter Institute is considered the leading journalism/theory think tank in the U.S. It's located in St. Petersburg, Florida and is set up as a nonprofit owner of The St. Petersburg Times newspaper. This arrangement was designed to forever keep the Times from being bought out by a publishing chain; it's one of the last truly independent newspapers in the United States. A side benefit is a "school" that the nation's leading TV, newspaper and magazine journalists both attend and teach at.
There's a lot to see at their web site, but my favorite is Romanesko, a regular column on the trials and tribulations of the writing life. Read that here: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=45 |
