Earlier this month, O’Reilly Media published its latest title in the “Missing Manuals” series, Josh Clark’s “iWork ‘09: The Missing Manual.” It throws a spotlight on Apple’s office suite, with how-to guides for the Pages word processor, the Numbers spreadsheet and the Keynote presentation app.
Even as a devoted Apple user, no matter how much I want to, I can’t quite make the psychological break from Microsoft Office. I’ve nothing against the software giant’s office suite — even the 2008 Mac edition I use is a great collection of software, although it is perhaps a little over-featured, lacking the intuitive web collaboration of Google Docs and not quite as elegantly Mac-native as I’d like.
Apple’s iWork ‘09 fares no better on web collaboration than Microsoft’s offering, but it’s certainly more Mac-native and tantalizingly low-priced, though it’s not as full-featured and lacks tutorials for new users switching from Office.
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Maybe I’m biased towards writing-related topics because of my background and personal projects, but I also think good writing is one of the most important cornerstones of good business, and therefore useful in any line of web work. One of the best ways to improve any kind of writing is to read as much as possible. BookGlutton is a free (ad-supported) tool that can help you not only read more, but read better, in a context that emphasizes social interaction.
Any professional who uses writing in any capacity can benefit from getting another set of eyes on their work, and from looking critically at the work of others in similar fields.
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One of the fancy terms that gets thrown around in Web 2.0 discussions is “disintermediation” – in other words, cutting out the middleman. Authonomy is a new site from Harper Collins that aims to do just that in the world of book publishing. If you’re a web worker with a book inside battling to get out – as so many of us are – it offers an alternative to the traditional ways of trying to break into publishing.
As anyone who has tried to get a book published knows, one of the biggest battles is to attract the attention of a publisher. If you don’t have some contacts on the editorial side, or a good agent, you can blindly send your manuscript around yourself – and likely it will sit in the “slush pile,” where, if you’re very lucky, someone might read it some day.
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The web change work in so many ways: where we can work, who we work with, how we work. Here are the books from 2007 that help define the ways the web changes work, from the practical to the theoretical. I’ve left out profession-specific book such as those on web design and development in favor of titles with more general appeal. Share your own favorite web-related books from 2007 in the comments.
Rule the Web: How to Do Anything and Everything on the Internet–Better, Faster, Easier by Mark Frauenfelder. Try this guide from Boing Boing co-founder Frauenfelder as your handbook to the web. The most advanced web users may find it’s mostly stuff they already know, but others will be happy to own such a wealth of web savvy all in one place.
Lifehacker: 88 Tech Tricks to Turbocharge Your Day by Gina Trapani. This was published in late 2006, but wasn’t widely available until 2007. This gathers the best of Lifehacker tips and tricks with Lifehacker editor Trapani’s easy style. She makes it seem like anyone can manage their to do lists by command line, install an invisibility cloak in their web browser, and use text substitution to save time.
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While the news of Amazon’s Kindle e-book reader could signal a changing trend in the way that readers consume their information, unremarked upon is how the rise of the e-book reader will eventually change the world for writers.
If readers can download books into their Kindle (or Sony Reader), what’s to stop them from cutting out the middleman and downloading directly from an author?
What’s happening to the news media (blogs vs. newspapers) and music (free downloads vs. buying a CD) and video (YouTube or downloads vs. buying a DVD) will happen with novels: the middleman will become unnecessary.
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