Fabricated Press - Author Uses RFID To Know “What To Like”

“I can only write from my deepest, most marketable passion.”

by Bill Powell

On RFID tags: With computer systems managing and analyzing the data they pass along, you could know where any individual copy of one of your books is in the value chain at any time, in real time…in the store, on the truck, in a thief’s bookbag…sitting on the bookstore shelf as the last copy and letting the retailer know to order more, the distributor know to send more, the publisher know to print more, the editor know to acquire more, the author know to write more.

From a member of the Book Industry Study Group.

NEW YORK, MI - Not-so-bestselling author Glen Caraway said in an interview Wednesday that without new technology that allows him to track book sales by the minute, he’d lose his “moral compass in a changing market.”

“You have to write from the heart,” revealed Caraway, 53, who has authored 57 novels, 202 nonfiction books, 30,154 magazine articles, and one limerick. “Passion. That’s my secret. Don’t put it in your article.”

Caraway’s most recent offering, Jerry Potter Cracks the Edwardo Da Vinci Code, has had mixed reviews, hasn’t sold well, and is in fact a self-help book. But he felt it was a case in point.

“Unlike my competition, I didn’t just do some cheap knock-off to confuse gift-buying grandmothers,” commented Caraway, his chipmunk-like teeth clicking audibly. “No. Cracks is about magic, about quoting ancient manuscripts out of context, about how these skills can make you a better person. Why? Because these things drive me.

“Course, if I didn’t know these things would also sell like blueberry hotcakes, sure, Jerry could go jam his wand in the pencil sharpener. Prissy idiot.

“In the Dark Ages, you know, someone like Aristotle or Victor Hugo would write all kinds of crud just because he felt like it. Sure, that’s responsible. Way to help the economy. I mean, maybe it was fine for back then, because they hadn’t invented money yet. Today, books have to sell.”

Which is where RFID (radio-frequency identification) tags come in. Thanks to recent technological advances and the usual pool of global slave labor, it is fast becoming economically feasible to put a hidden homing device on every single product of any kind. For Caraway, that means tracking book sales. Constantly.

“I’ve always watched the markets, but I used to have to wait weeks to get feedback,” reminisced Caraway, leaning back in his folding chair and rumpling his blond curl. “In the nineties, I drafted three whole volumes of Duckbumps before I found out horror sales were slipping. What a feeling! I wish I could do that to my critics! Often!

“Now, if I’m halfway into that draft and the ratings fall, WHOOSH, my heart is elsewhere. Sometimes I stop mid-sentence. I don’t write one word without a mandate. If you can’t be true to yourself, your art, your public, your student loans, you might as well go sell grapefruit. My brother-in-law sells grapefruit. One more slave to the market.”

Fortunately, getting that crucial guidance—nay, inspiration—is as easy as getting an Outlook virus. Almost. “Watch. I log in to this website, I click around, and, let’s see, in the last ten minutes, Cracks has sold … no copies? What?! Bad book! No sequel for you! Never mind, let’s see how cookbooks are doing. I’ve always liked eating.”

Glen Caraway may use new technology, but his wisdom is clearly ancient.

“Write what you love. Love what sells.”