For those of you unfamiliar with The Copyright Alliance, they are a “a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization dedicated to the value of copyright as an agent for creativity, jobs and growth.” They’re also the recent recipient of the Arnold Broido Award for Copyright Advocacy.

All-in-all, they’re a fantastic organization (in my opinion), and one that any creator or individual who cares about copyright or artists’ rights should be aware of and follow. You can learn more about them here.

Since my new book focuses quite a bit on the plight of musicians and songwriters, I thought it would only be fitting to try to help out by giving 20% of all sales of Starving the Artist throughout the month of May to Tennessee Flood Relief. So, not only will $2 of every paperback sold and $1 of every Kindle download sold go toward helping this treasure trove of our heartland, but by reading the book hopefully respect of the value of what this community of songwriters and musicians creates for us will grow as well – helping them to flourish in the aftermath through their hard work and creativity.

Of course, if you’d like to donate directly you can do so as well. Donate to the American Red Cross online here, or text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation.

Again, $2 of every paperback and $1 of every Kindle edition sold throughout the month of May will be donated to the American Red Cross for Tennessee Flood Relief.

Get the Paperback

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If you don’t know what a Roomba is, the basic idea is this: it’s a robot that vacuums for you.  (Scoobas mop). Yeah, it doesn’t take too much work to vacuum.  But what a Roomba does is quite a bit more than that – it’s the things you don’t really think about when you think of vacuuming.  Of course the actual “work” part of vacuuming is gone – but the additional benefits are where these little robots really shine.

Roombas are small in height, which means they go under all your furniture – no more moving the couch to clean up the cat hair that’s accumulated.  They’ll go pretty much everywhere you need them to go, and they’ll do it for you pretty much as often as you want.

The basic gist here is that you really have better things to do with your time. Technology is out there that makes it completely possible for you to free up more time for that “doing” I’ve been going on about.  Living life and growing as a person doesn’t involve vacuuming or other remedial tasks.  Go do yourself a favor and pick up a Roomba for yourself.  Run it every day (it’s as simple as pushing the “clean” button) and then proceed to go about living your life.

Your house will be cleaner than ever, and as a result you’ll feel better in both body (from not having to breathe in all the dust, dirt and dander you never even knew was accumulating every day) and spirit (a clean house makes you more at ease, plus you have a bit more time for yourself).

My one warning: Don’t fall prey to watching your little robots do their thing.  Yes, it’s mesmerizing – but you’ll end up wasting more time than you saved.

The thing is though, your personal “brand” needn’t be like everyone else.  What’s really important is what you want to define yourself or your brand as.

I’ve been silent for a long time – not because I don’t have anything to say, but rather because I’ve been taking the time to embrace silence.  Spending time updating a blog on a regular basis doesn’t really accomplish a lot for me, especially given the fact that life has limited time.

So instead of trying to position myself as a master of web marketing and usability, or an independent author trying to find a readership, or a dabbling artist, or a gamer, or a reef enthusiast or a father or any of those things – I’ve been actually doing. In the past months we’ve gone through the holiday season at Musicnotes, and grew sales at a fantastic rate (up over 20% for 2009).  Musicnotes has also undertaken a huge project that’s still in its early stages, but one that takes time and focus to do in order to do it right.  I’ve been actively working on being a better father and husband, and I’ve completed the first draft of that nonfiction piece I mentioned earlier.

In short, I’ve been silent so that I can focus on mastery.  There’s always a lot to say, but to be honest, it doesn’t always need saying.  Instead the time spent talking could be time spent doing or thinking.

As such, my silent period is likely coming to a close.  I have some very useful things to share, and they’ll be coming out soon.

In the meantime, I recommend you all consider just what it is you are trying to accomplish by “building your personal brand” online.  Rather than writing articles of speculation or being a “thought leader,” actually be a leader.  Take the time to go silent and stop worrying about how you present yourself online.  Instead do something fantastic and grow yourself as a person – as you accomplish, people will take notice.

This is the year you’ll likely hear quite a bit from me – and it’s because I’ve taken the time to stop talking.

Here’s a snippet of the current work-in-progress.

For a lot of people, creation is their livelihood. For others, it’s where their livelihood should be. I may be modest at times, but I know I’m no Picasso. For people like him, there obviously was a motivation to create – but there was also a cost. In his lifetime, Picasso created an estimated 50,000 individual works. If nothing else, that’s a lot of paint, paper and time.

Still, the obvious question here is “What if Picasso had not been able to create as his profession?” Of course there is no way he’d have created 50,000 works – there simply isn’t enough time in one’s life to do something like that as a hobby. Or, if somehow he could have still produced as many works, it is highly unlikely he would have had the drive to do so, much less perfect his craft to the level which he did.

In the time before creators were easily able to share their works directly with the public (before the printing press, the phonograph or the Internet), much of the work was commissioned by church of government. Works of art we consider core elements of our culture would not have existed had it not been for these commissions. Some works took years to complete, such as Michelangelo’s painting of The Creation of Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel which took four full years of Michelangelo’s time.

What is even more telling with this example, however, is that Michelangelo himself resented the commission for this work, believing it only served the Pope’s need for grandeur. So, in actuality, had it not been for the commission and promise of payment, The Creation of Adam would never have existed in the first place.

Of course, not all creators benefit financially from their work. In fact, many never expect to. This does not mean, however, they never desire to. With today’s technology it is much easier to acquire the tools to create, and much easier to distribute the creation once complete. The larger issue, and one that is oftentimes forgotten, is that these only make up the material costs of creation. As I’ve already mentioned, to create requires some sort of incentive to do so – and this is true for the most part because creating a work does not come without cost to the creator.

In Chris Anderson’s book, Free he says, “But some others have simply accepted that, for them, music is not a moneymaking business. It’s something they do for other reasons, from fun to creative expression. Which, of course, has always been true for most musicians anyway.”

Assumptions like this are at the core of what has been happening to reduce the value of music and other creations, which in turn has reduced the perception that being a creator of any sort is a viable career path. Having worked in the music industry for over a decade now, I can without a doubt say that the majority of musicians do so for some sort of future payment in mind. For many musicians, obviously this desire to be paid for their work does not come to fruition. There is only room for so many hits in the world. The fact remains, however, that the act of creation is not a selfless one. Whether it be for the hope of playing a gig, getting recognition from fans, getting signed to a label, being heard on the radio, or simply the hopes of using your music chops as a way to get “closer” to the opposite sex, very few musicians who go beyond school band or playing in the comfort of their own home do so for “fun” or “creative expression” – for them to succeed at their craft requires time, and time, as we all know, is not free.

To be honest, at first I really wasn’t very interested in reading his book. The cover art definitely screamed indie, and the premise seemed a bit cliche (man’s life sucks, is presented with chance to change), and I am also usually pretty wary of author’s soliciting their works to me to read.  (I already have quite a few books on my to-read list.)  But Rogers and I emailed back and forth a few times (full disclosure here) and I told him that if he put it up on Kindle I’d maybe read it.  He did, he emailed me, and I went ahead and read it.

The thing is, this really isn’t my kind of book.  From some of the reviews out there he supposedly has some similarities to Bukowski, who I’ve never really cared enough about to read (and therefore can’t comment as to if he really is like Bukowski).  I will say this though: Celluloid Cowboy is really damn weird.

I hated the main character. I would absolutely never want to know someone like him (actually I have known people somewhat like him, and make it a point to avoid knowing them now). He has no purpose to life, he gets caught up in violence and murder and sex and disgustingness far too often – and yet somehow he’s supposed to have some resonance with the reader as someone who really does have a chance at redemption. He’s a bad person and pretty much everyone he comes into contact with in this book is a bad person… but I kept on reading.  Something here pulled me in, and Rogers made me really want to see how everything would play out in the end.

The thing with Celluloid Cowboy is that I could really never see this being published by any respectable publisher. It’s just too plain whacked out to fall into anything I could see a publisher feeling safe distributing – which is why I give a lot of credit to Rogers for putting it out on his own imprint, Black Coffee Press. This is exactly what independent publishing is for: to take chances and write something daring and original – avoiding that attempt to appeal to a specific target demographic that some major publisher is trying to sell to.

Celluloid Cowboy is destined to find an audience, so long as those who read it share the word – and that’s what I’m doing. It’s not going to change your world, but if you’re down for a quick gritty read, I absolutely recommend it.

By the way, if you own a Kindle you can get your copy for just $1.59 (at least that’s the price right now).  Go get it.

Talk to me, people – and talk to each other.

That’s the most important message I try to get across to my team members.  As the Director of both the Web Team and Marketing/Editorial Team at Musicnotes.com, I have a lot on my schedule.  I directly manage and work with six extraordinarily talented individuals across these two groups, each of which is truly a master of his or her domain.  But along with being masters of their domains, they are also multi-talented individuals who are quite capable of helping each other out by stepping out of their specialty and into someone else’s (or  a specialty we didn’t know we even needed).

With such a talented group, and at a continually growing and forward-thinking company like Musicnotes, there’s always a lot going on.  When one project ends, another is always there to take its place – and oftentimes there are multiple projects being worked on at once.  These kinds of circumstances are the ideal cocktail for confusion and failure to brew; with so much going on, almost all of it “high priority,” it’s easy to see how things could quickly spiral out of control.

Thankfully, this never happens – and I don’t consider us lucky that it doesn’t.  Instead, I consider it a testament to good communication.

Recently we made some structural changes within the company that added a new member to my team.  Since she’d already been with the company for some time, there wasn’t too much for me to tell her, other than my one major rule:

Communicate.

In a fast-paced environment, especially one where projects are neverending and the goal is always to propel the company forward, it’s easy to be sidetracked by an emergency, underestimate just how long a project will take, or simply not foresee some problems that arise.  These things happen – but as a manager it’s also important for me to juggle everything that’s happening and figure out what to do when a curveball comes.  This is why my main request is that my team members openly communicate with me.

If a project isn’t going to be done by the time we planned, we can adapt to this challenge so long as the challenge is known ahead of time.  When someone is working on a project, and the fulfillment of that project by a deadline is on their shoulders, it’s tempting for that person to not wave a flag drawing attention to the fact that it won’t be done.  It’s tempting to put your nose the grindstone and keep working, hoping that the deadline passes and no one notices the project is not complete.

For me, that’s the worst thing you could do.  If it’s not going to happen, it’s not going to happen – communicating this information ahead of time is a key to being a good employee and team member.

Of course, there’s no excuse for laziness.  A deadline is there for a reason, and one should be expected to do everything in his or her power to make that deadline. This is why setting deadlines itself requires communication – communication that includes those members who are part of the project to ensure they understand the reason for the deadline and gather their input as to whether or not it is an attainable goal.  Once these aspects of the goal are made clear, there’s a promise that is made – and failing to treat it as so is a problem.

So how can you encourage communication and trust?

1. Make it a point to talk to each member of your team.  Each of my team members has a specific time set aside each week to meet with me.  It’s not a requirement that we talk, but it’s time specifically set aside for that person.  Not only is it a good opportunity to get an update on current projects, but it’s also an opportunity for them to talk with me about things that concern Bthem regarding their relationship with me or others in the company.
2. Encourage team members to talk too each other. Sure, I could always interject myself into a situation and tell each person what to do, but that doesn’t build trust between members.  As your team members learn the idiosyncracies of each other, they learn how to truly work together. This can’t happen without direct (and sometimes challenging) communication.
3. Help team members recognize the unique value the others bring to the team. I don’t surround myself with incompetent people.  The members of my team are truly experts in their respective areas.  As each member learns and appreciates the values the other members bring, they learn how the tea working together can be much more than the sum of its individual parts.

Of course there are many other aspects to good teamwork and communication, but these are several that I find to be key in my experience.  There is, however, one final piece of advice that I strongly agree with:

Be slow to hire and quick to fire.

Besides all of the job requirements and other due diligence of hiring, above all its important to remember that any new hire is a new member of the team – and as such, must be able to communicate with and respect the other members of the team. Those who don’t can cause a lot of damage, especially by causing communication and trust to shut down within the team.

If that happens, and you don’t act, then things will start to go wrong.

So what is the point here? For many its to network – to find like-minded game-changers who you can learn from or work with to help build their next big application or web site.  For others, especially at SXSW it seems to be mostly to drink and party.  But for myself, the one benefit I get is that when I’m listening to the right presentation a spark ignites into a lightning storm in my head. Most presentations fail at this, but for the few that do, they get me fired up in an internal brainstorming session that basically gives me the opportunity for insight – or in rare instances, genius (I never said I was modest).

So are the conferences worthwhile? Looking at each individual piece I’d have to answer with a pretty adamant “no.” However, looking at the one or two instances where ideas are triggered, or even simply reassuring us me that we’re on the right path, those instances are extraordinarily valuable.

The bigger question I ask myself now is this: if I forced myself to disconnect from daily routine and instead take time to look at things from the outside, would these ideas still arise? Or do I need to fly halfway across the country to listen to a bunch of people talk about in five days what I could read online in a few hours to enable this process?

I’ll be thinking about this for sure while I’m here. Still have almost four long days to go yet.

At home this has not ever been too much of an issue, as I make an effort to incorporate life in my home and yard (I have several cats, a large freshwater aquarium, a variety of bird feeders and a fairly robust flower garden area). At work, on the other hand, I never really gave it much thought until recently.

I’ve been working at Musicnotes for almost nine years now, and while I always tried to make my office have a definite feel of me (family photos, batman figurines, a Harley Quinn snowglobe and some old music press photos from The Beta Band and Wilco), I never reallly paid much attention to the idea of balance. Lately, however, this has changed.

The concept of balance between technology and nature has been on my mind quite a bit lately, and it’s definitely a major theme in The Unfortunate Expiration of Mr. David S. Sparks, but it’s something I’m finding to be quite important in a healthy existence – both for myself as well as for humankind.

Rather than try to save the world, however, my focus lately has been on fixing my world. As I already stated, my home has this balance – but my working environment did not. And, since I spend the majority of my waking hours in my office, this imbalance in favor of technology is doing a disservice to my own well-being.

So what did I do? Exactly what I suggest every one of you do – find a way to bring balance to your environment. For me, that meant bringing in elements that had been missing. There simply was no life where I was working, and there was no positive flow of energy. So what I did was rearrange my office, following a few tips of feng shui, including situating my desk so my back was no longer to the door, incorporating some lush plants  (I’ve learned cactus and bonsai are serious no-nos), and setting up a small saltwater aquarium in an eight gallon biocube (a lot of work and patience, but absolutely worth it).

The result? I am much better able to take a step away from my technological and Internet-focused day to zone out (some people might call it meditating) while focusing on these very organic distractions. They bring me back to equilibrium with life, and calm my nerves of their everyday pressures.

It’s therapeutic, to come back to nature once in a while. I recommend you all make a similar effort. You won’t know anything was missing until you do, but once you’ve done so, you’ll feel much more whole.

If you’ve taken this step, you’re a business – and you need to start acting like one.

To be a creator doesn’t mean you have to be creating a tangible item either. You could be running your own blog, review website, etc. – and if you are doing it with the intent to make money – and even if you’re not currently making a profit or doing it full-time – you need to treat it as a business.  And, during this time of the year, that means claiming all of your expenses in your tax return.

During my college days I launched and ran Music-Critic.com (I sold it years ago now) – and I ran it as a business. The fact of the matter is that if you’re going to make any money from a venture, you have to pay income tax on that money. This is why you are required to supply your tax ID or Social Security number when you sign up for affiliate programs, Google AdSense, publishing through sites like Lulu.com, and any other instance where an entity is going to be sending you a check.  At the end of the year, if they’ve sent you any money, they’re also going to send you your tax information – which you are required to include in your tax filing.

But whether or not you actually did make any money in the first year or two doesn’t mean you’re not running a business. If you honestly are attempting to make a profit from whatever you are doing (in my current instance, writing a book), then you need to start treating this venture as a business now. Beyond the mindest that running a business requires (seriousness, professionalism, etc.), you also need to run it right financially. And again, at this time of the year, it means writing off any expenses you put into it in the previous year.

The following are some examples of things that you should be deducting. Keep in mind that in all instances the primary use must be for your business though. Also, it is highly recommended that you keep any and all receipts and documentation you can, should you ever be audited.

• New Computer
• Software (Photoshop, Microsoft Office, etc.)
• Mileage Driven for Business
• Postage and Shipping Materials
• Review Copies
• Advertising Costs
• Real Estate for Home Office
• Internet Access Fees
• Stock Photography or Videos
• Web Hosting
• Travel
• Conference Fees
• Consulting Fees

Of course there are many more items you can claim – basically, if you spent money for your project, claim it. Eventually you need to be making a profit on the business, but like any business, the first few years are likely to cost you more than you earn. Over time, if you’re doing things right, you’ll start to make a profit. If not, then you’re going to have to stop filing the expenses for it in your taxes though, as it will be questionable as to whether it really is a business or a hobby.

For all of this, if you have questions, definitely talk to a tax professional.  They can help you out, and are well worth the cost. This year I went from owing several thousand dollars to getting  a refund of several thousand dollars – all due to the fact that I claimed my deductions where they were due.

One final tip: do not cheat on your taxes. There are plenty of absolutely legitimate ways you can save on taxes at the end of the year simply by doing what you are supposed to do.