Seasonal content, independent publishing

Clearly, I am not a natural blogger. Four posts a year does not a blog make. I’ve always had a thing for marking seasonal changes, and it looks like blogging will inherit those impulses. As a child, I would rearrange all the furniture in my room whenever the temperature hit an arbitrary number of my choosing (e.g. the dresser moves to the north wall when the overnight low hits 20°F). For ongoing design projects, I tend to roll out larger changes and pages every three months or so. And when I can resist summer fruit from Chile, my body appreciates food appropriate to the current season.

Nevertheless, one of the biggest surprises I’ve learned about building a small business is how vital it is to write well and often. If it’s not new client proposals, it’s maintaining existing relationships. There’s so much jargon and assumed knowledge with design and the internet that “writing clearly” is almost oxymoronic. So heading into year three of sole propriety, I’m setting a goal to increase the amount of content on this site, hopefully in more ways than lame seasonal posts.

Anyhow, with spring emerging my focus has turned back towards independent publishing. A new client, Shelterforce magazine, will require a satisfying mix of print and web design. The past few weeks have involved becoming familiar with the latest iteration of InDesign and lusting after all the typefaces I’ve missed from the pre-web design days. (Note to self: Look into flash type replacement.)

The Media Consortium (long-time client In These Times is a member) has also begun to show its prowess. They have begun building out their member tools with GoLightly and convened one (of two) technology sharing meetings. I attended the first one in New York and finally felt the benefits of collaborating face-to-face. Tech people like to use space-age communication tools, but there isn’t a technology that can foster the type of relationships that physical proximity can. You can’t react to someone’s facial expression or body language in a conference call, and forget about sarcasm over instant messenger.

Posted by Seamus Holman on March 9, 2007