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A SUMMARY OF RON PRICE’S INTERNET PUBLISHING
“HIS CUP OF PUBLISHING TEA”
I have outlined below(in 1400 words, four A-4 font 14 pages) several categories of my writing and my writing projects of varying sizes, genres and subjects on the internet. Readers can gradually get into whatever categories of my work they desire, if at any time they do in fact desire to read my works over the next few days, weeks, months, years or decades. The following items went onto the internet in the period 2001-2009. The following outline is a presentation of what might be called my marketing strategy, a strategy given the limitations of my technical internet skills. One might refer to my current modus operandi as my business plan. In some ways what I write below is an outline of this small business, how I operate, how I have built it up, its raison d’etre and where it seems to be going if, indeed, it is going anywhere at all—and I know it is!
Most of my writing is free of any cost, although some of the self-publishing material costs anywhere from $3 to $20 at self-publishing sites like Lulu and eBook Mall. I mention this fact: (a) not to advertise and (b) not to try and sell my work. I have 20 cents/annum in royalties since I began self-publishing in 2003. Fame and wealth will elude me as iteludes most writers. There are three general categories of printed matter, my own writing, I have placed on the world wide web. These categories are:
1. Books:
1.1. The Emergence of a Baha’i Consciousness in World Literature: The Poetry of Roger White. This 300 page ebook is available at Baha’i Library Online and parts of it can be accessed at many places on the internet.
1.2. A paperback edition of the above book is available at Lulu.com for $11.48 plus shipping costs from the USA. This self-publishing site also has a five volume, four book, work, a study in autobiography, entitled Pioneering Over Four Epochs which is 2400 pages long(four 600 page books). Much of this is available as an ebook and in paperback for $10 to $20 per volume at Lulu.com in 2009. It has been reviewed/approved by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States. The cost of these books is set by Lulu.com.
1.3 My internet set, also entitled Pioneering Over Four Epochs has some 450,000 words and 30,000 pages and is a book unto itself.
2. Internet Site Postings:
Essays, poems, parts of my autobiography/memoir and a wide variety of postings/writings in smaller, more manageable, chunks of a paragraph to a few pages are all free and can be accessed by simply: (a) going to any one of approximately 4000 sites or (b) typing some specific words into the Google search engine as indicated in the following:
2.1 Approximately 4000 Sites:
I post at a wide range of poetry, literature, social science and humanities sites across a diverse mix of subjects, topics and intellectual disciplines in both popular and academic culture. The list of these sites is available to anyone interested by writing to me at: ronprice9@gmail.com. But a simpler method for readers to access many of my postings would be to:
2.2 Type Sets of Words At Google:
There are literally hundreds of sets of words now that will access my writing at various sites. If you type, for example, Ron Price, followed by any one of the following words or word sequences: (i) poetry, (ii) literature, (iii) religion, (iv) Baha’i, (v) history, (vi) Shakespeare, (vii) ancient history, (viii) philosophy, (ix) Islam, (x) Australia Baha’i and (xi) pioneering over four epochs, et cetera, et cetera, you will get anywhere from a few sites to over 150 sites arranged in blocks of ten internet locations. This last site, “pioneering over four epochs”, is a particularly fertile set of words to type into the google search engine, although there are other sets of phrases that will yield a fertile list of my writings in prose and/or poetry.
The main problem with this latter way of accessing what I have written is that my work is side by side with the items of other writers and posters who have the same name as mine and/or the same topic. I have counted over 60 other Ron Prices and I'm sure there are more. You may find their work more interesting than mine! There are some wife bashers, a pornographer or two car salesmen, evangelists, media celebrities, indeed, a fascinating array of chaps who have different things to sell and advertise, different life trajectories and claims to fame than my life and my offerings. If you type/google the words Ron Price followed by some topic/word of an academic, literary, poetic or subject of personal interest, you will: (a) eliminate some of the other Ron Price’s and (b) have access many sites with my writing.
3. Specific Sites With Much Material:
Some sites have hundreds of pages of my writing and these sites are a sort of middle ground, a different ground, between the two major categories I have outlined above. The Baha’i Academics Resource Library(BARL) (or Baha’i Library Online), for example, has more of my material than at any other site. My writings are listed there under: (a) books, (b) personal letters, (c) poetry, (d) biographies and (e) essays, among other categories/listings. The Roger White book is at BARL under “Secondary Resource Material>Books>Item #changes. I find this site useful personally, but some of the poetry is not arranged in a visually pleasing form. Readers should click on “By author” at the top of the access page, then type “Price” into the box and 46 articles/documents will appear/be accessible.
There are some sites at which my writing is found in a very pleasing form with photos and pictures and general settings to catch the eye. Some site organizers have their location beautifully arranged. I leave it to readers to read what pleases them and leave out what doesn’t. When one posts as much as I do, one often writes too much, says the wrong things or upsets an applecart or two. It's part of the process. In cyberspace, as in the real world, you can't win them all. The pioneering over four epochs word sequence is, as I’ve said, a useful word package to access some 150 sites with my writing and has no competition from other ‘Ron Prices.’
Concluding Comments:
I had no idea when I retired from full-time employment in 1999, from PT employment in 2001 and from much volunteer work in 2005, to write full-time that the internet would be as useful a system, a resource, a base, for my offerings as it has become. There are literally millions of my words in many a genre now on this international web of words that I have written in the last seven years(2001-2008). From the early eighties to the early years of this new millennium I tried to get published in a hard or soft cover, but without any success.
My guess is that in the years ahead the world will be awash with books and various genres of printed matter from millions of people like me posting various quantities of their writing. In some ways the world is already awash with print as it is awash with audio-visual products. The print and electronic media have got something for everyone these days, probably more than most people can assimilate.
What I write will not be the cup-of-tea of all readers. This goes without saying. If that is the case readers are simply advised to drink someone else’s tea from someone else’s cup. There is something for everyone these days in both hard and soft cover and on the Internet. If readers don’t like my work or someone else’s go to sources of printed matter they like.
For those who already do or may in the future come to enjoy my writings, I hope the above is a useful outline/overview. For those who don't find what I write attractive to their taste, as I say, the above will give you a simple handle to avoid as you travel the net. I wish you all well in your own endeavours in the path of writing or whatever path your travel down.
Ron Price Updated: 13 March 2009
