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Bill Wasik On Blog Books

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by Matt Haber
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Aug 17 2009 11:43am EDT

Bill Wasik on Blog Books: 'It Does Seem Like a Real Crapshoot'

Read any good blog books lately? For several years running, publishers have been snapping up bloggers for book deals hoping to find the next Julie & Julia, which became a book and then a movie that's earned $43.6 million at the box office. Why, just today, the New York Post's Page Six helpfully promotes sister-publisher HarperCollins' upcoming book of Twitter Wit, which will hit booksellers in the fall.

But is it such a good idea to turn blogs (or tweets) into books? Today on Portfolio.com, And Then There's This author Bill Wasik warns:

"It does seem like a real crapshoot for them, doesn't it? In that the pattern of the uptake of those sorts of memes, of those sorts of sites, tend to be swift. But then there tends to be a big drop-off in the interest in those things. This to me seems like an example—one of many examples—of the old media panicking when panicking isn't what's called for."

Read the rest of the interview here: The Culture of Already Gone.

Matt Haber is the media blogger for Portfolio.com.

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