The Book Has Entered Production

Well it is official. As of Friday, July 27th, the final text for the book has entered the publishing machinery. The process of writing a book has alway been interesting to me. Just when you think you are done, the real work begins. To give you an example:

Draft 1) Submit what you think is the final draft to the publisher

Reviewers get a look at it and you realize you need to rewrite several chapters.

Draft 2) Submit the next draft with all reviewer feedback incorporated and a lot of good reviewer feedback left painfully on the floor due to schedule pressure

The Copy Editors now get their crack

Draft 3) You now get to agree or disagree with all the copy edits. For the most part, copy editors save me from extremely poor and wordy books. If you read this one you'll realize I'm a conversationalist writer. Maybe better to just buy me a beer and hear me tell you about it.

The Layout then gets done

Draft 4) My first book was an extremely techie niche book on ClearCase an SCM tool. This book did not get nearly the full-up treatment that my Second Life book is getting. Full color, and designed, this is the point which the review turns from not so much content as to figure placement, quality of figures, the right fonts, treatment of notes, tips, etc. You read through word by word as this is really your last change to make minor changes.

Proof read

Draft 5) The final draft is a read through with the proofreaders comments and all your comments incorporated. At this point, you are so tired of reading your own book that you have to focus to catch any of the small mistakes.

General Project Schedule:
March 2006 - Heard about Second Life
April - Got an Account
July - Submitted Proposal
March 2007 - Submitted First Draft
July 2007 - Submitted Final Copy


I have a few copies coming to SLCC hot off the presses, let me know if you are going to be there! The book should be available latest by September.

The Business of Second Life

With my first book Second Life - A Guide To Your Virtual World set to hit the streets by end of August, I am starting to think about the next project. At this point, I believe there is a need for guidance and help with the business of Second Life.

I'm not talking about a real-life start up, doing the venture capital circuit, and come up with the BIG idea kind of Second Life business, there will be plenty of that. I'm more interested in the build and sell something for fun business of SL. The pay my tier business of SL or the buy my morning Starbucks latte kind of SL business.

The platform offers such a great arena to learn business basics and have fun doing it. My plan as of now is to chronicle several business experiments in this blog and then to fold the info back into another book.

For starters, I'm wondering what types of "fun" businesses / experiments people have done in SL. Here are I believe the three main ones:

1) Product - Build something and sell it (the stock SL business)
2) Rentals - Become a landlord or mall owner and make money on rentals
3) Service - Become a service provider / club owner / marriage arranger, etc. Make money selling in-world services

Two other ones which are too close to RL business are land sales/speculation and providing build services for companies wanting to get their brand in-world. I'm leaving these on the cutting room floor.