Writer’s Digest Conference–Day 1

Hi! Well, I’ve had one heck of a time getting onto this blog today as I promised I would. First, the wireless connection specifically set up for the conference had some “technical difficulties,” and won’t be live until tomorrow morning (Saturday) at 6 a.m. Then, the room where all the opening sessions were held this afternoon did not get 3G reception–and, of course, I have my new iPad with me, which operates on either 3G or wireless. Finally, there was a “tweet-up” at a club about a block away from the hotel from 7:30-10:00 were I was able to finally get a wireless connection, but for some unknown and highly irritating reason, the iPad wasn’t letting me key in anything except the post’s title (which I ended up publishing just to let you know that I was trying to get to you …)

Otherwise, this has been a great day! For those of you who are long-time followers, you know how significant the first Writer’s Digest Conference was for me in September 2009 (see my blog launch posting on November 4,2009). Consequently, I have been anxiously awaiting this second conference for the last year and a half–and I don’t think I’m going to be disappointed.

Since I couldn’t get online for the first three sessions, I took notes in the iPad Notes sections and will summarize those for you tomorrow. And hopefully I’ll be able to capture the rest of the sessions as they happen, as promised. Meanwhile, the big deal tomorrow afternoon will be the Pitch Slam where 55 agents will be arranged for us to each have three minutes with as many of them as we can squeeze in to pitch our books/manuscripts/ideas. I’m going to pitch Separation of Faith and will report on my immediate reactions and feedback.

Lots of eye-opening stuff has already been presented and discussed, with plenty of time allowed for our questions. (There are about 450 of us in attendance here.) The publishing industry is changing daily and is now ready to entertain just about any version of the Dream we want to pursue. And quality self-published books are now viewed as far more of a valuable commodity than even two years ago. POD (print on demand) is a business tool now being utilized by the remaining twelve major mainstream publishing houses for traditionally published books. And ebooks are the monster eating everything up at the moment. According to Richard Curtis–longtime literary agent and book publisher (he has his own ebook publishing company)–ebook piracy is poisoning the entire ebook business. He looks for government regulation and stiff penalties to start showing up in the near future. That little bit of information was sort of scary.

Logistically, the Sheraton where we’re staying is on the corner of 7th Avenue and 53rd Street in the heart of midtown Manhattan. Unfortunately, the temperature is hovering around 10 degrees without the wind chill factored. Otherwise, I’d be out walking around this amazing city that I love so much.

Well, I’m going to sign off for the night and will keep my fingers crossed that the conference’s wireless connection is up and runnning by morning. I want to make sure you don’t miss anything.

If you’re a Twitter person, you can follow a lot of the dialogue through #wdc11. Talk to you soon.