Facebook and Lazy Bastards.

I generally enjoy Facebook. But I can't really speak my mind there. Initially things weren't that bad. You could say what you pretty much wanted to say without much in the way of repercussion. But in more recent years a certain subset of members (along with corporate policy) have made it increasingly difficult to engage in conversation or commentary on the platform.

Last year I spent about half (maybe more) of the time banned from Facebook. This cut me off from communicating with my various Facebook friends and even with my family members (via FB). After the fourth time of being banned (for saying something negative about the government of Saudi Arabia) I figured I'd just stay away. But, since I do have so many actual friends there, I returned.

Well, it didn't last. Once again I found myself banned for making a single negative comment about police brutality. I didn't even use profanity. Still, the brief sentence was flagged and I found myself once more banned from Herr Zuckerberg's domain.

This time I did follow through and deleted the program from my desktop and various electronic devices. When my prison sentence is ended I don't think I'll go back this time. I think it's for the best. I've found that I produce more work when I'm not on Facebook than when I am there. The professional writing networking I once enjoyed there had collapsed anyway, so it wasn't any good for that.

Oh, well.

It reminds me of the situation I had with a trio of former friends. These three guys were all about my same age, all fairly creative in one way or another, and all three of them had found a way to lead an existence without working. Instead of holding down an honest job, they stayed at home all day long doing a little cleaning, but mainly lounging about performing very little to nothing in the way of honest labor.

How did they do this? How did they get the money to pay for that roof over their heads, the clothes on their worthless backs, and the food they stuffed into their selfish gobs?

They had--all three of them--married women who were willing to demean themselves by working while their worthless husbands sat in the domicile. Sure, a couple of those guys learned to vacuum, and fold the clothes, and wash the kids. But by and large they spent their leech days just puttering around, driving to see locals pals, smoking their tobacco, and living safe knowing that their wives were bringing home the bacon so that they could be lazy, worthless bastards.

I don't see any of those guys anymore. One of them was just far too stupid for me to talk to. One turned out to be psychotic. And the last of them became a neo-Nazi.

I deleted them all. Not the same way that I deleted Facebook, but just as effectively.

My biggest question remains: Where did they find women who had so little self-respect that they kept those scumbags around??!!

FREE! ON KINDLE! YUP!

When I began to write with a serious eye toward publication my first ventures were in the short story form. I figured that the way to learn to write was to start with short stories and move beyond that as I became proficient in that form. Scripts, articles, and novels followed. It was the way to go.


One thing that I always wanted to do was to make money through writing. I wrote anyway, for my own pleasure, but the main thing was to try to learn how to write well enough to earn spending cash from my efforts. So when I began to send my stories out into the market I would begin with the highest-paying markets I could find. If a story failed there I would down-climb the ladder of paying markets until I reached the folk near the bottom who paid 1/2 cent or so per word.


What I did not do was give my stories away for free. If I couldn't sell one, it went into the trunk where all bad little stories go to sleep forever. Or, if they're lucky, to be dusted off and rewritten or cannibalized into something that can be sold.


One of the things I dislike most about the current self-publishing scene and the accompanying micro-publishers is that there is often no promise of payment. I see ads from online magazines asking for submissions of fiction--and yet these markets ask that stories be submitted for no payment. The author receives absolutely nothing in return for publication! Worst of all, there is no shortage (apparently) of idiots willing to give their work away.


Recently I recommended a novella to an online fan. The novella was by a professional writer and the work is quite good. The person to whom I had recommended the tale balked at buying it. Why? Because the writer was charging $2 for it! "Most stuff I get is either free or only a dollar," they wrote back. "I can get novels for less than $3. I'm not going to pay $2 for a novella."


I really do wish this self-publishing ebook market would implode. It's loaded to the gills with idiots, fools, and just by-Jove lousy writing. The purveyors of this monstrosity are, quite frankly, a bunch of jerks. I hope they all get ass-cancer and die horrible, painful deaths.

We're gonna self-publish our own novels on KINDLE! Yup!