2013 is fast approaching, so I thought for my final installment of Naughty Bits, I'd indulge in a bit of the prognostication that's so popular at this time of year. In the other columns in this series, I've tried to demystify various aspects of today's information...
If you're technologically-challenged, take heart. According to the digital diviners, in the relatively near future, personal computers as we know them will disappear. No more confusing software installation! No more frustrating crashes and lock ups! The only program...
Do you need an author app? Do you have any idea what I'm talking about? The ecology of computing has changed dramatically in the past two or three years. Touch-screen cell phones and tablets have taken the world by storm. Sales of notebook and desktop computers have...
Writing used to be a fairly private endeavor. An author would spend weeks or months alone with her typewriter or word processor, creating a work of fiction. Nobody other than her immediate family or friends knew much about her work in progress. After the book was...
"You're nobody till somebody friends you..." That could be the theme song of the twenty first century. The explosion of social networking has transformed entertainment, commerce, and most certainly, publishing. To someone (like me!) who remembers the world BF (Before...
Ephemeral. That's the nature of an author's work, especially today when every stage of the writing and publishing process is digital. The products of our creativity and sweat exist primarily as files in computer storage, fragile collections of bits that are highly...
Two months ago, I explained the basic way the World Wide Web works. [HTML 101: Web Basics for Authors] It's a remarkably simple paradigm. A program running on your computer called a web browser (Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, etc.) sends a request to a...
If you're an author (and I assume you must be, or you wouldn't be wasting your time on this column), words are your primary medium of expression. You use them to set the mood, to evoke emotion, to help readers imagine your characters' actions. Your success depends on...
I'm not normally known as the dominant type, but in my role as the Erotogeek, I'm going to make you do things you never believed you'd agree to. Believe me, it's for your own good. And I promise it won't hurt — much! This month we're going to tackle the basic...
Quick! What does a software error have to do with an orgasm? If you're scratching your head, consider this: for an author of erotica, the former can prevent the latter. Maybe your word processing program is more reliable than mine, but I've certainly experienced...