Just Books

Spamming YouTube

Spamming YouTube

YouTube is owned by Google, which I will admit right up front is not one of my favourite companies. In my opinion, Google behaves like most bad, bossy fathers, demanding that you do as they say, not as they do, if you want to do business with them. I also suspect that they are are a data-collection agency for the CIA and would sell out dissidents in any country at a dime a time.

Hey, but that is just my opinion... although there are probably a few who would agree with me. Furthermore, they are not adverse to promoting crappy, cheating ads via Adsense, or allowing forgers, pirates and thieves to sell counterfeit books and other goods from D.I.Y blog platform Blogger.

However, like all good online hypocrites, they profess to despise cheats, conmen and spammers.

Right... and trees don't grow in the woods.

YouTube

Anyway, a few weeks ago, I decided to start promoting my stuff through podcasts as well, so I opened and account with one of the best companies online and got stuck in. An account included free dispersion of the said podcasts over several platforms including most of the well-known ones such as Facebook and YouTube.

My posts, and subsequent podcasts, were pretty innocuous, I thought, being mostly book reviews and author interviews with a link back to further information.

Within days, Google had sent me notice of a six-month ban from YouTube for 'spamming'. Closer inspection, however, revealed that they were not happy about my 'trying to divert' surfers from their website.

Although I was honestly not actively trying to do that, I can see how they came to that judgement. However, that being said, I wish that Google was just as fast to react to allegations of, or even completely prevent, wrongdoing on its websites.

So, beware of anything that Google can interpret as spamming YouTube, or you might lose your account, because they are just like bullying big daddies all over the world, preaching one thing but doing the complete opposite!

Please LIKE and SHARE this article using the buttons below and visit our bookshop

All the best,

Owen

Podcast: Spamming YouTube

 

Megan Goes Yachting

Water Supply

I didn't realise it until today, but the local water supply was cut off five days ago. Please don't assume that I don't wash often, it isn't that, we have a water tank with a capacity of a thousand litres and an automatic pump attached to it, so while other households have been without a water supply for the last three or four days days, it has only just hit us.

When I bought that tank ten years ago, I had calculated that it would last us five days, or maybe even a week, if the water supply were cut off, but I hadn't reckoned on having a baby in the house, and she probably uses more water than I do... or causes it to be used anyway. It's quite a thought that about ten thousand people are without water around here.

Mains water is not used for drinking, except by the old toughies, but it is used for everything else. However, the older houses have water butts which hold a couple of days worth, so no washing now, no flushing toilets. It's all pretty grim, but then some people, in other countries, live like this all the time, don't they?

I'm pretty sure I couldn't though, not at thirty-five degrees Celsius. I have felt dirty and sticky since I found out about the lack of a water supply a few hours ago. Apparently, a water tower needs replacing or repairing, it's always hard to find out exactly what's going on, but surely there should have been a contingency plan for when it broke, or their should have been a backup water tower so that so many families did not lose their water supply unnecessarily?

Surely, the expense of having a few score extra of the old, young, and frail fall sick because of the (temporarily) unsanitary living conditions caused by an unreliable water supply is justification for having an extra water tower?

All the best,

Owen

Please visit my list of books

Podcast: Water Supply

Being Ill in the Countryside

 

Being Ill in the Countryside

A lump has been growing on my back for the last week or two. I haven't paid it much attention because it didn't hurt and I have had a non-malignant lymphoma removed before. The surgeon who did that in the UK twelve years ago, said that I could get another one there again or somewhere else in the future, so I put it down to that.

However, this one burst last night, so I suppose it is some kind of boil instead. My wife suggested going to hospital to get it sorted out and I agreed. So, I asked when she wanted to take me to the local hospital and she said they couldn't deal with something like this there, we'd have to go seventy-five kilometres to a big city hospital instead.

That has got me thinking about being ill in the countryside, if they can't handle a boil, what about a stroke or a heart attack?

Five or six years ago, my wife bought fifty mapang saplings, which grow into trees, or big bushes, I suppose. Anyway, we're had a few fruit from them over the years, but they were a little bitter and, so, rather disappointing. However, this year, she has bucketfuls of mapang and they are the best I've ever tasted.

Perhaps they just needed to grow up a bit - like children. I'm not certain, but I think mapang are called plum mangoes in English. The name certainly suits their size, colour, shape and taste. They look like large, yellow duck eggs with a big, flat, central stone.

This is Thailand's summer, so you can expect it to be hot, late thirties to early forties centigrade, but it is also overcast, which is unusual... that doesn't usually come until May when the Big Monsoon traditionally arrives. However, the old weather patterns are becoming less predictable, as in most places in the world.

Regards,

by +Owen Jones

Podcast: Being Ill in the Countryside

Fourth of July

Fourth of July

From the thirteenth of September, 2004 to the fourth of July, 2005, we slept on my mother-in-law's floor in the small, rice-growing village where we live in northern Thailand, while we were waiting for our own house to be completed. However, after a party at a friend's that finished after midnight on the third, instead of going back to Mum, we slept on our own floor.

You could say that the fourth of July, 2005, was our own Independence Day. There were no windows or doors yet in those days, and I'll never forget being awoken at seven am by my wife's screams when she surprised a poisonous snake changing its skin in the spare bedroom.

She phoned her mother who lives only fifty yards from our rear gate, and she came over and killed it.

She also phoned the contractors to tell them to get the doors on sharpish, and then she set about organising a party. The eleventh of July completed my first full year in The Land of Smiles.

Just under seven years after that event, I was filling in a U.K. visa application form for my wife and it called for details of her parents' identity cards. Well, her father has been dead for twenty years, so that only left her mother.

When I saw the card, it was my turn to be shocked.

'Do you know when your mother was born?' I asked my wife, not knowing whether it was a stupid question or not, but I had never seen her have a party.

'No,' she replied, 'I'm pretty sure she's never told us'. Now, I'm fairly certain that as a Westerner, you find that strange enough, but I informed her that her mother's birth date was easy to remember because it was on American Independence Day in the year after World War II finished: July 4th, 1946, but she gave me a blank look.

'What are they?' she asked.

She had never heard of either, but Thailand doesn't look far outside its own borders or affairs, except where football is concerned, and they are not taught about WWII, because the Japanese overran them and that is considered embarrassing, so they just ignore it.

On the other hand, every year, I get asked by at least one American, whether we British celebrate the 4th. Of course no! We lost! Although I personally am glad you escaped the poncy British royal family and aristocracy (despite the fact that you have let everyone down by allowing your own aristocracy to develop).

However, in spite of not celebrating the day, I hope that those who do have a great time, and maybe some of you will remember my lovely mother-in-law's birthday as well.

(This true story is expanded upon in the second volume in the series 'Behind The Smile' called 'An Exciting Future").

Please visit our new book links page here: Books

All the best.

Owen

Please visit my bookshop

Podcast: Fourth of July

Golden Tree Snake

Cruelty to Snakes

When I arrived at the shop for a beer a few minutes ago, the 'landlady' was in a panic, because a girl had reported seeing a snake entering her shop. I saw it too, but I wouldn't have said anything since it was not poisonous and I knew what cruelty would await it if they found it.

Most Thais kill all snakes on sight whether they're dangerous or not, which I think is bloody stupid and their least endearing quality. Often they display the most extreme cruelty during these usually pointless killings.

They say it's better to be safe than sorry.

It's hard to argue with that, but since most snakes are not poisonous and eat a lot of rodents that eat their rice, I would have thought it was worth learning (at school perhaps) which ones were helpful and which were to be avoided. It would put an end to a lot of the ritual persecution and cruelty.

In fact, most of the snakes' killers are older women and teenage boys. I've seen women dancing after killing a snake and boys parading their trophy about as if they had achieved something miraculous. They're big heroes with snakes that can't fight back, but daddy is called to kill the really serious ones.

Identifying Snakes

What I have learned is that short, stumpy, light-green snakes whose back of the head is a lot wider than its nose are killers. This includes the pit vipers. Then there are cobras, which tend to be black here, and a few others which have quite distinctive markings and that's it. The large constrictors (over three or four metres) are also best given a wide berth, but I think that would come naturally J

This one today didn't match any of those criteria. It was about two foot six long, as thin as a bottleneck and dark green with hatching (a little like in the photo). It probably ate beetles, but three people armed with six-foot-long long sticks trapped it in a corner and hit it a few times before dropping it into the drainage system. I don't think it was dead, but perhaps had a broken back, so it's going to have to lie down there in pain until it starves to death.

That sort of cruelty makes me sick.

All the best.

Owen

PS: a note about the photo: my neighbour found this five-foot, harmless beauty, a so-called flying snake, on the outside of her front door when she got up bleary-eyed after their house-warming party. She called me to see it and then shooed it away :-) but most would have killed it on the spot.

Please visit our bookshop

Podcast: Cruelty to Snakes

Linguistic Sloppiness

Linguistic Sloppiness

As my regular readers will know, I am fascinated by languages, so I have noticed a strange shift in the BBC's reporting.

When I was a student of the USSR and Russian in the seventies, we talked about THE Ukraine, THE Caucasus et cetera. Now, as a Russian language speaker, I know that Russian does not have articles (a, an the), so when I heard them dropped in reference to the recent troubles there, it was a surprise more than a shock.

However, last night, I heard a UK BBC reporter refer to THE United Kingdom as 'United Kingdom'.

Is this a new trend or just sloppiness?

To my mind, WE, in English, have articles, if you want to be taken seriously, bloody well use them, plonkers!

** Update: I just heard a reporter referring to 'Muslim Brotherhood' not 'THE Muslim Brotherhood', yet he used articles correctly elsewhere in his report. It's catching on! **

∞

On a different subject, I want to promote the advertising power of this website, I cannot believe that so few people have picked up on it.

Anyway, 90% of readers are American, that means 70k page views a month, and the next best are UK at 17,788 and France at 17,648 per month.

Today, the sixteenth, Google has sniffed around 3,846 times and the average for a human visitor has been 359 secs a visit, which is high. It translates to 22.34 pages a visit.

Handsome!

∞

I was just talking to 'my daughter', sorry, I still don't know what to call her even after ten years, although I've heard she calls me 'Dad' generally, but Owen to my face. We will iron that one out tomorrow.

Anyway, I told her that her English was worse than it had ever been even after three years in university. She said that the reason was that she was scared of making mistakes and people laughing at her now that she was older.

This is the root cause of intelligent Thais not getting on - it's a national tragedy!

They are scared that people will laugh at them.

It reveals a high level of national insecurity.

∞

'Asian Shorts' is now 100% full and I have pencilled in 'Paranormal Shorts' for next month, so if you have a story for it, send it as soon as you like, or start writing one if you haven't.

Get a free copy of the Asian Shorts audiobook here: Asian Shorts free audiobook

All the best,

Owen

PS: if you like linguistics, listen to this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tl3jm

Podcast: Linguistic Sloppiness

Marketing for Small Businesses in 52 Parts

Marketing Your Artwork

Marketing, advertising, promoting, publicising... it's all basically the same thing, ie getting the word out there that you have something fantastic to sell. So, where do you begin?

This may sound odd, but you should begin before you have anything to sell.

Let's say you're a writer, like I am. You could set up a website in the name of your book, with an eye to it becoming a series, and talk about books you like; review books and post articles on events going on in the literary world - the Pulitzer Prize, that sort of thing. Then, when your book is ready, you already have an audience to present it to. So, it is never too early to start building what is called your author's platform.

If you are that kind of person, you could make weekly or even daily posts about the progress of your novel. Some authors like this approach to marketing; others feel that it detracts from the suspense of the launch. I personally would not give away any spoilers, but I would talk about how I feel the writing is going and about cover designs. It's up to you through, isn't it?

About six weeks before you're ready to publish, you could offer your potential readership the chance to pre-order at a discount. The effect of this is that you have six weeks to sell something that isn't yet sellable (as it is unfinished) and all the pre-orders that you do make will go through on the one day, causing your book to jump in popularity. This is great because many people buy, and many firms recommend books on the strength of where they are in book lists.

However, as an unknown, you will find it very difficult to sell pre-orders.

Once you get to that stage, you could join a few of the online joint promotion schemes which combine the strengths of Twitter and Facebook. Try Bridgette's T4US on Facebook. She and her group are innovative and hard-working.

Maybe I'll see you there :-)

All the best,

Owen

Please take a minute to LIKE and SHARE this post below or above – thanks Owen

and visit My Books

Podcast: Marketing You Artwork

American versus English

American versus English

I have had a hard week one way and another, but mostly because of the way different people have a different take on things or even life, I suppose. A lot of it has had to do with language, I think, American versus English and perhaps something to do with gender

This last week, I have had 'difficulties' with four American women. Basically, they think that I've been rude to them, and I think that they have overreacted to me. I can furnish examples.

A woman responded to my appeal for short stories about Asia(ns). She replied that she wasn't Asian, and I said that that didn't matter, the condition referred to the story not the writer. She had first said she had a story, but when I replied as above, she wrote, 'Right, I'm out of the loop then'.

To a Brit, using 'right' in this context makes it sound as if there has been an argument and she has left in a huff, yet I cannot see why she would do that. A simple, 'Thanks for the offer, but I've changed my mind' would have been more British. Did she think I was being rude? I don't know, but I do know that her reaction seems over the top to me.

Another, I accidentally posted on a group page on Facebook. I was told, 'Refrain from doing that...'. I said it had been a mistake and complained that that she made me sound like a serial offender. She flew off the handle, saying she wasn't 'in the mood to deal with me'.

I have no idea where she is coming from.

A feature is that all of these women emphasized how 'cool' they were, but that I'd better not rile them. That doesn't sound very cool to me, it sounds like they're looking for an excuse to boil over.

British women, American and British men, both sexes of all other nations (bar one person) and most American women I email, I get on well with.

Another example of American versus English, last week, a male American writer friend, told me that his book had been 'slated' on a famous website, so I commiserated about trolls. He quickly pointed out that 'slated' in the US version of English means lauded. Great! However, the point is that he didn't jump down my throat like some of his female counterparts. He recognised the American versus English difference, and dealt with it.

An ex US Marine told me yesterday that a section of American female society was making it hard going for men because of their aggression, although he had no idea of my recent experiences.

Coincidence? I don't believe in them. This is obviously a big problem in the USA, which is being exported via the Internet. These women are not 'cool', as they profess to be, they're as taut as a tow rope on a tailhook!

However, I could live with all that, if they just considered for one moment that the form of English that they speak is not the only one in the world and that comradeship, if not friendship, should be factored in, if they are as cool as they say. I have a sneaky suspicion that these gender warriors have never left their continent and rarely speak to foreigners.

Churchill was right, two nations divided by a common language, but now exacerbated by an unwillingness to listen to what someone is saying instead of how they say it. After all, every good linguist know that you have to translate ideas, not words.

I despair.

Oh, on the American versus English debate, but Australian, I like how the Australian prime minister expressed himself! He told the American actor via the world media that it was time his pooches 'buggered off back to Los Angeles'.

I like it, I like it, I like it! No pussy-footing about, no PC flim-flam, no ambiguity - just straight-talking. There should be more of it, and he should have fined the bloke $1m and given it to t...

Site Maintenance

Site Maintenance

Site maintenance is an important part of any webmaster's duties and has to be taken seriously, but it is not usually an onerous task.

However, in the last thirty days or so, two of the largest players on the Internet, Google and Amazon have decided to force everyone to make huge alterations to their web sites

If you make any money from the Internet, the chances are that these changes will affect you.

Google says that most people now access the Internet from mobile devices with small screens or will do soon, so they are going to give priority to websites which are 'small-screen friendly'.

While it is perfectly feasible to have a menu of twelve or fifteen buttons taking you to different sections of the site, a mobile screen can't really accommodate more than two or three.

Therefore, to make a large site mobile friendly, you would need to drill down through many, many more menu options. That is tedious and means the downloading of many more menus and so the use of much more bandwidth.

I wouldn't be happy with that, but I suppose it must be easier than scrolling right and left and up and down all the time, but then why use a small screen for this type of work/pleasure? However, what bothers me is the site maintenance involved. If it is not your profession it will take a lot of thought and much more work.

Why? Because a private company has decided that that is the way they want to see websites so that they can make more money on the public Internet.

I have forty websites to redesign and maintain. Thanks Google, thanks a lot!

Then Amazon stuck its oar in. They have been doing their own site maintenance and decided to rename two of the root directories that deal with books and their sales (I only sell books, it probably affects all the items on its website).

There is no automatic fix for renaming all the links to products on their websites, but they will tell you where their software has found links that will need to be changed. There are about two thousand of them on 197 URL's on the forty websites.

At ten minutes a link, the site maintenance to make me Amazon-friendly is going to cost me 20,000 minutes or 333 hours, which is a month at ten hours a day with no days off and the old links will expire on July 15th.

Today is June 16th, so even if I start my enforced site maintenance right now, I will not finish in time. Who do these people think they are? However, it does make one thing very, very clear: they don't give a toss about the small entrepreneur.

Google and Amazon are firmly on the side of big businesses like themselves who have entire departments to deal with their site maintenance.

All the best, I'd better get on with my site maintenance, how about you?

Owen

Please visit my bookshop

Podcast: Site Maintenance

Become a patron of The Arts with Patreon!

Patreon - What's That All About?

Put simply, Patreon is a way for an artist - in my case, a writer - to keep in touch with his or her most avid fans and receive patronage (sponsorship) for his time. Conversely, it is place where fans can have a closer relationship with their favourite artists for a small fee (in recognition of the fact that an artist has to make a living too).

So, basically, in this post, I am asking you how much you would like to become involved?

Levels of Patronage

I have four levels of patronage: $2, $5, $50 and $100 per month sort of like on standing order, but very easy to cancel (or increase) wherever you like via the Patreon website.

The benefits for me are twofold: 1) increased communication and feedback from the people who care about my work, and 2) the funding to be able to make that communication possible. The benefits for patrons rise with the level of donation, but include increased access to me and my work; increased participation in the creative process; acknowledgement in my novels and much more. Follow the link at the end of this piece to find out the full details.

You may be wondering what I intend to do with the extra money. Well, it's a fair question.

I have set goals on my Patreon webpage, but the main one for now is to upgrade some of my existing book covers, starting with the series Behind The Smile. Poor Lek looks as if she's on a wanted poster. I have wanted to get a professional designer in for years, but have never been able to afford it.

You could help there and always know that you were behind the cover change on this very popular series!

So, the ball's in your court... would you like to be my patron and officially become a Patron of The Arts? I think that donations such as these are even tax-deductible in many countries.

Go on, check out the details, it's the least you can do ?

Visit Patreon by clicking here

All the best,

Owen

Podcast: Patreon - What's That All About?