Like the three other baseball blooks I've looked at: Bleeding Red, Redbird Nation, and Ducksnorts 2007 Baseball Annual, The Best of Dodger Thoughts is based on a blog, Jon Weisman's blog. With seven years of writing under his belt [or should that be "in his archives"?], Weisman has been at blogging almost as long as Geoff Young (ten years).
The blog, "Dodger Thoughts," is described at Lulu as "featuring Jon Weisman’s personal insights, reporting and research, has been the leading independent source online for information on the Los Angeles Dodgers."
If the title hasn't already convinced you that posts had been pulled selectively, Weisman put it this way on his blog:
"I am pleased to announce the release of The Best of Dodger Thoughts, a
325-page book featuring the top selections from this website since its creation
in the summer of 2002. Unlike the chronological archives of Dodger Thoughts, The Best of Dodger Thoughts is organized thematically (2005-11-28).
In a recent post I once again commented on how important it is to organize your blog. While I seriously doubt that you can slot something, even potentially, as one your best posts, hopefully you will tuck it into a meaningful category for later retrieval. [By the way, I've been conscientiously trying to make my post titles more indicative of content - both for the reader and myself.]
The idea of history or legacy struck me as curious, I found it in the Lulu description and on Weisman's blog - see if you agree.
"Besides providing immediate enjoyment for you this offseason, The Best of Dodger Thoughts will have long-term worth as a historical resource: a you-are-there record of an important chapter in Dodger history, as well as the first printed compendium of blog coverage of the Dodgers. For both longtime readers of the website and those who have never seen it, The Best of Dodger Thoughts will be well worth owning" (Lulu)
He repeats this almost verbatim in his blog with one exception:
"It is ... a document of an important chapter in sportswriting history - the first printed compendium of blog coverage of the Dodgers. It will only become more valuable as time passes."
Another thing which makes The Best of Dodger Thoughts stand out from the other baseball blooks that I've looked at is Weisman's inclusion of comments. In announcing his blook to his readers he said:
"In addition, there is a special 30-page bonus section featuring many of the best Dodger Thoughts reader comments. That's right - many of your words are compiled within the book, an enthusiastic celebration of your contributions in making Dodger Thoughts great."
Now there's a real curiosity! How on earth would you begin to select comments?! Especially when you have the readership that Weisman has. One of the posts that I looked at had 711 comments! They were presented in table format so you could choose which 50 you wanted to look at. You know, 1-50, 51-100, etc. [I wonder how that works, I mean the creation of the table for comments. Maybe it's a plug-in?]
I wrote to Mr. Weisman asking him, if he would, to give you and me an account of how he went about putting his blook together. Here is his response.
****
Cheryl -
Basically, in the fall of 2005 I read through three years worth of posts, pulling out the ones I liked and putting them into different Microsoft Word files labeled thematically. I tinkered with those files a little bit, made a preliminary table of contents which grouped certain themes together, and then got down to the nitty-gritty editing. I eventually put all the files together into one giant Word file, and did the layout there (which was a bit more cumbersome a process than I anticipated, thanks to Word's idiosyncracies.)
I then self-published via Lulu.com, which was relatively simple. You change your Word file to an Adobe file, upload it, and just see if it looks okay. Make a cover design, and you're done.
The one thing I didn't bargain for is that it took so much energy to get the book together, I was spent when it came time to market it. You really have to budget time and energy for that if you want to sell.
Does that help?
- Jon
It helps lots, Jon. Thanks! The lack of energy with regards to marketing reminds me of Nickie Coby's comments (see Accessibility - Part 3, last para).
The only thing that Jon didn't address was what he did with links, but since much of his content is personal observation and opinion, perhaps there weren't that many.
****
Blooks of Baseball
Boston Red Sox • St. Louis Cardinals • San Diego Padres
|