Publishing News: E&P and Kirkus Reviews to close, more

Editor & Publisher and Kirkus Reviews, two venerable chronicles of the newspaper and book publishing industries, are closing as their owner, Nielsen Business Media, gets out of the trade publication business.

Wow. I heard last week that some major publishing news was coming before the end of the year. Wonder if this is said news, or if there's more a-comin'.

More details here.

Consulting, unemployment, important reminders

In an effort to get some consulting on my resume so it doesn't look like I've been sitting on my butt for months, I've spent the morning working on a pro bono project for a friend. I still have a lot more work to do, but it's nice to feel the neurons firing. It's also nice to be able to apply all this Web experience. Whether or not the recommendations I'm making for the site in question will be applied is out of my hands, but I hope that, in the end, some of this will help.

If learning is reminding oneself what one already knows, then I'm learning a great deal here. Remember the other day when I said that just because you can speak English doesn't mean you can write fiction? Same is true for building a Web site. Just because you can doesn't mean you've got all the other angles down: usability, site organization and functionality, marketing, and so on. Small things can make a huge difference. And sometimes, in order to achieve the thing you want, you need to ask yourself what your users want, then figure out how to provide that so that ultimately by giving them what they want, they'll give you what you need. It's backwards, round-about thinking, but it's all tied into usability, user expectations, hierarchy, directive design, and so on.

And my point is that this work is a good reminder to myself that I know all this stuff. I'm not just one more piece of unemployed flotsam washed up on the shores of Useless Beach. I have skills that are broad and deep, I'm smart, and I am a valuable commodity in this marketplace.

It's hard to remember all this when the calls don't come, companies don't respond to applications, and the agencies don't get feedback from the places they submit your resume. I work so hard to keep the fear and anger at bay by creatively distracting myself, keeping myself busy. But sometimes, it's really hard to maintain my morale, to not look at my house and wonder how long I'll be able to keep it.

Anyway, this work is a good reminder. I have more work to do. I hope that, ultimately, it all bears fruit.

(Spelling corrected. Guess I can't hire myself out as a proofreader.)