Theme-Story Integration Part 8 - Game Theory And Public Relations The Epiphany Revisited

Theme-Story Integration

Part 8

 Game Theory And Public Relations 

One way to craft an immersive world into which to drop Characters is to take two elements of the "real" world, combine them, and let your blood boil until you're angry enough to ask a question your readers have not (yet) asked themselves.  

This process won't lead you directly to a "narrative hook" or the beginning of a story, but it will begin to reveal the theme that is rooted in the guts of your being, and that will yield a narrative hook.

Mostly, when you start this process, you become utterly inarticulate -- you can't put a word or a name to what you're feeling, and have no idea why it disturbs you.

It is your own internal conflict arising to compel you to write your story - the magnum opus of a lifetime.

It is the theme of your life, and inside that theme lies the point which connects you to all other humans of your generation, particularly those younger, or those less experienced.

Vocabulary must be expanded to cope with the nascent thoughts that churn upwards disturbing your view of the world.  Sometimes just randomly reading a dictionary or encyclopedia like Wikipedia can bring the vocabulary, and thus the tools with which to think the thoughts that will define your story's theme, into sharp focus.

A story isn't a plot, and it takes both to create a novel. A story by itself might yield a vignette or series of them - a randomized tapestry of scenes, not connected by anything.

A story is all about how emotions churn, become powered, arise and command actions (often ill chosen decisions).  A story is the evolution of wisdom within an individual.

But to craft a novel from a Story, the writer must find a PLOT.

A plot is the sequence of actions the Character initiates that cause Events, which cause more events, until the consequences of the initial action splash back on the Character and trigger an epiphany.

The epiphany in an action novel happens at the 3/4 point in the book -- in a Romance, ordinarily the "that's my man!" epiphany happens at the 1/3 point -- and in other sorts of drama, that turning point is the 1/2 point.

Knowing which genre you are writing in will help you find the narrative hook, the opening line of page 1, and the Conflict you must define on  page 1 and resolve on the last page.

By placing the epiphany that redirects the main character's thinking, and feeling, and thus action according to the genre, you will zero in on the Narrative Hook -- and within that Narrative Hook's choice of vocabulary, you will find the seeds of your epiphany.

Following this method of generating immersive novels will likely launch you into a 20 year writing project.  I have witnessed a few writers struggling with a novel they feel they must write and rewriting it for decades, eventually coming out with a theme-story integrated work of Art that is head and shoulders above previously published works.

It is the topic that makes your blood boil that leads to being able to finish a 20 or even 30 year war with the words of your novel.

You'll get the words right only if you're mad enough when you start, if what you have to say is gut-wrenchingly important to you, and you know how to explain that importance to your readers.

As noted above, one fertile source of such ideas is Wikipedia. Much of what you find there is not actually, wholly, true -- but the contents of wikipedia do reflect what a huge swath of the population thinks is true.

What is true vs what a majority thinks is true is a quintessential Conflict which works marvelously for Science Fiction and for Romance genre.  

The discovery that what you think is true, is in fact not true, is an "epiphany."  Or what is now termed "woke" - a state of mind where your eyes suddenly see something different than they did only one blink previously.

The world has not changed, but your method of interpreting it has.

You can study this effect just by staring at one of the optical illusion memes that streak across the internet from time to time.

Blink and it's two vases - blink again and it's two faces. The lines of the drawing haven't changed!  

When you've been hoodwinked, scammed, fooled, made into a patsy, robbed blind, victimized by disinformation, and don't know it, it is two vases -- but suddenly you know it, and it's two faces.

The scam and your position as a victim hasn't changed -- you have.

That change in you is your STORY.

How, why, and when you BLINK (blinking is an action) is your PLOT.

Here is a Wikipedia juxtaposition of well known processes that, if understood in a wider context, can lead to that sort of EPIPHANY at the core of Theme-Story Integration -- the realization that you have been fooled that comes because you have changed, not because your world changed.

--------------------

Wikipedia - the place to find what people think is true

Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interaction among rational decision-makers.[1] It has applications in all fields of social science, as well as in logic, systems science and computer science. Originally, it addressed zero-sum games, in which each participant's gains or losses are exactly balanced by those of the other participants. In the 21st century, game theory applies to a wide range of behavioral relations, and is now an umbrella term for the science of logical decision making in humans, animals, and computers.

---

Public relations (PR) is the practice of deliberately managing the release and spread of information between an individual or an organization (such as a business, government agency, or a nonprofit organization) and the public in order to affect the public perception. Public relations (PR) and publicity differ in that PR is controlled internally, whereas publicity is not controlled and contributed by external parties.[1] Public relations may include an organization or individual gaining exposure to their audiences using topics of public interest and news items that do not require direct payment.[2] This differentiates it from advertising as a form of marketing communications. Public relations aims to create or obtain coverage for clients for free, also known as 'earned media', rather than paying for marketing or advertising. But in the early 21st century, advertising is also a part of broader PR activities.[3]

-----

Conflict arises (thus plot arises) from discovering how decision makers have "gamed" you by carefully curating the information you have access to.

If you do something about it, they will do something to you.  

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com 

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World Part 23 - Mastering The Narrative Line

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World
Part 23
Mastering The Narrative Line

Previous posts in this series on Marketing are indexed here:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/05/index-to-marketing-fiction-in-changing.html

In writing classes, emphasis in the explanation of how to sell your fiction is always focused on the Narrative Hook.

The Narrative Hook is one of those dense mysteries for new writers, especially Romance genre writers because most of a Romance is not NARRATIVE at all, never mind "hook" worthy.

The whole point of a Romance is the emotional Velcro that binds two into one -- yes, Velcro has "male" and "female" hooks that make it stick together, so it is a good analogy.  That's not "narrative" but worldbuilding and Theme-Character-Worldbuilding Integration.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/04/index-to-theme-worldbuilding.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/12/index-to-theme-plot-character.html

We have discussed construction of Narrative Hooks, and will no doubt revisit that pure craft skill.  But it occurs to me to wonder if the real reason new writers have such an amazingly difficult time crafting a Narrative Hook lies within a lack of conceptualization of what a Narrative Line is, where it comes from, and why readers expect it.  What the Narrative Line has to do with Art and the reader's determination to memorize your byline and find all your books.

The Narrative Line begins with a Hook (on Page 1) and ends usually just before the Plot Climax and Story Conflict Resolution.  The Narrative Line ends with the bald articulation of the THEME,  which is most effective when phrased as a "one-liner."  Those single lines of dialogue that audiences take from movies and quote out of context to reference the underlying theme of the movie -- which has suddenly appeared in their real life.

People communicate in references, in one-liners, and so must your characters.

The Narrative Line is the "Show-Don't-Tell" explication of the Theme.

The Narrative is not the Event Sequence (or Plot, Because Line), and it is not the Character's Life Lesson (or Story).  Both of those are derived from the Theme (or generate the theme, depending on where you start creating the novel). The Narrative Line is usually less tangible, less memorable, and much harder to articulate.

The Narrative Line is what makes sense of the World you have Built.  If the Plot is the backbone of the novel, the Narrative Line is the Spinal Nerve running down the hollow bone, causing the moving parts to move both consciously and subconsciously.

If you can grasp the concept of Narrative Line, find it operating in your own Reality, and then in the (very different) Realities your readership inhabits, then you will very likely have little trouble crafting a Narrative Hook to alert that specific readership to HERE IS THE STORY OF YOUR LIFE.

Real life work situations are usually very boring, repetitive, dull.  Most jobs are tiny parts of a big whole operation that produces something the worker never sees or has any use for.

If you make steel bolts for a living, you aren't involved in enjoying the backyard swing set they hold together -- you never meet those children, have no idea they even exist.  You sweat away your days in a noisy factory floor running giant machines that hammer out identical bolts, and get punished if too many aren't identical enough.

You are on the Narrative Line those parents and children are on, but you don't know it, and you're likely too tired to care.

"Art" -- storytelling -- replicates reality by dramatizing (making larger) certain parts, and minimizing others.  In the case of making bolts for a living, the noise/sweat/exhaustion part gets minimized and the pride/precision/workmanship and economic elegance of the production line is dramatized.

How would you dramatize making bolts?

Well, what if a swing-set manufacturer had a massive recall because of faulty bolts, and the floor manager and maybe his gang of workers got called to testify in court about the process of creating that particular bolt that broke at the top of a child's swing-arc and sent her over a neighbor's fence into the empty cement pool?  The bolt making floor boss has to meet the widowed mother and crippled kid, learn the husband who bought the swing-set committed suicide while the kid was in Shriner's Hospital For Children with bleak prognosis.

See? An isolated, boring, lonely, miserable job can be dramatized by revealing the Narrative Line the boring situation lies on.

This kind of material is sometimes identified as "back story" - and it can be that.  But the parts of the back story that belong in this current novel have to be selected, teased out of the whole life stories of all the Characters, and presented in a discernible "line" -- a curve, or arc, or hurtling straight line into a Fate, ass-backwards into a bear trap, or upwards toward a worthwhile goal.  Selecting what to include in the Narrative Line is Art.  Art is selectivity -- omitting in order to sift a pattern, a statement, a "truth" out of the mixed background noise of "life."

In 2016, we are in the middle of a huge transition in the Narrative Line of the Human Species.

Yes, not "race" because humanity is not a "race" but a species.

And yes, our Narrative Line is about to swoop into a new direction. We have the ability to edit genes (even before figuring out what that gene does), and transform humans. We are using that ability to craft mosquitoes to fight that disease vector.  We've found traces of very ancient DNA from viruses inside our genes.  We're beginning to see how all living things on Earth are "made out of" each other -- we all contain parts of each other.

Tracing the development of genetic knowledge from the mid-1950's onward, you can create a "Narrative Line" and project it into the future.

Then look at research into Personality and Behavior (even Mental Illness).  Brain, nerve, and chemistry studies are probing for the origin of Love inside our physical bodies.

There is even a "line" of studies trying to show how brain configuration determines your politics (Republican or Democrat).  This opens the possibility of "editing" genes so we're all Democrats and don't argue so much.

A person with a job in a vast gene-editing operation might do one task repetitively all day long without ever knowing the "back story" of the Narrative Line or the ultimate result of the end of that Line being reached.

Of course, we also have the Automation Narrative Line that started maybe even before Henry Ford implemented the first Assembly Line.  Today boring, repetitive jobs are being filled by robots.  Today's cars have more parts, and fewer assembly line jobs, even though most families have at least one car (unless they live in the city with bus service).  Of course, the self-driving car will put taxi and truck drivers out of work.

Automation is a Narrative Line you can use to dramatize a Character's life.

Take a hot topic, ripped from the Headlines -- Gun Control as the solution to Alien Invasion.  You can't have an armed (and ignorant) public confronting the Flying Saucer People -- humans tend to shoot things they don't understand, right?  That could start a war we can't win.

Another hot topic, ripped from the Headlines, sexual misconduct by famous people, stars, celebrities, politicians, even Heads of State of other countries.  Or the same misconduct by a total nobody, an unknown, whose trial is dramatized by Network News until everyone knows the guy's mother's maiden name.

Yet another hot topic, ripped from the Headlines, Police Misconduct -- over-reaction against suspects who are actually innocent.

Which leads to another topic, the legal principle of Innocent Until Proven Guilty which is the Narrative Line Media News has set aside in favor of Allegations Must Be True Or They Would Not Have Been Alleged.  Suspicion = Guilt.  For example, merely being on the Terrorist Watch List is cause for suspicion.  Or the bureaucratic mishandling of some email documents puts you under suspicion of treason, and we all know suspicion means guilt.

So Narrative Lines have TOPICS.  Mass Communications, such as TV News or making Speeches to stadiums full of people, or guesting on a call-in radio show, requires sticking to a TOPIC.

You have probably noticed that these blogs don't stick to a topic.  There is an esoteric reason for that.  I, personally, do not see the world, reality, or life as divided into separate things of any sort - topics, ideas, points.  With one mental eye, I see Reality as one, single, interconnected, single-origin whole -- completely undifferentiated.  With another mental eye, I see individual particles and people connected directly to a single origin much more strongly than to each other.

This binocular vision gives me a notion of another "dimension" to Reality.

My Topic in these posts is that other "dimension" -- how it is related to what we see with our everyday physical eyes.

As a result, I bring in what appears to be unrelated material and drop it in the midst of what might be making some sense to you.  If you can discern a relationship instead of an intrusion or an "off-topic" remark, you might glimpse a bit of that "dimension" in a way you can use.

Today's topic is The Narrative Line (or arc, circle, spiral).  The Narrative Line of a novel has a TOPIC, but is not a topic in itself.  The Theme is a slice or cross-section of a Topic, and both contains a topic and is derived from a topic.  Theme is what you have to say ABOUT a Topic, not the topic itself.

Once completely drawn, the Narrative Line will illustrate your Theme, and may not appear to most readers to stick to a Topic.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/12/index-to-theme-plot-character.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-to-use-theme-in-writing-romance.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/04/index-to-theme-worldbuilding.html

The core skill of Illustration is Depiction.  Here's the index on Depiction.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/04/index-to-depiction-series-by-jacqueline.html

Once you have constructed a Narrative Line, fabricated to illustrate (using depiction and symbolism) your theme, you will have no trouble finding the right Narrative Hook for your own Targeted Readership.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/10/index-to-targeting-readership-series-by.html

And here is Part 4 of Symbolism series with links to the previous parts:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/01/theme-symbolism-integration-part-4-how.html

Here is the key post on Symbolism:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/03/communicating-in-symbols.html

Those posts on Symbolism explain to the fiction writer working in text medium what the visual media (TV News for example, or online video news or advertisement) call "Optics."

Optics is about what the target audience will infer or deduce from the visual image, not about the image itself or the reality behind it. That concept embraces the paradigm "Suspicion=Guilt" that is so pervasive today.  An image or angle on an image taken out of context or perspective is as misleading as a quote taken out of context.

This is why politicians learn to speak to Mass Media in sound bytes or Talking Points, pre-scripted, memorized monologues.  Professional writers create those Talking Points to be quoted out of context harmlessly.  Today's politics is a battle of writers putting words in the mouths of Characters (the candidates) to thwart other writers excerpting those Talking Points to quote out of context and reverse the meaning.

The trick for constructing the Narrative Hook that drags your Target Reader into your Narrative Line and holds them on that line is to select a Topic the reader is interested in, but does not know they are interested in.

When we post a news article on Facebook, we often say "This is interesting."  But the truth is the opposite.  The quality "interesting" does not reside in the thing itself -- but rather in the observer.  What we really mean is, "I am interested in this" -- not that "this is interesting."  English has many such grammatical twists which can be used in writing dialogue (but not narrative).

Here's the index to posts on dialogue - there are actually more than 4.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/10/dialogue-parts-1-4-listed.html

Readers often don't know what is interesting about what they are reading (fiction or non-fiction, the source of fascination is hard to spot and articulate.)

You are familiar with the Acting lessons that emphasize "people watching" -- closely observing people, their mannerisms, accents, dress, and especially "walk" (how they move -- a dancer vs a martial arts master vs a runner vs a soldier etc).  Character is intrinsic in one's "walk" or "stride."

Honing the ability to observe random strangers is the key to good acting.  Honing the ability to observe one's own reaction to words is the key to good writing.

In other words, good reading is necessary to good writing.

What is the difference between reading and good reading?

Analysis.  Just as an actor analyzes the people walking through the mall, the writer analyzes the words of the story being read.

One thing you analyze for is "interest" -- why is this interesting to me?  What is it about ME that makes me respond to this?  A story, Character or Topic is not inherently "interesting."

Grasp that fact and you'll have an inexhaustible source of Narrative Hooks.  Find the right hook for your Line and you will catch a lot of readers.

What it is about you that makes you interested in This Topic is the exact reason why your Target Reader will find This Topic interesting.  If you understand the Topic well enough to grasp the import (even on a non-verbal level), you will be able to explain the Topic to your reader in a way that will interest them -- perhaps subconsciously.

How do you teach yourself to straighten your stories out into a Narrative Line and craft a strong Narrative Hook?

Study Network News -- Video News online -- text-news stories and articles such as the one I pointed you to in Part 22 of this Marketing Fiction In A Changing World series.

The very best way to learn "pacing" in fiction writing is to understand what constitutes NEWS.  "News" is a Plot Development.  Every scene on a Plot-Line starts with a Narrative Hook and ends with NEWS.  That is basic scene structure, and it works on stage, screen and text page.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/11/story-springboards-part-3-art-of.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/06/finding-story-opening-part-2-avatar-and.html

To teach yourself to identify a Narrative Line that large numbers of people (even beyond your targeted audience) are interested in analyze Network News.

To teach yourself to understand why those people are interested in these Narrative Lines, study the Network News.

Don't ask people what they find interesting. They don't know (some do, most don't) why a Narrative captivates them.  The most captivating and compelling stories are the ones that communicate with the subconscious, illustrate or symbolize subconscious issues.

Find a Narrative Line that interests you and probe your own subconscious until you see why it does.  Chances are good that once you consciously know why that Narrative holds your attention, it no longer will hold your attention.

To get good at Narrative Lines study the ones that you already have no interest in.  Some of those will be Narrative Lines you have an aversion to.  Those are extremely valuable as they are the raw material of Conflict that can drive a novel.

In our world today, the biggest Narrative Line is the Rate of Change in our world far outstripping our ability to adjust.  The human genome (as currently constituted by Nature anyway) has built-in limits on what can be changed at certain ages, and how fast change can happen, as well as how severe and urgent the need for change must be.  The older you get, the more severe the need must be and the harder you have to work at it.  EXAMPLE: stroke victim learning to talk or walk again.  The older you are, the harder it is to create new neural connections.

Which brings us to Snapchat and the article we touched on in Part 22 of this series:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/enriquedans/2016/06/19/what-snapchat-tells-us-about-the-future-of-news-and-information-gathering/#440c2d41480d

As you see in this quote ...
---------quote---------
There are other differences that set Snapchat apart from Facebook, for example the complex algorithms and procedures that have led to accusations that Zuckerberg’s company is editorializing; Snapchat Discover is essentially a feed reader or news aggregator, the magic tool that many of us consider to be the beating heart of our information systems, but that few adults who haven’t grown up with the internet still don’t really understand and thus fail to use. If you don’t use a feed reader you aren’t informing yourself, you’re being informed. Think about it.

-------end quote-------

... if you don't use a feed reader you aren't informing yourself, you're being informed.  I've been using feed readers since they first came available, and many have come and gone since then.  Yahoo is being sold, so I expect my all time favorite feed reader page on Yahoo will be gone.  Therefore I've been watching Snapchat develop, and meanwhile using Flipboard more and more.

The Snapchat Discover feature has serious promise.  The Narrative Line of the world's problems as seen by the young people this Forbes article refers to is very different from the Narrative Line presented by Cable News or Broadcast Network News.  They will lose audience share as the older folks die off and the young become Middle Aged, thinking about "the narrative" in a different way.

Meanwhile you can find me:

https://flipboard.com/@jacquelinelhmqg

On Snapchat search for thelichtenberg or click here (on your phone)
 https://www.snapchat.com/add/thelichtenberg

As also noted in that Forbes article on Snapchat,

---------quote--------
So while most adults either continue to inform themselves via the same media they have always read or simply accept what is put in front of them by whichever social media, young people are learning to choose, to subscribe to publications that mean something to them, rather than accepting segmentation, which they see as creepy, as though they were being spied on, and just about accepting geographic segmentation. Meanwhile, Snapchat Discover is an exclusive club, a place newspaper editors are dying to be admitted to, and that feels free to kick out Yahoo! News after six months because Spiegel thought they didn’t get millennials.

I’ve been saying this for a while now, but Snapchat is much more than it seems, and it is doing what it does spectacularly well. If you’re aged 25 or over you might find it challenging, but make the effort: it’s well worth it.

----------end quote--------

Look for and identify Narrative Lines embedded in Mass Market News.  You can rip TOPICS from the Headlines, but to get the Narrative Lines about those topics that captivate the aggregate subconscious of a country or the world, you need to study more deeply than just headlines.

Mining of Big Data is one Narrative Line to follow.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/06/19/television-as-data-mapping-6-years-of-american-television-news/#5430ebdf628c

And the counter move to Privacy embodied in Snapchat -- and also Whatsapp's encryption protocols -- is another Narrative Line.

Gun Control, Privacy, Personal Sovereignty, Income Redistribution, Religious Freedom -- these are TOPICS.  Each one has a different Narrative Line on different News packagers (NBC, CBS, ABC, Reuters, AP, Fox, etc.).

These News organizations create the Narrative Line then cherry-pick Events, developments that further that narrative.

Once you get hold of how this is done by comparing them on a New Aggregator like Snapchat or Flipboard, you will begin to understand Scene Structure and The Narrative Hook in a new way.

If you are under 25, you may need to make a conscious effort to acquire the Narrative Line of the world as seen by today's teens -- your market in 5 years or so.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/benrosen/how-to-snapchat-like-the-teens?utm_term=.lcGJJdaZx#.wunppoeAN

------quote----------from buzzfeed.com
my 13-year-old sister, and she’s the most prolific Snapchat user I’ve ever seen.
We live in different states, so I rarely get a chance to hang out with her. That’s what made Thanksgiving so eye-opening. I would watch in awe as she flipped through her snaps, opening and responding to each one in less than a second with a quick selfie face. She answered all 40 of her friends’ snaps in under a minute.
How was this even possible? Is she a freak of nature, or is this just how things are done when you’re young? I had to find out what I was missing. What do these “teens” know that I don’t?
I decided to investigate further…

---------end quote--------

That single description of a 13 year old's worldview should indicate what different Narrative Lines will look like in 10 years.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Depiction Part 1 - Depicting Power In Relationships

Depiction Part 1
Depicting Power In Relationships
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Depiction essentially means to symbolize, to draw a picture, a sketch that will evoke the essential attributes you think are singular or recognizable about the subject.

Depiction is a subset of Show Don't Tell. 

Depiction is based on an agreement between depictor and recipient. 

It's the brain trick that lets us look at a scrambled page full of LINES and "see" a map, and understand it as a depiction of a territory (real or imagined).

Writers depict both concrete and abstract elements in mere words.  Readers agree to accept the emphasis the writer's selection of certain attributes and omission of other attributes to "depict" a character, situation, philosophy, threat, conflict, or the stakes in a transaction.

If the writer writes, "It was a dark and stormy night ..." the reader may KNOW there were some street lamps or car headlights (or carriage lanterns) but at the same time understand that the main character's emotional "place" is inside the primal threat-zone that dark and stormy nights were for cavemen. 

The character is aware of the light, but seeing only the dark. 

Emotional tone is created by a mental filter that can be set to see only the rosy-sunshine or only the slimy-dark-shadowed crannies full of dirty snow.

Thus in a few words, a writer can DEPICT an emotional state by sketching a few concrete and familiar things, all in words.

Most beginning writers get this trick right away, and have a lot of fun with it.

The next, and somewhat harder trick to learn with Depiction is to depict the Relationships between characters in show don't tell.

A) Relationships are two-sided at least.
B) Relationships are intangible
C) Relationships shift and change (ARC just like Characters do, and in step with the characters changes).
D) Relationships are mostly subconscious -- the characters themselves are not aware of the dynamic parameters driving a Relationship.

How do you "depict" the dynamic changes driving a Romance? 

What does he see in her or what does she see in him?  Is what is seen actually there, or not?  Does what is seen change or Arc as the character Arcs?

Here is a previous post on What Does She See In Him:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/08/what-does-she-see-in-him.html

Now we all know sex is about Power.  But Love is another topic altogether, and more about what you do with Power.

The Power dynamic underlies all Primate Relationships.  I'm assuming you all know that and have read a whole lot of primate studies, anthropology, The Rise And Fall Of The Roman Empire, and so on.

You know how Power -- the ability to Dominate, and the choice of when, where, and how emphatically to use that ability -- figures into all human endeavors.

The world your reader lives in is currently dominated by a Power Game that is all about tricking people into doing things against their best interests.

It's called PR -- Public Relations -- and I've discussed the mathematical underpinnings and history of this pervasive science of controlling people (you, your reader, your characters, whole governments, and reshaping the World Order).  It is the art of the Grifter and the Science of Merchandising.

From Wikipedia:
---QUOTE----
Ivy Lee and Edward Louis Bernays established the first definition of public relations in the early 1900s as follows: "a management function, which tabulates public attitudes, defines the policies, procedures, and interests of an organization... followed by executing a program of action to earn public understanding and acceptance."[citation needed] However, when PR pioneer Ivy Lee was later asked about his role in a hearing with the United Transit Commission, he said "I have never been able to find a satisfactory phrase to describe what I do."[4] In 1948, historian Eric Goldman noted that the definition of public relations in Webster's would be "disputed by both practitioners and critics in the field."[4]

In August 1978, the World Assembly of Public Relations Associations defined the field as

    "the art and social science of analyzing trends, predicting their consequences, counseling organizational leaders, and implementing planned programs of action, which will serve both the organization and the public interest."[5]

Public Relations Society of America, a professional trade association,[6] defined public relations in 1982 as:

    "Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other."[7]

In 2011 and 2012, the PRSA developed a crowd-sourced definition:

    "Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics."[8]

Public relations can also be defined as the practice of managing communication between an organization and its publics.[9]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_relations
----END QUOTE----

Over about a century since 1900, the math and science behind manipulating people has gone from odd curiosity to major, serious, methodology for forcing large numbers of people to behave the way a small number of people prefer.  And this power has come into the hands of a small number of people who see nothing wrong with using the power of your subconscious against you and your best interests for the good of "society."

Think about the place of Publicity in our world.  Think about why it is that all these committees keep telling you that you have this or that problem in your town, your state, your job or the wages you get for the work you do, and then say just give that committee MONEY and they will solve the problem for you (by "supporting" this or that politician running for office.)

What does it mean "support" and why does it cost MONEY (especially the huge amounts of money they collect for political campaigns?)

"Support" is a euphemism for ADVERTISING.  It's not support at all -- because once such a Group spends that much money "supporting" by making and running ads, they expect (it's illegal ever to say it or write it down, but it happens) "access" to that politician.  And that means that the "supported" politician will do what the Group wants -- and that Group isn't necessarily bound to make the politician do what you want or expect.  You are, after all, the one being controlled, and the effectiveness of their control over you is measured by how much money you give them.

Now, read the Wikipedia quote and my last few comments -- that is a DEPICTION of the world your readers live in.  It defines what they will believe in your fictional depiction of your fictional universe -- and what else you will have to work to get them to believe temporarily.

Note that a depiction is a depiction as much because of what it leaves out as what it puts in.  Think of a caricature of a person's face -- a few lines suggesting other lines and planes that you fill in with your mind, and then you SEE the real person's image in the suggestion.

In Science Fiction, the plot is based on "action" (things people do that cause changes in their world).  The actions are usually taken on the basis of "science" (some extrapolation from the science that the reader is expected to know.)

Science Fiction is the playground for scientists -- after they do science all day, they take a "bus man's holiday" and play with science, way off the edges of what is known and into FICTION.

Science Fiction Romance has to have that element in it, but plot has to be driven by the RELATIONSHIP which is romantic in nature.

Today's romance novels usually include a lot of sex -- most often graphically depicted.

Yeah, novel-sex isn't real, but a depiction.  The reader has to fill in the picture. 

In a lot of Romance Novels, it's hate-at-first-sight not love, or at least not recognizably love.

The Conflict that generates the plot is in the Relationship.  The two forces that conflict to generate the plot are the male and female lead characters.

Very often, that conflict is a POWER STRUGGLE -- and the stakes of that struggle can vary enormously.  They might be fighting over a Throne, or control of an interstellar corporation, or influence over an AI, or for a Patent.  The possibilities are endless.

In a Power Struggle Plot, all the principles of Public Relations apply. 

So here are some headlines from which you can rip a story, a plot, a character, the stakes, and a major conflict as well as a multitude of themes.

http://www.businessinsider.com/7-ways-to-get-people-to-take-you-seriously-2014-5

That is advice on how to depict a character you want the reader to see as "in charge" or "powerful."  This is a portrait of your Alpha male or female.  That article tells you what attributes to give your POWER PLAYER to make readers believe that character is what you say he/she is.

--------QUOTE-----------
1. Let people talk about themselves.

People spend 60% of their conversations talking about themselves.

It feels good: Harvard researchers have found that talking about yourself activates the same brain regions as sex, cocaine, and a good meal.

"Activation of this system when discussing the self suggests that self-disclosure like other more traditionally recognized stimuli, may be inherently pleasurable," Scientific American reports, "and that people may be motivated to talk about themselves more than other topics."

Research shows that when people disclose information about themselves, they like each other more. It's also the primary way to form social bonds, or another way of saying it helps earn their respect. 

--------END QUOTE--------

Now come on - isn't that what your Mama taught you about "getting a man?" 

My question is, "Does this work on women, too?"

The 7th item in their list is not passive-aggressive tricky like item 1. 

But I think # 3 in their list is important for writers to incorporate into dominant character traits.

---------QUOTE----------
2. Win people over with the first introduction.

Esquire's Tom Chiarella perfectly captures how to make a great first impression. He writes:

    On the street, in the lobby, square your shoulders to people you meet. Make a handshake matter — eye contact, good grip, elbow erring toward a right angle. Do not pump the hand, unless the other person is insistent on just that. Then pump the hell out of their hand. Smile. If you can't smile, you can't be gracious. You aren't some dopey English butler. You are you.

Why is this important? Because paying full attention to someone is a way of showing respect, and social science confirms that we get respect when we give respect. Add that to the list of reasons that conscientiousness predicts success.

------------END QUOTE----

And here is a DEPICTION of an application of the PR principles of exercising POWER over others, regardless of whether it's really good for others or not.

http://www.businessinsider.com/how-starbucks-lures-customers-to-spend-2014-5

That one is about how STARBUCKS tricks people into buying things.  Grocery supermarkets do this, too, as do department stores. 

Mobile Advertising applies these principles.

I put articles such as these (and many others) into the Magazines I edit (or curate) on Flipboard.

You can find my Magazines at:
https://flipboard.com/profile/jacquelinelhmqg

It has a mobile app and a link on that page (big red link) leads you to the app you need if you have mobile devices.  Or you can read on a PC.

Because of the insane amounts of money available to political advertisers, the cutting edge of developing absolute power over large groups of people is currently with the Political Ad producers, directors, and the people using donated money to buy air time for ads supporting whichever side. 

Study the writing behind the political ads this season, and you will learn DEPICTION.

Those ads depict candidates -- they don't actually portray the candidates.  The ads are designed to lure you into filling in the gaps in the caricatures.  You imagine you saw what you most want to see.  It is the epitome of the grifter's art. 

Now, take your novel's Main Characters -- and write a POLITICAL AD presenting that character to the world he lives in.

Imagine your character running for public office in this current election.  What would the ads say?

What has this to do with Romance Novels?  Or Science Fiction Romance? 

The advertisers -- whether they're selling beer, Viagra, or people -- are attempting to use mathematically based skills to entice large numbers of people into a love-affair, a Romance, with whatever they're selling.

That's the nerve political ads try to hit (which is why negative ads often have negative effects, and yet they work because rough sex also sells). 

The political ads are designed to ignite a desire for affinity, to develop trust, to establish community.  And those are the opening moves in any "pick-up" that eventually leads to something serious.

To find your opening scene and opening line, study political ads that are designed to hook viewers and rivet attention.

Remember the A, B, C, D of RELATIONSHIP noted above.  It applies to political ad induced seduction romance as well.

You're writing fiction and so are the PR folks who spin out these ads (but they make more money).  They are using Science to create Fiction that entices you into a Romance.  How can you go wrong learning to do what they do for the Big Bucks?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Index to Marketing Fiction In A Changing World by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Index to Marketing Fiction In A Changing World

by 

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

It isn't enough to just write a great story, nor even to write a story that precisely fits what publishers want. 

Today's changing world requires writers to do much more than write. 

Some manage this problem by marrying or partnering up with someone with the requisite skills, and some hire an agent.  Some get lucky and connect with the right editor.

Everyone else has to pay attention to Marketing, Markets, Publishing, video, advertising, PR, and branding -- all kinds of things that really compete with creative time. 

Self-publishing is yet another whole set of skills that adds in book design, formatting, layout, cost-effective use of various online outlets, accounting, and a myriad secretarial skills. 

We have not yet covered all these requisites in this blog series, even though I've been touching on this subject since 2009.  Here is what we have so far in this series, with the newest at the top.

My series on Marketing Fiction In A Changing World:

Part 27 -
The Half Hour Drama Is Back
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2017/08/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html
Part 26 - 

Must You Compromise Your Art To Sell Big? 

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2017/06/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

Part 25 - Understanding the Shifting Fiction Market
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2017/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

Part 24- Writing About The Future And For The Future
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2017/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

Part 23 - Mastering The Narrative Line
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/10/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_31.html

Part 22 - Making A Profit At Writing In A Capitalist World
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/10/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_11.html

Part 21 - Crafting Book Links To Track Via Google
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/10/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/07/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_19.html  Part

20. Guest Post by Miriam Pia

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/07/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html Part 19, Guest Post by Deb Wunder on non-fiction writing

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html Part 18 - Amazon makes some bad marketing decisions

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2016/01/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html Part 17 - Fiction Writing still pays less than minimum wage, considering the hours spent. Make your living at non-fiction. See where the opportunities lurk.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/11/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_24.html Part 16 about which is more science fiction, Star Trek or Star Wars? A question via Quora.com

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/11/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html Part 15 - Guest Post by Kirok of L'Stok and discussion of new series by Jean Johnson
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/09/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html Part 14 - posting on September 1, 2015

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html is Part 13 in this series.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html is Part 12

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2015/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html  is Part 11 in this series.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/11/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html  -- this is Part 10

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/07/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_18.html


http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_11.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_25.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_18.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World - Part 6 - The News Game by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World
  Part 6
The News Game
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Previous parts in this series:

Last week, Part 5:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_25.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_18.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html


In Part 5 I referred you to a non-fiction book about the history of science fiction in which some of E. C. Tubb's work called "melodramatic." 

Here in Part 6, we're going to extend the reasoning laid down in Part 4 and examine how the News Game has changed over decades (and why) -- which could indicate what it will be in another decade or two.

We also (as writers who want to stay in print) have to gain a grasp of the connection between non-fiction and fiction -- between News and TV Series -- and what Marketing has to do with that connection.   

Let's start with Name Calling as a writer's tool.  "Melodramatic" is a Name that Romance is often "Called" so it didn't surprise me that E. C. Tubb gained that epithet for what is essentially pure male-action-adventure writing.  His work is built on Relationship, and dips into Romance (he does great Hunks).   

The discussion of Name Calling here extends the discussion in the series on writing Dialogue,
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/08/dialogue-part-6-how-to-write-bullshit.html

The most popular post in the Dialogue series is How To Write Liar Dialogue, and in a way Name Calling belongs there.
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/11/dialogue-part-5-how-to-write-liar.html

Name Calling is a useful tool for giving a character depth without sketching an entire life history.  It adds "color" to a characterization. It's a great way to make a minor character hated by the reader so the death is a triumph. 

So why is it that "Name Calling" tags a character as worthy of a messy death? 

"Name Calling" is revealing your own personal opinion, ramming your opinion down someone else's throat.  Neither the label nor the tone of voice explains or reveals anything about the object discussed, but only about the speaker. 

That's why "Name Calling" doesn't "work." 

The objective is to harm the other, but the result is harm to the self. 

Name Calling is an aggressive act.  It's a great tool to increase the pacing and action-element in a scene.  Think of the bar scene where gamblers sit around a table.  One calls another "cheater" -- boom, bar-fight. 

When you "call" someone a "name" (or categorize or classify them together with others who share one of their traits), you are revealing your opinion, which says a whole lot about who you are and nothing at all about who the other person is. 

The statement the Name Caller makes about him/herself (regardless of what "name" is "called," or who is so labeled) is, "I am a person of very weak character, and I hate myself because of that, so I resent the fact that you are not weaker than I am so that I don't have to work to get stronger.  I am going to destroy you." 

It doesn't matter if the Name being Called is a prestigious label or a derogatory one.  The act of "Calling" reveals all.  This is an application of the writing rule: Show, Don't Tell.  You don't tell the reader that this character is weak.  You give the character a line of dialogue that reveals all. 

Putting someone on a pedestal above you by Naming them something prestigious reveals just how little self-esteem you have. 

As a Dialogue Technique, Name Calling is fabulously effective for communicating to the reader that the character doing the "calling" is in a peak emotional state (discussed in previous parts of this series on Marketing). 

That peak emotional state is so very treasured by Public Relations professionals for a reason. 

And that reason explains the connection between TV News and TV Fiction Series (and Reality Shows also). 

As explained in previous parts of this series, the state Advertisers treasure is the one in which emotion supplants rational thought as the driver of actions. 

The act of plastering a category-label on another person is done in this activated emotional state so you don't have to think.  Name Calling substitutes for the hard work of evaluating all the disparate traits that make this other person unique.

Name Calling is a technique for denuding a person of individuality.

Name Calling is a technique for creating a human "herd." 

For more on Public Relations and Herd Creation as the goal of Advertising, see the previous entries in this series listed at the top of this post.

Name Calling -- real, serious, professional Name Calling -- is a complex technique, and has been reduced to a mathematical formula by Advertisers. 

Professional Name Calling may turn out to be the source of our problem with the prestige level of Romance and the HEA.

It is possible that Romance has been the victim in a PR campaign -- or possibly we're just collateral damage. 

In Part 5 of Marketing Fiction In A Changing World, I did note in the discussion of E. C. Tubb's DUMAREST OF TERRA series that Tubb gives us an example of how to use words with precision and variety -- a lesson in why a writer must develop a massive vocabulary.  Choosing the exact word for what you must say lets you say it more succinctly - and that increases the "pacing."  Tubb is a writer to study for this technique. 

The Dumarest Series is erudite, deeply philosophical, and precisely focused on today's hotest thematic topics -- yet it is pure Action-Adventure and textbook Romance writing.  Tubb uses Theme exactly as I have explained in the posts with THEME in the title. 

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2013/05/index-to-theme-plot-integration.html

Tubb does everything I've explained, all of these techniques flawlessly executed simultaneously -- and makes it look effortless. 

And yet, the historical work on the history of Science Fiction that I pointed you to in Part 5 of this series, written by those who should know better, "calls" E. C. Tubb's work "melodramatic." 

Yes, name calling in non-fiction.

Why is "melodramatic" a name that's being called?

It's just a word.  It's a technical term for a specific genre of stage play. 

Oh, there's a lot of reasons to regard this label as a name being called. 

If we can understand the nuances of what's going on with this, we may be able to figure out where the opprobrium laving the HEA is coming from.  If we can figure the origin of that opprobrium, we may be able to fix that problem. 

An adjective like "melodramatic" refers to a quality which is only present subjectively.

The usage of Melodrama to refer to Science Fiction and Romance has changed the meaning of the word Melodrama over time. 

In the mid-20th Century, the Merriam-Webster definition was "...emotional in a way that is very extreme or exaggerated : extremely dramatic or emotional..." held true.

The word was used to refer to an "extreme" or "exaggerated" fictional situation - a caricature of reality.

The more modern Urban Dictionary says:
The state of being overly emotional - therefore often in a situation that does not warrant such a strong reaction.

Can you see the subjective judgment components of the term Melodrama?

What is "extreme?" -- well, that's your opinion, and might not be mine.

What is "exaggerated"  to you may seem in correct proportion to me, or even understated.

What is "overly" emotional?  What exact situation does in fact warrant 100% response? 

Should responses be metered by degrees of emotion driving them? 

Remember, we're discussing "degrees of emotion" in the context of PR, and Parts 3, 4, and 5 of this series of posts. 

This is all about Advertising which is the science of arousing emotion to a peak high enough to get humans to form a herd and follow the leader to buy a product (such as your book, for example) -- regardless of whether the herd is rushing to self-destruction (paying a lot for a badly crafted book).

PR (Public Relations) is the mathematical science of creating human herds and then gaining power over the herd's stampede.  Advertising is the main tool of PR.  Once you understand what's behind Advertising, you become immune to the herd-joining impetus of the emotions advertisers try to whip up.

Here's an article that gives you a "professional" slant on emotional content used to increase visitor response to a website:
http://www.searchengineworkshops.com/articles/emotional.html

So where emotion is involved, what does it mean "overly emotional?" 

Where that borderline between over and under is, depends on who you are and what else you've experienced.

Imagine two characters arguing about whether the argument two other characters are having is "melodramatic" or not.  As an exercise, write the argument the two characters overhear, and write their elevator conversation as one calls the argument melodramatic and the other says it's not melodramatic. 

Now review Part 4 in this series where we ended off discussing how Hard News used to omit any hint of opinion, and carefully reveal the editorial policy whereby they chose "important" stories and ignored others. 

In that kind of a Hard News organization, a JOURNALIST can't use the word Melodramatic -- except when quoting someone. 

The word melodramatic itself is commentary -- and Hard News is factual and only factual.  There are many such words that Hard News must avoid.  Interestingly, English provides many alternative ways to convey facts without ladling on opinion. 

So there are a hundred little tricks of the trade journalists used to use to keep all hint of opinion out of News Reports: word choice, syntax, tone of voice, and juxtaposition of topics are only a few. 

Another characteristic of Old Fashioned Hard News was that, while every outlet had an editorial slant (clearly delineated in editorials and never hinted at in News items), and each outlet selected things to report on according to their slant, they did not CRAFT A NARRATIVE.

Today, TV News (and most other media outlets) blatantly admits (via TV anchors) that they omit any item that "does not fit the narrative" being crafted, and they do those omissions merely to justify their editorial slant -- no matter how much hypocrasy oozes through the cracks.  They see nothing wrong with that because it's The News Game -- it's essential to the business model of TV News to create a "narrative." 

The very definition of News has changed, just as the definition of words such as Melodrama has changed. 

This discussion in Part 6 of Marketing is about where that change came from, why it happened, and what that means for the fiction-delivery-system into which you are marketing your novel. 

 Very few people channel-surf News programs and do relentless contrast/compare studies to sift out the few real Hard News Facts buried amidst the torrent of opinion.

Most people don't understand the reasons the use of the word Melodramatic disqualifies a piece as a News Report. 

Most people have no idea there is a Narrative being "sold" (via precise mathematical PR techniques).  And in fact, if you told them, they'd consider you a bit daft, or maybe a flat-out liar.

In Part 3 of this Marketing Fiction series, we discussed the movie Anchorman 2, and most especially the PR campaign that surrounded it's debut. 

OK, it's a funny movie -- but it's about the News Game.  If you're going to set a novel amidst The News Game, you must understand the game, and you must understand how very little of that game your readers believe exists. 
-----------------
Here's a quote that turned up on twitter from poster TheBlackBoard:

TheBlackBoard
"Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious."
—Peter Ustinov
-----------------
Anchorman 2 may be an example of that principle. 

In the SAVE THE CAT! trilogy of books on screenwriting, Blake Snyder makes the point (emphatically) that you must, at all costs, KEEP THE PRESS OUT OF THE PLOT. 

When you bring in news stories, your plot explodes in your face, your theme goes out the window, and your project flops...unless you really know what you're doing. 

So that's another objective we're pursuing here.  We have to really know what we're doing when trying to sell the HEA to readers who live in a HFN world portrayed on TV News as if HFN were the only reality. 

So, we're looking at how the News Game has changed (and why), and we're looking at the audience perception of that Game. 

Once you have both of these firmly in mind, you can use Press Conferences and Newspaper Items as plot-points in a way that viewers of TV News who think that news is "reality" can accept and believe. 

So changes in Hard News on TV have happened in lockstep with changes in Fiction. 

The reason can be seen as PR.

Public Relations software, Google tracking, all in service to Advertising can measure audience size, composition, and emotional response to a TV News or Series segment by segment, even minute by minute.  The News item or "Act" of the TV Series exists to 'set up' the audience's emotional pitch for the run of advertising that comes next.

Have you noticed how many more ads, more products, are pitched between segments of content than was the case 10 or 20 years ago?  Have you noticed how the runs of ads are as long, or longer, than the content-segments?  Have you noticed how the length of the ad-runs differs from hour to hour and day to day around the week?  Have you thought out the reasons for all this?  Writers need to understand.  Others can ignore it all. 

This new PR science is called "metrics."  All TV Network content choices pivot on "the metrics."

Driving that PR push to measure and quantify every aspect of the eyeballs attracted and held by the content-segments, is profit. 

The TV metrics' objective is to control which eyeballs are present for which commercials.  That's the opposite of online advertising which aims to choose the commercials to suit the eyeballs preferences. 

PR "metrics" is the business-model shift that caused a shift in content in broadcast and cable TV. 

The shift in content is easiest to see in News -- but is also visible in fiction. 

This business model shift in TV News is largely attributable to the advent of the Internet -- but more broadly, to technology, computers, data-mining.  You all know the NSA problem -- Big Brother Is Watching You out of your TV set, whether you're hooked to broadcast, cable or internet streaming. 

Cable became popular and brought us the giant, world-girdling news gathering and delivering organization CNN (Cable News Network). 

Cable was advertising driven (PR) but also subscription driven as you couldn't get it over broadcast airwaves.  You had to have cable, and that's a subscription fee.  In some cases, Government had to force cable to carry local broadcast channels. 

Cable still operates on this antiquated business model which is why it's collapsing.

Cable charges subscribers a FEE for a BUNDLE OF CHANNELS (most of which you don't want).  They make you pay for other people's taste.

That's why, for example, Fox Business Network (FBN) is bundled by Cox Cable (in the Southwest) with the Sports Channels.  FBN is a non-lucrative item to carry -- very VERY small audience.  Stuffy, abstract, numbers-strewn, full of abbreviations nobody understands and about nothing of any moment to most people.  But almost every single household lives and breathes SPORTS.  So the bundle taken together is profitable.

CNBC is another cable Financial News  channel and is in the general-tier subscription (Bloomberg is another).  CNBC is not a lot more entertaining than FBN but is bought by the Cable provider in a bundle from CNN which everyone wants.

Now, it is true that the Financial Markets Coverage is all about gambling, aggression, swagger, bluffing, playing chicken over shorted stocks, so the appeal to Sports fans is obvious.  Most professional investors are sports fans, or pretend to be for professional reasons -- you have to have something to make small talk about with strangers.

The Cable business model is to sign up subscribers who pay a monthly fee -- then go to channels and buy content to deliver to the subscribers, all wrapped around advertising. 

The Cable company has a department that markets TIME (between show segments) to advertisers.  Cable is a middle-man operation.  They get paid by subscribers and by advertisers who want glued-to-the-screen-eyeballs, and they buy and operate equipment and Content with the money they collect with hopefully some profit left over. 

With the Internet growing, people are "cutting the cord" to Cable -- just subscribing to the feeds they actually want.  That's why your Cable bill keeps going up -- fewer people subscribing means less income to spend delivering the same (bloated) number of channels.  Of course, taxes are adding to Cable bills, too. 

Another reason Cable bills are going up is DVRs.  People time-shift, and skip commercials, so commercial time is worth less because there are fewer eyeballs being delivered to the advertiser.  Cable operator gets less per commercial, but still has to pay for the program content -- so they stuff in more ads. 

Cable advertising metrics show a waning effect -- in the 2012 Elections, vast amounts of money went to Cable ads but barely budged the needle in most races.  People skip commercials, audiences are smaller.  PR formulae are being adjusted.

As writers, you followed carefully the Auction of Spectrum by the US Government a few years ago where they mandated the shift from analog to digital (that forced people to buy new TV sets or $50 set top boxes).  The conversation to spiffy new flat-screen (or 3-D) TV's in digital is almost complete.  I own an analog TV still, but never turn it on!

The spectrum auction re-allocated spectrum so we can have LTE phone-data service for smartphones.  It reserved some spectrum for Emergency Services.  It totally changed the foundations upon which TV signal delivery has been built -- and as a result, as people adjust their habits, Cable's business is less and less profitable.

And Advertising Firms are going NUTS!  PR still works, but their business model doesn't! 

A new generation of Advertising Executives are conquering this problem.  Google leading the pack.  The new generation of ad-execs grew up on a world dominated by Google. 

Internet Advertising is beginning to work, thanks to Google's "tracking cookies" that lets them sell your eyeballs to advertisers selling something you might be interested in.  It doesn't work yet, though.  They keep trying to sell me what I bought last week and so don't need anymore.  They need better spies.  They are inventing them.

With Cable came hundreds of channels -- with DIGITAL and INTERNET came thousand and thousands more channels, websites, blogs, YouTube, all kinds of ways to spend the little time you have to acquire information you need, and entertainment your frayed nerves absolutely demand.

I've noted on this blog how fragmented the USA has become -- nobody watches any one thing.  About a third of the country's 320 million watch the Superbowl. 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/04/us-superbowl-cbs-ratings-idUSBRE9130P720130204

This fragmentation of the market works against profitability -- but in favor of the Indie market. 

With streaming, on a Roku or Apple TV, or other device, you have access to Vimeo, Netflix, other movie deliveries, Amazon Prime with TV shows -- more hours than anyone can possibly watch.

If you track the rise of this fragmentation against the rise in the number of commercials  between content-segments, against the longer advertising-runs vs shorter content segments, you find something very interesting.

As advertisers have become more desperate, content-segments have changed the nature of their content.

This is evident in TV Series Fiction, yes, but much harder to spot.

It's most clear in the TV News. 

As advertisers have become more desperate for glued eyeballs, TV News has become more "narrative driven" and content has changed.

How exactly has content changed?

Where once opinion was prohibited, now it is required to be salted into Hard News.

Where once narrative was prohibited, now it is the only thing allowed.

Where once name-calling was prohibited, it is now reported on by other networks.

Where once mention of the existence of another network was prohibited, it is now THE breaking news story of the day that this anchor said that nasty about another anchor on a third network.

It isn't enough that Anchors yell at Guests who yell back, everyone talking at once, on opinion or analysis shows -- they yell at anchors on other networks! 

Where once the Lead Story Of The Day would be something you needed to know to figure out what to DO to avoid harm to you and your family, now the Lead Story is some bit of local-news gossip.

What's gossip?  Oh, that is another study that belongs in the Dialogue series.

Essentially, gossip is something of personal interest woven of emotional dynamics.

Today National News And Commentary shows focus on traffic accidents, road rage, mentally disturbed people shooting children, rape and other violent crime, and the subsequent court cases.

These are "reality show" drama topics popularized by Oprah Winfrey, but they are local gossip and belong in local newspapers aimed at the people with a personal connection to those involved (such as the Apartment Building Fire on the block behind your house - what happened? Who's responsible?  Who was killed?  That matters if you know the people -- otherwise it doesn't.)

Why are the 20 minutes you have to discover World Events you must know about (to plan your next vacation; to know why you couldn't get a call through to Europe) now occupied by local gossip, oblitterating the information you need?

Maybe it is a political conspiracy, but "never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity."  Or perhaps by profit motives.

Now, as a writer, I'm all for PROFIT.

But Cable profits are on the decline. 

What's really going on?

The same thing has happened to TV News as has happened in Book Publishing under the impact of technology.

As noted in a previous part of this series on Marketing, TV News, back in the day when it was news rather than gossip, was not a profitable department of a broadcast network.

Networks ran News Departments (and corporations owned Newspapers or Wire Services) for the prestige of it.  To get prestige, you had to deliver real facts, first and devoid of opinion. 

Just as big publishers were owned by bigger businesses for the prestige of it, and therefore could publish unprofitable but "important" books, Networks owned News departments and lost money but delivered Hard News.

Neither big corporation looking for a tax write-off cared whether anyone watched or read or paid any attention.  The few who did pay attention awarded them Pulitzer Prizes,  etc. 

The information feed to "the public" (e.g. the audience of a TV News show) was a by-product of the operation, not the point of it.

Then came Pac-Man Publishing where publishers ate each other, and now audience-fragmentation is weakening all Cable companies.

Both these trends were caused by technology -- innovations coming in waves of 20-year-duration.

The not-for-profit publishing operations suddenly had to turn a profit -- Accounting Department Ruled All Decisions. 

Publishers were taken over by "the bean counters" -- and where there used to be indepedent acquisitions editors who chose books to publish, suddenly those same people had to take a book proposal "to committee" (marketers, cover artists, PR department) who would have the final say on whether a book was published.

The Editor would later be reviewed for profitable choices, and could lose a job on the basis of not making as much money for the company as the editor in the adjacent cubicle.

And TV News operations had to go from delivering information to making a profit because the TV Series fiction wasn't making as much profit (because of falling audience numbers).

Not only that, but the PR science of "metrics" could now measure which news stories kept the most eyeballs glued to the commercials.  (I know it sounds ridiculous; but it is really happening.) It's not enough to make a profit; you must make the most profit.

Advertisers pay for your "free" TV News, and it's their metrics that determine what is or is not News. 

TV News isn't just on TV.  Check Yahoo News, AP, CNN, NBC, FOX, New York Times, any source you want -- correlate with the concurrent TV news -- same items handled the same way, only slightly different slants, and sometimes radically different narratives.

They call it the 24-Hour-News-Cycle -- and a number of Anchors have used those words with tension in their voices, with scorn and even derision (yes, I'm evaluating).

Note how there's an ad running before videos, popups and pop-unders evade your blockers.  The content of those news stories is chosen according to the responses to those ads.

The PR principle to remember when duplicating this research is that the "News" Stories with the highest emotional pitch (tragedy, pathos, horror, The Injustice Of It All, Victim-hood, etc) get the most responses to the advertising. 

You'll see this with the Healthcare Law coverage -- the focus will be on the joy of individuals who have been relieved of an injustice, and the utter hopelessness of victims who have become victims of an injustice. 

Watch how that coverage unfolds into the next Election - watch the emotional content.

The reason that statistics, facts, figures and even reality don't count, and just don't make the News, is that tragedy, pathos, horror, injustice stir audiences emotionally, thus cutting critical thinking out of their motivations -- right before a commercial run.

This shift in the relationship between Prestige and Profit has been going on for centuries -- since Guttenberg, actually.

The Aristocracy were Patrons of the Arts (not Patrons of News!  That was delivered by the Indie Writers called Bards -- some of whom had Patrons!) for prestige not profit.  With an Aristocracy dominant, you see the rise of Rumor as the main source of information. 

Trace the fall of the Aristocracy over centuries against the rise of the concept "Commercial Art" which is what genre fiction is.

Now we have almost all Art (even News Reporting) done as Commercial Art.  There is a minority practicing "Fine Art" -- but they have to find another way to earn a living besides writing.

Have we reached the end of this cycle?  Will e-book, website art, etc. draw Patrons (e.g. advertisers can be regarded as Patrons who must be pleased by content produced)?  If not, what happens at the end of this cycle?  Will we break out of this Historical pattern of Prestige to Profit to Prestige to Profit?

If you look closely at TV/Webisode/IndieFilm as an industry, you can see how, at this Profit-dominated point in this cycle, we are seeing Prestige and Profit confused, mixed up with one another, the line blurring.

In the early 21st Century, we have a situation where the only prestige you can achieve is by amassing huge amounts of money.  Power goes with that money -- but Prestige does not naturally come from fortune.  Your current fiction audience is under a trip-hammer PR Messaging campaign to convince them that the only way to Prestige is Profit, and in fact Profit is Prestige (there's no difference).

Prestige is a word/concept being redefined, just as Melodrama has been redefined.

The central problem we've been tackling on this blog is the problem of the Prestige of the Romance Genre in general and the Science Fiction Romance (and Paranormal Romance genre) in particular.  Why the general scorn for the HEA as a life-goal?

Perhaps we've been looking in the wrong direction for answers to that question.  Perhaps we are collateral damage of the tug-of-war between Profit and Prestige.  Romance SELLS gangbusters compared to other types of novels!  We have a Profit Producing Business Model in the exploration of the HEA and how to achieve it in your own life.  Is that why we lack Prestige?

If so, then our Prestige should rise as Profit becomes more prestigious?

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World Part 5 - Ace Doubles by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Marketing Fiction In A Changing World
Part 5
Ace Doubles
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg

In Part 3 of this series we began looking at Making A Living as a writer.  The discussion of how to achieve that continues here in Part 5.  Part 6, next week, will bring these ideas together. 

Here are the previous parts of Marketing Fiction In A Changing World:

Part 4: Understanding The Headlines You Use For Springboards:
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world_18.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2014/02/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2012/03/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

Long ago, in the mid-20th Century, Science Fiction was just getting a start.

A lot of publishing projects, writing projects, etc. were all put on hold for World War II.

That interval concluded around 1947 - a couple of years after the official end, troops had mustered out, reclaimed or acquired spouses, found jobs, started families, -- and in England, were still in the process of rebuilding buildings.

By the mid-1950's the rebuild had primed the pump of world economies and we were roaring along in publishing.

During that era, many science fiction magazines thrived, and niche imprints were created for books. 

ACE books, which still publishes some of the best stuff, especially in kick-ass heroine fantasy, launched a unique, exploratory publishing program called Ace Doubles. 

It was the biggest publishing genre innovation since maybe The Dime Novel which brought the Western genre to the densely populated East Coast -- ignited dreams and send droves of people to colonize the USA mid-West. 

The Ace Doubles ignited a furor of book-buying of science fiction.

Now these "books" were really composed of 2 novella length works -- longer than magazine stories, but shorter than Novels. 

Ace put 2 of these long-stories back to back, but upside down with respect to each other.  Each side of the volume was a "front cover" with illustration.

They packaged a well known writer on one side, and a beginner or unknown on the flip side.

Many great writers got their start this way. 

But at the same time, by using this format, ACE was able to import works from England, introducing popular English Science Fiction to the US audience. 

Marion Zimmer Bradley's SWORD OF ALDONES (her first novel; she had sold short work to a magazine prior to that) was an ACE Double.

It was a marketing ploy, and it worked fabulously well by making longer works cheap and accessible, and exploration of new authors painless.

E. C. Tubb was one of the British imports. 

I've recently picked up the audible.com version of the first three novels in Tubb's DUMAREST OF TERRA series, remembering it and finding it still stands up.

Here is a glimpse of the ACE marketing and decades later, the audible.com marketing via Wildside Press.  Study this.
              
If you're just starting out as a writer, this is what you aim to accomplish -- longevity.  Tubb's heirs are benefiting from this series which ran over 20 books.

Now, I have to tell you about DERAI, the second in the Dumarest saga.



Dumarest is a man from Earth, traveling the galaxy (much populated by various human cultures).  He has gotten so far from Earth that nobody's ever heard of it except as the legendary (how ridiculous!) birthplace of humankind.

 Now look at this non-fiction book from Wildside Press (available for reading on google) is an excellent history of science fiction, and the influential writers of so long ago.






Google this:
E. C. Tubb Serialization 

You should find this book at the top of the list and it will display a comment on Tubb's work in the mid-1950's.

I have this vague memory of my first encounter with Dumarest.  I used to haunt the used book stores and buy British magazines (tattered and yellowed with age) and other very hard-used paperbacks, reading Science Fiction from the 1930's and 1940's while waiting for the next new book.

Today, there's no way any one person can read everything the big publishers are churning out in Science Fiction Romance, Fantasy and PNR.  That has not always been the case!

So in my mind, E. C. Tubb and Dumarest and this style of storytelling he uses seems to me to have been one of those used magazines from the 1950's -- it was old when I got it, and is long since gone.  So I can't check this.

Everything online, and the serious scholars who have searched hard, are saying the Dumarest material dates from the mid-1970's Ace Doubles -- see the covers above. 

I could be confusing two different Tubb works. 

According to this book:
http://books.google.com/books?id=9j70AAAAQBAJ&lpg=PA138&dq=E.%20C.%20Tubb%20Serialization&pg=PA138#v=onepage&q=E.%20C.%20Tubb%20Serialization&f=false

Tubb dominated the British SF magazines in the mid-1950's and it could be some of that material that grabbed me.

Later, ACE did Tubb works in Ace Doubles. 

In the mid-1970's, the copyright laws were changed, so many earlier works were re-copyrighted so heirs could benefit from re-sale.  Nobody knew then what e-books would do to the reprint market -- or what the advent of Science Fiction Romance would do.  But right now, those older works are re-appearing, and they reveal the origins of SFR, PNR, etc.

Read page 138 of the book on Google.  Part 4: REBIRTH AND BUSINESS PLAN (1954-55).

It claims that Tubb wrote in a melodramatic vein.

That word, used in reference to science fiction, is a perjorative. 

It was used to disparage some of my favorite works -- the Lensman Series by E. E. Smith, Ph.D. -- along with the term "Space Opera."

These are terms which simply scorn anyone who respects these works.

But the fact is these works were and still are, deep, far-ranging philosophically challenging explorations.  They could even be seen as "subversive" -- even today! 

The second Dumarest novel, DERAI, is a Romance.

It is a standard modern-day ROMANCE!  (except for the ending, plus the idea that the man who marries the heiress gets control of her fortune).  It even has a Heroic-Heroine Telepath who falls in love with the Hunk Hero non-telepath assigned as her bodyguard. 

The ending, by requisite marketing formula, requires the heroine to die, leaving Dumarest single, free, available, and able and willing to travel to the next planet in search of Earth. 

That's what the series is about - Dumarest's quests to find his way back to Earth, and all the adventures he has getting there.

But using a science fiction twist, Tubb leaves her alive and even happy! 

Meanwhile, she has informed Dumarest of who knows where Earth is.  And he is now in hot pursuit of that information, knowing the galaxy-spanning organization is his mortal enemy.

So the Dumarest saga is about how one man confronts seemingly overwhelming odds to go home to Earth.

The other thing I noted about E. C. Tubb's writing which didn't distinguish the work against the background of contemporary works, but causes it to stand out against today's novels -- vocabulary.  The choice of word is excellent, precise, jewel-like (very much as you find in Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's St. Germain Vampire novels).

Tubb doesn't reach for those OED gems, though -- he uses normal, everyday vocabulary, but uses it well.

So I recommend the Dumarest saga as a way to study how to achieve inconspicuous but elloquent precision in vocabulary usage.

Just like a TV Series Hero, Dumarest has to stay footloose.  But his character is such that he does form relationships, and his personal integrity requires him to risk even his life for the sake of those relationships. 

He demonstrates Self Respect -- something you don't find a lot of on TV Series these days.  When you do find it on TV, it's watered down compared to this.

Which brings me to an article published last year, the 13 attributes of successful people.

If you are building a character to be the center-pole of a long series, a quintessential Hero, use this list and test every line of dialogue and every decision that character makes against this list.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/cherylsnappconner/2013/11/18/mentally-strong-people-the-13-things-they-avoid/

Check Dumarest against that list.  See what markets on both sides of the Atlantic.

Now, why would a modern Romance writer want to study dusty old adventure-action novels written for boys?

It's not the "dusty" or "old" part that you need to study -- or emulate.  (Please, no emulation of the dusty or old parts!).

To figure out what to do TODAY that will last and last and come back into print to put your grandchildren through college -- study the parts of these novels, the ingredients, that have lasted.

The parts that still work will very likely still work 50 years from now. 

To figure out how to use that information to create a galaxy you can tell a long-romance-saga against, you do need to know something about what else was going on during the early 20th century. 

What did life feel like?  Well, Hollywood isn't a reliable source of historical information, but it does show the Fantasies and Aspirations -- the wishes, dreams, spirit -- of that time.

Combine watching some really old films on Netflix with some non-fiction written at that time (not in modern times) about the world-forces shaping people's lives.  "Life" is mostly about wedging yourself a place between sweeping, storming forces.  We all try to find our place, our "Home" as Dumarest does, and make a safe place to raise children.

I should also note that board gamers look at the Dumarest of Terra Series as the origin of the extremely popular (Dungeons & Dragons level popular) TRAVELER game. 

Study the Dumarest phenomenon (how popular it was -- it is in the same category as the Sten Series, also from Wildside) against those two dimensions, Hollywood dreams and cold-hard-facts of history, and you will understand what Ace Doubles were and what they did for science fiction.

That is what has to be done for the HEA plausibility in the Romance genre.  We have the leverage now.  We have but to use it.

Here is the first of the Sten novels:
http://www.amazon.com/Sten-The-Series-Vol/dp/1434430979/

There are 8 main novels and several additional newer volumes.  They are in paper, e-book, and audiobook. 

Sten dates from the 1980's or so, and the series was written concurrently with a large number of screenplays (mostly TV) by Cole and Bunch. 

Stack up STEN next to DUMAREST, and contrast-compare what innovation they brought to their decade's audience. 

While you're at it, you might want to make a third column for the 8 original Sime~Gen volumes (there are now 12 volumes). 

Look at the strong influences and criss-crossing thematic lines.  Look at the character-formulae relative to that list of 13 things successful people avoid. 

Now look around at the current headlines.  Evaluate the current culture surrounding your target audience.  Check your Market. 

Wildside Press is today reviving the Ace Double format.  Two of the new, first publication Sime~Gen novels are part of that program. 



These two new novels are available in this paper Doubles format, and individually as e-book and audible.com editions.

Study these achievements that test out over time, adapt the principles behind these achievements to your purposes, and launch a byline that you will live with for the rest of your life.

Up until recently, Romance Genre was never considered "reprintable" -- today, Bestselling Romance writers are bringing their own backlist books out as e-books (yeah, Bestselling writers are self-publishing).  And these golden oldies are selling very well!

Yes, pre-cell-phone plots seem awkward.

Yes, women who lack adherence to those 13 principles of successful people in that article seem implausible. 

But yes, that's how life was -- and still is for a lot of women world-wide.

Consider that when you're rummaging around in your mind for a story that's marketable today and for the next 50 years.

Then ponder this article, and why it is that self-published writers don't make much money.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeremygreenfield/2013/12/09/how-much-money-do-self-published-authors-make/

And in that article is this link:
http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2013/self-publishing-debate-part3/

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com