LitTAP Blog

Here is a Q&A response from Paul Morris, General Manager of Digital Media and Marketing for BOMB Magazine. Thanks Paul!

How has your literary org changed over the past 5-10 years due to technology changes?

BOMB launched a basic HTML website in 2000, featuring partial content from the current issue only. This helped to increase exposure to BOMB’s mission: to deliver the artist’s voice through carefully developed interviews between visual artists, writers, filmmakers, actors, and musicians. However, at that time we had no way to sell subscriptions online, except by referring people to a phone number and to newsstand retailers. Our resources were limited back then, and most grants and private donations were funneled back into printing and overhead costs for our quarterly publishing operations. Staff size was approximately 4.5 people—primarily comprised of editors—and most were considered part-timers.

It wasn’t until 2005 that we really began to strategize e-commerce solutions for driving online subscriptions and back issue sales, and also for delivering past and current content. Since that time, we have completely reconceptualized BOMB’s entire web presence to include a radically restructured website running Ruby on Rails web server, using a MySql database, that contains a near-complete online archive of BOMB’s 28-years of interviews.

The BOMB Digital Archive, made possible in part by grants from NYSCA, the Warhol Foundation, and private donations, is a three-year digitization project that will be completed by the end of 2009. In addition to the Archive, BOMB has been pursuing several new online initiatives over the last three years made possible by new media technologies, including a streaming BOMBLive video series; downloadable podcast features; photo galleries of parties and live events; web-exclusive interviews and conversations; and regular e-blasts that promote new content and programming. Most importantly, we now have a clearly visible subscription and back issue sales option that has increased revenue substantially, and we have plans underway for a more formal shopping cart model.

About a year ago, BOMB launched a blog, BOMBlog, which has allowed us to reach a younger and more widespread demographic than ever, especially students, through programs like BOMB.edu. As opposed to the long-form interview format for which BOMB is famous, BOMBlog features short, pithy Q&A’s, reviews, round-ups, photo essays, original poetry and fiction, and regular event listings curated by BOMB staff. Built into the fabric of the blog is an option to comment on and discuss articles so as to encourage discussion among our readers, inviting them to join in on the conversation that is at the core of BOMB’s mission.

In addition, through third-party licenses with such companies as JSTOR, Project MUSE, and the Copyright Clearance Center, BOMB’s content will now be accessible at university and institution libraries throughout the world via private database companies, who pay BOMB modest annual royalties. We are currently exploring other ways to monetize BOMB’s content using e-publishing platforms through Kindle and other e-book reading devices, an iphone application, and digital facsimile editions of the magazine.

BOMB regularly partners with key organizations, via cross-linking, digital ad trades, and content sharing; these relationships complement our own distribution methods by pushing our content online virally to areas that we have yet to penetrate. Finally, BOMB makes full use of social networking sites to broadcast its message, with a robust presence on Facebook, Twitter, and its own Youtube Channel. BOMB is now a 10-person large organization, with 8 interns on rotating days per semester. Our ability to grow the brand online has increased exponentially in a very short period of time.

What do you feel new technologies offer you a chance to do that you could not before? What do you wish you could do, if you had limitless resources?

The advent of new technologies has allowed BOMB to broadcast our mission of delivering the artist’s voice across multiple channels and through different mediums. Whereas before we only delivered the artists voice within a print magazine and primarily through the medium of text, we are now able to explore a fuller range of media for disseminating our content, from streaming video conversations, to podcasts of interviews, to 140-character tweets of interest for our fans and followers to appreciate. BOMB content is now available to a greater number of people, as well as a greater variety of users, who might not otherwise have encountered BOMB in print, but who prefer to receive their content in audio, video, or mobile technology formats.

Given additional, or limitless, resources, BOMB would provide the most complete picture possible of its 28-year legacy for free as an online open-access model for content sharing. This would require full-time technical support, which we don’t currently possess, and the purchase of additional hardware like computers, scanners, recording equipment, and state-of-the-art software applications. This would allow us, for example, to make full PDFs of past issues available online and for download too, to better illustrate the vintage layouts from the ‘80s and ‘90s. We would also expand our video series and push it into the broadcast television realm, through cable programming or such sites as hulu.com and babelgum.com. We would increase production of our podcast audio series and venture into internet radio, featuring a variety artists & writers in conversation. We would launch the BOMB Oral Histories Project with a dedicated staff to coordinate, record, transcribe, and edit transcripts. With limitless resources, we would expand our range of partners we work with to ensure that BOMB’s content reaches the widest possible audience, becoming a content provider for other websites, blogs, and organizations where appropriate. This would entail research, outreach, and strategic planning with additional full-time staff leading the charge…resources we currently lack.

What are the challenges you have faced, and expect to face in the future, in terms of technology?

There has been a steep learning curve as we get up to speed with new technologies and what they can do for us. We are still very much a small staff, most of whom are artists and writers in our spare time who come from traditional print (i.e., analog) publishing environments. The language of new media technology is not our lingua franca. But as we learn the value of going digital everyday, we appreciate the democratization of information that we’re witnessing. In keeping with our mission to deliver the artist’s voice, we understand that BOMB’s content will be of the greatest value if it can be accessed online for free worldwide.

Our biggest obstacles include limited resources and few full-time staff. With the example of our Digital Archive, we have relied on unpaid interns, enthusiastic and committed students and recent grads, to help scan, OCR, code, and proofread past interview content for the web. The learning curve for the technological processes is high, and interns invariably move on, so we find ourselves in training mode frequently, which slows our progress. As we gear up to tackle e-books and iphone apps, for instance, we’re facing the dilemma of whether we will be able to afford to pursue these initiatives just to test the market, with no guarantee of success. We need to be very focused with how we spend our time, and on what, so as not to be stretched too thin. As a result, we cannot pursue some of the more exciting and innovative avenues until other projects have been completed, and even then we may find them too cumbersome to tackle given our limited means.

What other literary orgs do you feel use technology most successfully, and how?

We like what the Paris Review does with their site, as well as The Believer. Several of our peers’ e-blast newsletters are smartly configured, like A Public Space’s. We’re big fans of Stephen Elliot’s The Rumpus, and the new McSweeney’s iPhone app is a great model for us in thinking about this possibility. We partner with the Academy of Americas Poets and PEN America, and we’re happy that content and link sharing is so seamless with these organizations.

How do you see the literary landscape in 10-20 years from now, given the possibilities that technology is opening up for us. How do you think technology might specifically effect literary orgs?

More and more, we are seeing that readers no longer necessarily head to websites for their content; the content is now coming to them through RSS feeds, PDAs, Audible/iTunes, etc. Likewise, people are not going to bookstores, preferring instead to order online. The novelty of attending a reading or panel or staged conversation has worn off, aided by the pervasiveness of podcasts that offer recordings of these same events, without the need for tickets or crowds. With the advent of smart phones and other mobile technologies, people are reading on the go more than ever. The result is an ever-discerning, harder-to-reach audience, one that may well end up having a shorter attention span and which will not be satisfied with a just a text-based experience. They will be expecting multimedia to complement, or replace, what was once a text-dominated industry.

Literary orgs will have to adapt to this lifestyle change, finding ways to promote their missions and their content to audiences with inventive solutions that anticipate this trend. A decline in traditional “reading” does not have to mean a drop-off in interest in literature, however. Literary organizations will need to work together in the future, supporting each others’ efforts by partnering on new projects. As more content is created, and as the access to more information increases, readers will be looking for trusted, reliable filters to help them make choices. That’s where we as literary organizations come in. Lits orgs, independent publishers, etc. will have to step up and strengthen their identities, refining their editorial choices, ensuring that readers understand their curatorial tastes. In this way, technology will keep us all more focused in our efforts to support arts and culture.

Next up: E. J. Van Lanen, eidtor of Open Letter at the University of Rochester.

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1. How has your literary org changed over the past 5-10 years due to technology changes?

Open Letter Books is only about 2 years old, so we were born more or less at the moment when publishers were discovering new ways to communicate with their readers on the internet. We incorporated these ‘advances’ into our plans from the very beginning. For example, more than a year before our first book went on sale, we launched Three Percent–a blog dedicated to covering international literature and literature in translation–as a way to build interest in literature in translation and also to establish ourselves in the public mind as both fans and publishers of these kinds of books.

2. What do you feel new technologies offer you a chance to do that you could not before? What do you wish you could do, if you had limitless resources?

The most important aspect of new technologies is that they allow us to get in closer touch with our readers, creating space for direct communication in both directions. This is relatively new in book publishing; traditionally, the only real feedback publishers got from their readers were sales numbers. Now we can find out what people think of our books even before they’re published, which allows us to more finely tailor our marketing and publicity efforts.

3. What are the challenges you have faced, and expect to face in the future, in terms of technology?

Our biggest foreseeable technological challenge will be e-books. Obtaining these rights is difficult (so much is up in the air right now), and because we have a small staff, it takes a great deal of our resources to keep up with making our e-books available in the different available formats. We await the mysterious Apple tablet with some trepidation.

4. What other literary orgs do you feel use technology most successfully, and how?

I think PEN America has been out in front with their website for a while, especially with the advent of the World Voices Festival and the videos of authors, translators, and publishers they’ve been able to make available.

5. How do you see the literary landscape in 10-20 years from now, given the possibilities that technology is opening up for us. How do you think technology might specifically effect literary orgs?

The main effect of most of the recent technological advances seems to be a kind of atomization. On the one hand, this is good, since it opens up space for smaller organizations to have some real influence. On the other, this atomization makes it more difficult to find the persons and organizations you might want to reach and affect. I think those literary organizations who are best able to use technological advances to draw a community of supporters around themselves will likely be successful in a way, and on a scale, they wouldn’t have been able to even 10 years ago. However, it still feels like the early days, and it’s difficult to say which of the technologies we find so interesting today will be actually useful and interesting 10 years from now.

The below is from Geoffrey Gatza, Editor and Publisher of BlazeVOX Books. Thanks so much, Geoffrey!

1. How has your literary org changed over the past 5-10 years due to technology changes?

In every new age there comes a new method. Today the cyber culture sits on the brim of explosion. Our mission, after ten years is still very hard to pin down; we represent neither a group of writers nor one mode of writing. We enjoy innovative works of literature in whatever format that it chooses to find itself. We wish to promote new style, emerging voices and provide an outlet for these artists to express their artistic visions. This sounds good, and in turn we will try to live up to these standards and will do whatever is humanly possible. Please forgive us in advance for our flaws. Without the computer or other technologies, BlazeVOX [books] would not exist.

BlazeVOX Books has published over 150 volumes, mostly poetry, and will publish approximately 20-25 more each year during 2009 and 2010. Our latest book authors include Anne Waldman with illustrations by George Scheenman, Raymond Federman, Ted Greenwald, Celia Gilbert, and Craig Paulenich. A detailed list of all of our titles is located in our online catalog blazevox.org/catalog.htm. Also just out is the latest issue of BlazeVOX2k9 and online journal of voice. But wait, there’s more; our Wilde Reading Room has 75 ebooks available for free download. As you can see, BlazeVOX [books] presents some of the most original voices writing today.

2. What do you feel new technologies offer you a chance to do that you could not before? What do you wish you could do, if you had limitless resources?

All of our work comes from the computer, either the writing itself or the method it comes to our inbox, to the way it is processed and published. In one sense our resources are unlimited, well limited to what can humanly be done. We have managed to publish a great many authors as our online journal can be distributed to anyone with a computer anywhere in the world. We have no upper limit on page count so we can display a larger look at one author’s work, where in many print magazines we can only view one or two poems. This has been very successful for the authors and us.

With new technologies we have the ability audit our performance and see in real time who and what is being accessed on our site. We know how many people are reading which author and from that we make decisions on how to best plan for future issues, ebooks and printed books. Oddly though, our ebooks are the most popular items on our website, as folks want to read poetry but are resistant to buy the book. The reason for the success, one garners readers and make waves for future book publications. Our ebooks have an average readership of 7000 downloads per title, this compared to the POD titles which have a sales of less than 500 copies.

We are also looking to update our services with recorded performances, video and other emerging forms of communication as technology grows. Not only the tech we have to bring things out, but more importantly it is our reader who are using new devices to read literature and we are ready to meet those needs.

3. What are the challenges you have faced, and expect to face in the future, in terms of technology?

Some challenges are in keeping up with the new programs and educating oneself in the current methods of real communication. Only recently I have been feeling overwhelmed by the new forms of communication, like Twitter and Facebook. Which are themselves not difficult to learn, but to keep up with all that is out there and how close ones readers are to that author have had a real impact on how we conduct business.

Also, as you know, every year software changes and to keep current required a lot of time keep up on self-education. I have recently joined Lynda.com training site, which has short films on how to work almost every piece of software we might encounter. So this helps.

4. What other literary orgs do you feel use technology most successfully, and how?

There are a thousand more but these are a part of my daily ritual.

UBUWEB http://ubu.com/

UbuWeb is a large web-based educational resource for avant-garde material available on the internet, founded in 1996 by poet Kenneth Goldsmith. It offers visual, concrete and sound poetry, expanding to include film and sound art mp3 archives. UbuWeb was founded in response to the marginal distribution of crucial avant-garde material. It remains non-commercial and operates on a gift economy. UbuWeb ensures educational open access to out-of-print works that find a second life through digital art reprint while also representing the work of contemporaries. It addresses problems in the distribution of and access to intellectual materials. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UbuWeb

Their extensive collection is wonderful, various, important and free. The collective, decentralized nature of UbuWeb gives it the ability to be open and responsive in keeping these works in the public eye.

Poetry Foundation http://www.poetryfoundation.org

The ideal website for a poetry magazine, luckily this is Poetry magazine so it is good that they are leading the way! From their archives, to their blog of revolving prominent poets on varied subjects, reading guides, videos and much more. If the Lilly Foundation gave me money this is what I would install immediately. This is one of the great resources!

Silliman Blog http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/

Generally, a well-informed blog by Ron Silliman, providing a daily run down on the current Post Avant poetry activity.

5. How do you see the literary landscape in 10-20 years from now, given the possibilities that technology is opening up for us. How do you think technology might specifically effect literary orgs?

Literary organizations will thrive in the new technological landscape. In the next generation of the Kindle or a more advanced device based on the cell phone, literary journals and arts organization will find to project their texts and performances over the new devices for audiences to see then when they want to and not go to the event itself. This is already beginning to happen and will only become more pronounced as a single platform and device becomes established as the new reading / watching / listening device.

Now that we’ve had the pleasure of hearing from Debora Ott and Kathleen Masterson, I’m happy to let you know we’ll feature LitTAP Convening panelists. So look forward to Q&A responses from BOMB Magazine’s Paul Morris, Geoffrey Gatza of BlazeVOX, and E.J. Van Lanen of Open Letter. After the convening, we will also feature your reflections on the event — a great way to continue the conversation!

In the meantime, Kathleen Masterson says, “If you want a good laugh re: technology and publishing, go to this article (a “Shouts & Murmurs” piece in The New Yorker):

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2009/10/19/091019sh_shouts_weiner

Here is a post from Kathleen Masterson, Director of the Literature Division at the New York State Council on the Arts, about the history and development of the LitTap Convenings. Thanks so much, Kathleen!

The NYS Council on the Arts provides support for the Literary Presenters Technical Assistance Program (LitTap) at Just Buffalo Literary Center, and for the NYTAP program for literary magazines and presses at CLMP.  These projects address technical assistance needs of literary presenters and publishers all around New York State.   NYSCA has had a long tradition of supporting field-wide convenings in its various discipline programs, as well as across disciplines.  The organizers of LitTap and NYTAP wanted to bring this face-to-face experience to both literary presenters and publishers, so the Facing Pages literary convenings were begun five years ago.  We took the name from the method of printing writing in translation and in the original language side by side on facing pages.

Deborah Ott of LitTap (formerly at Just Buffalo), and later Laurie Torrell, also of Just Buffalo, took the lead as project directors at LitTap in making the convenings happen, with help from a great Statewide Planning Committee, and with support from NYSCA.  Writers and Books of Rochester was the founding sponsor for LitTap and Facing Pages, prior to Just Buffalo’s involvement.  The Poet’s House event will be the fifth convening.  The first was at the Center for Independent Publishing in Manhattan, the second at Writers & Books, the third at Minnowbrook Conference Center in Blue Mountain Lake with help from the Adirondack Center for Writing, and the last here in the Council’s offices.  The convenings have covered technical assistance topics requested by the field, including successorship, fundraising, and the ever-changing issues surrounding new technology.  Each has been designed to help presenters and publishers strengthen their infrastructures and their service to the public and to literary artists, and to exchange resources and information to serve that end.

This year’s Facing Pages, at the stunning new Poets House space in Battery Park City, is entitled “Beyond the Tangled Web: Envisioning a Comprehensive Technology Strategy for Your Literary Organization.”  There is a talented subcommittee of literary people planning the agenda, comprised of Michael Kelleher of Just Buffalo, Ron Kavanaugh of Mosaic Magazine, Veronica Liu of Seven Stories Press, Billy Merrell of the Academy of American Poets, and Stephen Motika of Poets House, also our MC for the day.  The subcommittee wanted participants to step back and look, not only at what’s right or wrong with their websites, but at how to think strategically and comprehensively about their overall use of technology and how it will shape itself over the next several years, including, beyond the web, approaches to audience development, marketing, archiving, use of databases, and so on, and how to engage staff and board members in technology planning and use.

I personally find these convenings to be so idea-driven that my mind is reeling for weeks afterwards.  My literary colleague at NYSCA, Christine Leahy, and I are inspired daily by the energy, intelligence and skill in the literary field in this state, and we’d like NYS’s literary organizations to experience firsthand the wonderful resource they have in one another.  People will be attending from as far away as Olean in the Southern Tier, from the Adirondacks, Syracuse, the Finger Lakes, Rochester and, of course, Buffalo.  Participants will have the opportunity to meet NYSCA’s Executive Director, Heather A. Hitchens, as well as NYSCA’s newly appointed Deputy Director, Megan White.  The insights of featured guests Steven Tepper from the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy at Vanderbilt University and Bob Stein from The Institute for the Future of the Book should be perfect antidotes to any lingering deprivation thinking.  No question we’re in hard times right now, but, ironically, that makes it the perfect time to come together and see that bigger picture through the wide new windows at Poets House.

Our first Q & A features Debora Ott, LitTAP Founding Director and Liaison for National Projects — thank you, Debora!

Can you tell us about the history of the convenings? How did you come up with the idea, and how has it developed?

In the mid-late ’90s, the Lila Wallace Readers’-Digest Fund (now the Wallace Fund) supported an audience development initiative among eight select literary arts centers and libraries throughout the U.S. called the Audiences for Literature Network, or ALN. When ALN ended after three years, the intention was to expand the network of literary arts centers and keep dialogue/sharing going through technology. Without funding, the best of intentions were not realized.

Kathleen Masterson, Director of the Literature Program for NYSCA, decided to move forward with a New York state-based technical assistance program in keeping with ALN’s goals. In 2001, she approached me and asked it I would organize a technical assistance program for NYS literary arts presenters. LitTAP — the Literary Presenters Technical Assistance Program — was conceived, a web site was built, and literary presenters were able to apply to Consulting Funds to build their infrastructures. Kathleen Sarkis, formerly of CLMP, assisted with the first convenings. The first administrative partner for LitTAP was Writers & Books in Rochester, under the guidance of Executive Director Joe Flaherty; now the program is facilitated by Just Buffalo Literary Center, Inc., under Executive Director Laurie Dean Torrell’s supervision.

The first convening took place on June 3-4, 2005 at the Small Press Center, The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen, at 20 West 44th Street in New York City. This convening did not have a theme, but was a mix of technical assistance break-out sessions, roundtables, and reports from the field. Subsequently, convenings were held in Rochester in collaboration with Writers & Books on May 12-13, 2006 (theme: The Future of the Book); and October 19-21, 2007 at Minnowbrook, a conference and retreat center in the Adirondacks (theme: New Leaders in Literature). Budget cuts from NYSCA resulted in our postponing convenings for FY 2008 and 2009, but as in the convenings, we were able to focus on particular issues that were important to the field and host the following one-day intensive workshops: October 2008, Fundraising for Literature (at NYSCA) and upcoming on October 30, Beyond the Tangled Web: Envisioning and Implementing a Comprehensive Technology Strategy for your Literary Organization.

One of the greatest developments to come of this venture is collaborative nature of planning the events. NYSCA’s support allows colleagues from around the state to gather twice yearly, conceive of, and plan these events.

What ways do you feel the convenings have helped NY State literary orgs?

The intent was and remains “facilitating exchange among Literary Presenters, Publishers and Writers in New York State.” Best practices are shared, trends are explored, and colleagues have time to share informally with each other. Many other fields have national organizations (dance, opera, chamber music) that sponsor annual convenings; literature does not. The program is unique in the US.

What are you most excited about in regards to this year’s convening?

Hmmm…untangling? Seeing the new Poets House? Understanding how to use technology to advance the work? ALL OF THE ABOVE!

I’m writing to announce the blog for the upcoming LITTAP meeting, on Friday, October 30th at the new Poets House location in Battery Park. To help get all the attendees “revved up” for the Convening, I will be featuring the day’s presenters/presenting organizations, as well as our convening “co-founders,” NYSCA’s Kathleen Masterson and Deborah Ott of LITTAP. Stay tuned . . .