Friedman’s not the first person to remind us that self-promotion—or “building a platform”—in the digital age is a nuanced and long-term project, a leap-of-faith investment, whose dividends are hard to quantify. But she hits the nail on the head nonetheless. Be creative, she is is saying. Participate. Bring something of immediate value to the table, and (this is critical) be willing to give it away.

Most importantly, it has to be about more than selling books—or whatever your goal might be. It has to be about what you stand for, and who you are.

Self-promotion, with integrity. Is that it? Coincidentally, this is the title of a great piece in Publishing Perspectives about Stephen Elliot and the interesting and innovative ways he has generated a following, both as founding editor of the online magazine The Rumpus and as author of The Adderall Diaries. With his house-to-house reading tour, his weekly personal e-mail to 5,000 subscribers, a self-designed iPad app for his book, and other outside-the-box initiatives, Elliot seems to exemplify much of what Friedman is talking about.

But it’s also notable that he is willing and able to live on $25,000 a year (in a co-op with a communal bathroom, no less) and that he disavows any aspiration to become a best-selling author. By his own account, Elliot will be content to know that he has made an impact on a relatively small but devoted readership and that his books will remain in print. The new literary model, the Elliot case study suggests, is not just about improvisational marketing strategies; it’s also about rethinking your definition of success.

So what does this video have to do with publishing or virtual offices? Well, nothing, really, unless you consider what a staple coffee is in the publishing industry as well as offices (I know, it’s a stretch, but I am taking it). In addition, it’s hard to think about the pleasures of reading or writing without also considering coffee.

I think you can also draw a parallel between the coffee industry and the book publishing/book selling industry. There are the giants, and then there are the small, fiercely independent outfits. To say that coffee is important here in Portland, Oregon, would be a gross understatement. There are dozens of microroasters and nanoroasters with their single-origin, medium-roast coffees. Sometimes, as with small publishing houses and booksellers, it can start to feel a bit . . . precious. That is why I appreciated this Coffee Wars video. I love coffee, and I love books, but I also think it’s important to maintain a sense of humor and not take things so seriously.

Flux Film 001 | Morse from Proper Medium on Vimeo.

Artist John Morse has come up with a clever way of spreading haiku around Atlanta. His project, dubbed “Roadside Haiku,” uses bandit signs, those not very attractive, cheap white plastic corrugated advertisement signs that are ubiquitous in metropolitan areas. In keeping with the general aesthetic of bandit signs, Morse uses large black lettering, and the poems begin with catch phrases commonly found on bandit signs.

Morse has written 10 haiku, each printed on 50 signs for a total of 500 scattered across Atlanta. Here are some examples:

BUILD PERSONAL WEALTH
In the comfort of your home!
Read to your children.

LOSE UGLY WEIGHT FAST!!
Feel Happier! Healthier!
Dump your bigotry.

You can also check out the signs on Morse’s Facebook page.

For more information on the project, visit Flux Projects or see this article from the Guardian.

I have to confess that I have not really understood the point of book trailers. It seems counterintuitive to market a book with a video, but perhaps I just need to rewire my brain. Well, if more book trailers were like the one above for Gary Shteyngart’s Super Sad True Love Story, then I would completely be on board. It’s clever! Funny! Heart warming! Of course, not all authors are connected enough to have celebrity authors and famous actors appear in their book trailers, but I think there’s a lesson in the trailer nonetheless: it’s okay to have some fun.

There are probably plenty of writers out there who kind of dread book tours, but author Jim Lynch isn’t one of them, or at least he isn’t at the moment—he has found a way to combine pleasure with work. An avid sailor, Lynch cruised from his home in Olympia, Washington, to various booksellers in the San Juan Islands (in the Seattle area) during a weeklong tour at the end of July. He promoted two of his novels on the tour: The Highest Tide, his first novel, and Border Songs, recently issued in paperback.

Lynch’s sailboat is a 1970 Bristol 32. He kicked off his tour on July 24 on Shaw Island as guest speaker at the Shaw Island Historical Society Annual Meeting. His final stop was on July 31 in Anacortes at Watermark Books. Lynch also made stops on San Juan Island, Lopez Island, Orcas Island, and Lummi Island. This month he will be traveling on land in Oregon and Washington. For more information visit his website. Also check out this article about his nautical tour in the Wall Street Journal.

Do you attend bookstore readings? I am fortunate to live in Portland, Oregon, home to many bookstores, including the venerable Powell’s Books. I could probably go to a bookstore reading on a daily basis, and I often read through the listings in the local paper with great interest. The truth, though, is that I rarely go to bookstore readings. I never gave it much thought other than to attribute it to laziness, but then I saw this article, “The Dreaded Question: What is a ‘Reading’?” in the Huffington Post. The piece is by bookstore owner Alex Green, who talks about how the label “reading” is not quite accurate. He writes that “many of us are reluctant to attend a reading because we don’t know what one is, and we become afraid that something egregiously uncomfortable, or boring, is going to happen.” Green then goes on to explain that readings, at least at his bookstore, are engaging and lively discussions.

Green’s article made me question why I don’t attend more bookstore readings, and I think he is right—I think they are going to be kind of boring. I fully expect the author to read a chapter or two from a book, and thanks, but I can do that on my own at home. I would rather know about the author’s writing process or reasons for writing a particular book, or maybe I want to know the author’s favorite flavor of ice cream. If Green is correct that “readings” are actually conversations between authors and readers, then I could get on board, but really, it’s hard to know what to really expect. So, what do you think of bookstore readings? Do you attend? Look forward to them? What do you like about readings?

*The photo is from the last “reading” I attended. It was at Powell’s Books for my friend Amy Karol, author of Bend the Rules Sewing and Bend the Rules with Fabric. At the “reading” she displayed and discussed some of projects in the book, took questions, signed books, and hosted a cakewalk, so no, it wasn’t a typical reading.

First there was the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile and then the Peeps Fun Bus, and now there’s the Penguin Anniversary-mobile. The automobile, which commemorates the 75th anniversary of Penguin Books, will be touring the United States and making stops for anniversary parties at bookstores. The Penguin Car, a flaming orange Mini Cooper emblazoned with the Penguin logo, will also be transporting authors to book signings and celebrations.

Penguin will donate a set of 75 of its most prominent titles to a library or literacy organization in each scheduled stop along the anniversary tour. In June the Penguin Car will visit Minnesota, New York, South Carolina, Kentucky, and California. Though Penguin’s official anniversary date is July 30, the anniversary tour will continue through the summer. At the end of the anniversary celebration, the Penguin Car will be auctioned off, and proceeds will be donated to a literacy group.

Another fun part of Penguin’s celebration is Penguin Ink, which pairs six tattoo artists with six Penguin titles. The tattoo artists designed new covers for the titles, which include Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee, From Russia with Love (yes, it’s a James Bond title) by Ian Fleming, and The Broom of the System by David Foster Wallace.

Visit Penguin’s special anniversary website here to follow the Penguin Car and read about the history of Penguin Books.

Some of the published titles are already well-known works, such as Natsume Soseki’s Botchan and Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories. The selected works cover a number of genres, including mysteries, poetry, short stories, and novels. Upcoming titles (for which, I believe, the publishing rights are still available), include an introduction to contemporary Japanese poetry, fantasy novel The Mandala Way by Masako Bando, historical novel Tokyo Seven Roses by Hisashi Inoue, and literary biography A Thousand Strands of Black Hair by Seiko Tanabe.

Thanks to the very informative Three Percent blog, which focuses on international literature, for clueing me in about JLPP! I’m definitely going to check out some of these books.

Weale is a founding member of Livity, a socially responsible marketing agency based in south London. In 2004 the agency launched Live magazine, a publication produced, marketed, and distributed by local youth ages 13 to 21. In creating a platform for young voices, Live has also captured a young readership. The project has enjoyed considerable success, spawning sister publications in other areas of London. Now a multimedia enterprise, Live Futures also provides youth with the opportunity and tools to produce their own music and videos.

Check out this video to get a glimpse of the tremendous energy and positivity that Live is generating:

Weale believes that there is similar energy (and a huge market) just waiting to be tapped in South Africa. On a recent trip to the country, where the population consists of 4 million whites and 39 million blacks, he was “shocked by the small, inward-looking” publishing industry, which does not engage with the black audience at all, despite the fact that 80 percent of South Africa’s disposable income is spent within the townships. Here, as in London, Weale sees enormous potential in the convergence of entrepreneurship and social engagement. “Not only could [publishers] use the power of their brands to improve literacy and deprivation, but also to open up a new market,” he says.

Convinced that social responsibility is the future of business, Weale and his colleagues at Livity would probably agree with a previous article in Publishing Perspectives, “The Rise of ‘Cause’ Publishing,” which cites Dave Eggers’s Zeitoun and other McSweeney’s projects as evidence that “literary activism is fast-becoming the new arbiter of cool.”

Gabriel Levinson, who wrote the “Cause” article and has spearheaded some literary activism of his own in Chicago, makes a critical observation about all of this “publishing with a purpose”—which is that its success, both socially and in business terms, revolves around building and engaging community. Strikingly, it’s the same principle that’s driving so much innovation in publishing right now, from websites like Fictionaut to Richard Nash’s new Cursor project.

Classroom Publishing is a revised second edition and focuses on introducing publishing in the classroom and using it as an educational tool. Ooligan has set up a dedicated website and blog for Classroom Publishing, a twitter feed, and an e-mail newsletter. The website is much more than a mere advertisement—it serves as a guide, offering educator resources, news, and links to helpful information and sites. It continues the dialogue introduced in the book.

Ooligan will be hosting a launch party for Classroom Publishing on Friday, February 19, at p:ear gallery in Portland, Oregon, from 7 to 9 pm. See you there!

Translation is a funny business. With a novel it’s important not only to maintain the meaning of the original text but to express that meaning in a way that can be understood and appreciated by people conditioned in another culture. For commercial publishers there’s another concern: how best to attract potential buyers.

In 1951 Catcher in the Rye became an instant best seller in the United States. Soon it started to spread across the globe, contorting itself into different languages. Although in some countries the title kept its literal referents (catcher, rye), elsewhere publishers chose titles that presumably better expressed the intended meaning, or would be more interesting or understandable to their readers, than a literal translation. In Swedish it became Raddaren i noden (”Savior in a Crisis”); in Hungarian, Zabhegyezõ (“A Sharpener of Oats”); and in Polish, Buszujący w zbożu (”Rummage Around in the Corn”).

In France J.D. Salinger’s classic became L’attrape-coeurs (”The Catcher of Hearts”). Why didn’t the French choose a more literal translation? I’ve read several explanations.

The English and French titles are both taken from a scene with Holden and his younger sister, Phoebe, with Holden starting off.

“You know what I’d like to be?” I said. “You know what I’d like to be? I mean if I had my goddam choice?”

“What? Stop swearing.”

“You know that song ‘If a body catch a body comin’ through the rye’? I’d like —”

It’s ‘If a body meet a body coming through the rye’!” old Phoebe said. “It’s a poem. By Robert Burns.”

Holden then says he imagines a field of rye next to a cliff, and in the field thousands of kids are running around. He is the only big person there to protect them from falling off the edge.

I mean if they’re running and don’t look where they’re going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That’s all I’d do all day. I’d just be the catcher in the rye and all.

In the French version of the book, Holden says something different.

Tu connais la chanson « Si un cœur attrape un cœur qui vient à travers les seigles » ? Je voudrais . . . (”You know the song ‘If a heart catches a heart coming through the rye’? I’d like . . .”)

When Phoebe corrects him, she uses the word “body” (corps), not “heart” (coeur), and the French is a literal translation from the English.

C’est « Si un corps rencontre un corps qui vient à travers les seigles ». C’est un poème de Robert Burns.

But when Holden continues his thought, he goes to back to using “heart.”

C’est ce que je ferais toute la journée. Je serais juste l’attrape-cœurs et tout. (”That’s what I would do all day. I would just be the catcher of hearts and all.”)

Why did the translator choose the French word for “heart” and not “body” here? One theory I read is that for an adolescent the body is often confused with the heart and with hormones energizing the body. For Holden, then, it would be normal for a teenager to mix up the two words.

But another idea is that a well-known book, Boris Vian’s L’arrache-coeur (English title: Heartsnatcher), was published not long before the French version of Catcher in the Rye and that the publisher wanted to make the connection. In fact, at a dinner in Nice recently, I asked people at the table why the book was called L’attrape-coeurs, and someone immediately thought of Vian.

So my best guess is that, while the translator and the publisher remained faithful to the original meaning in the scene of Holden and Phoebe, the use of coeur (”heart”)—and especially the turn of phrase “L’attrape-coeurs”—was at least in part a marketing strategy.

In conjunction with the Books = Gifts campaign, Random House compiled a Personal Shopper Kit for bookstores. More than 200 kits have been sent to booksellers across the country. The kits contain store displays, “Personal Shopper” buttons for employees to wear, and book recommendation materials. The Random House logo doesn’t appear on any of the materials, and the products are designed so they can be used in conjunction with individual store campaigns.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go work on my book wish list . . .

I’ve always been a sucker for the whole “gift with purchase” thing. Offer me something for free, and I will most likely purchase something I don’t need or even want just so I can score the free item. I am a marketer’s dream. But really, who doesn’t like to get something for free or for a good deal?

Japanese marketers caught on to incentive marketing long, long ago. I remember visiting Japan during Japan’s prosperous years, and it seemed like every time I bought something, no matter how inexpensive the item, I would get a little gift (”omake”) or a raffle type of ticket that could be reimbursed for a “prize” of some sort. Nowadays Japanese companies aren’t as willing to dole out freebies, but the phenomenon certainly is not extinct. I recently visited Japan, and I received plenty of goodies, including gift socks at one hotel chain for making online reservations.

The concept of omake is still prominent in Japanese publishing. Publishers sometimes run campaigns to promote best sellers. My mother, for instance, once received a wizard’s cap and tote bag for purchasing one of the Japanese-language Harry Potter books. Magazine publishers have taken incentive marketing a step further by sometimes including brand-name extras with issues. For example, fashion magazine Sweet has enjoyed phenomenal growth in readership since offering popular, designer omake, such as Anna Sui wallets and Charlotte Ronson makeup cases. According to website Japan Trends, circulation for the magazine has grown to some 700,000, and many may be purchasing the magazines solely for the gift.

So do you suppose book sales in the United States would increase if publishers included a little omake with the books? This would certainly provide an advantage over digital books; after all, with a digital download of an e-book, all you get is the book. The horror!