Know your target audience

[Cain]

OK, so some of you guys said you wanted a book from me.  A politics book.  And I have given this some thought.  I am thinking a series of essays with a linked overall theme of where we are right now, with a mix between more national based politics (whether that is in the USA or UK or France or something) and more systemic issues, such as the international system, changing nature of war etc.  Both of which would likely be done in a sort of gonzo style, or at least include a lot of swearing and mockery.

I've drawn up some draft chapter names, which I will repeat here, in no particular order:

Dead Jackasses and Rotting Elephants: All politics is vanity
Teabagging the Birthers
Killer Robot Death From Above
Those Wacky Nazis: Europe's far right
Global Disorder: America's hegemonic gift
Our Kampf: The Defining Struggle of This Generation
Liquid War: Mercenaries, spys, terrorists and hackers
Government as Daddy's credit card, or why we must eat the bankers
Defeating extremism at home by allying with extremism abroad
Gordon Brown: best Prime Minister in history

However, that's not enough.  I want more.  And that is where you come in.  Since you are, primarily, the target audience, I want to know what you want to read about.  General topics would be nice, I'll come up with the amusing chapter titles.

[Da6s]

The (ir)relevance of the UN at this point.

[Cramulus]

This sounds like a great read already

perhaps a chapter on libertarians?

[East Coast Hustle]

fuck yeah, dude. I think you could have a surprise hit on your hands if you go through with this.

also, you should do a chapter on the rise of private armies and how they've even been hired in roles that have them replacing traditional national armed forces (cf: Blackwater/Xe) , possibly focusing on how this has allowed corporations to achieve, in some cases, equal or greater power than the nation-states in which they operate (PNG and Ecuador are the two examples that spring immediately to mind).

[The Johnny]

Id enjoy this future book, but i would recommend (i dont know how) you dont just target us as your audience, try to publish it while retaining your style. The day i get around to plasmating my ideas in a coherent and profound way, id like to make some "moohla" while im at it, and i dont see why you shouldnt try too.

[Template]

I disagree, JohNyx.  An informative book in a personal style would probably sell very well--it FEELS like someone's granting you their hard-won knowledge.  And humans are a pack of voyeurs, if you had not noticed.    Such trouble as might exist in publishing would be with getting a compatible publisher.  And it seems like there are already apparent candidates for that.

[The Johnny]

I guess it could be done as long as he clarifies terms that are common speak in the forum, but might not be outside of the net and here.

[Requia ☣]

Politics books sell well, if not for very long.  It's not the most reliable investment (books never are, especially from new authors) but there's no reason it couldn't happen.

As for topics to cover... How about stuff on the history of how the political scene got into the shape its in now?  Not so much the dirty backroom stuff as the rise of religion in politics and all that.

[Iason Ouabache]

This sounds like a great read already

perhaps a chapter on libertarians?

TITCM. Of course I'd love to hear something on the Religious Right/Dominionists. Maybe a bit on domestic terrorists too.

[Cain]

Well I was mainly going to have the book published through Lulu, since some people here mentioned they'd like hard copies, and leak maybe some sample chapters on TPB in pdf format, with a link to generate some more interest.  But to be honest, if I have to release it as a free ebook and set up a tip jar through Paypal, then I will.  Also I'm going to write it to keep in mind that people not from here may pick it up, so I wont be using constant in-phrases or anything.

Anyway, since publishing details are boring, onto suggestions.  I was going to include mercenaries in the chapter on liquid war, but given their importance, they probably should have their own chapter.  Taking a hammer to vulgar libertarianism could be very funny, though I might need to take a crash course on what they've been up to the past year or so.  The religious right could be a way to go, too, though I might have to concentrate on a particular facet of them, given the breadth of the topic.

One of the possible taglines to this book was going to be "picking through the wreckage of the Post-American century", with the implication that Bush oversaw the end of such a century and now Obama is being forced to preside over the downfall (not that he's doing it very well), so therefore I was mostly going to try and focus on events from the last year or two, or trends that have accelerated.

[Triple Zero]

Our Kampf: The Defining Struggle of This Generation

I like this title, good play on words. I know you will come up with your own amusing titles, but this variation immediately sprung to mind: MyKampf (a play on MySpace).

I also really wonder what the chapter "Killer Robot Death From Above" will be about, awesome title too

Anyway, you want suggestions for topics.

- maybe it's already covered in your other chapters (Vanity Politics, I suppose), but I found your take on populism in your Interregnum series very insightful. how and why and what our Wilders is just whoring for attention (head rag tax!!) regardless of his goals and targets. you know it's almost refreshing to see some old clips of Pim Fortuyn recently, whose political viewpoints I despised just as much back then, but fuck, he was intelligent, had a point, and damn, charisma too--ok I'm starting to digress, so not to jack your thread, I made a new one here.

- be sure to mention the black uniform civil cleansing brigade in Italy. and what they did to the Romans/Gypsies. (but that would probably be in the Wacky Nazi chapter)

- it's a bit of a thought I had myself that I wanted to bring up in TFYS, but if you want you can run with it. "Sarcasm, Irony and Satire are dead; Reality has made them obsolete". I maybe thought up a solution to, you know how they say we are stuck in Post-Modernism, because every thing, every new thing we do or create will always be a collage or a critique of something old/classic/modern. We cannot rebel against or destroy it because po-mo represents the rebellion and destruction of whatever it was that we were doing. It is the "edge" of "edgy". You know what I mean. Someone probably said this better than me. But then we get Horrormirth. And then we get Fox. But that's also nothing very new. But then we get the Daily Show, a satirical comedy program that, through satire, allows people to a closer representation of the truth than that which it satirizes. And we get Glenn Beck. And then we get that Onion article, that was just a liiiiiittlebit too real, too possible, too much like something you'd expect to read in a "real" news source. You see where I'm getting at?
It's like "Reality Strikes Back: The Death of Satire", it might be our ticket out.

- Another general suggestion, might be to keep it as accessible as possible. You say we are your target audience, but regardless of what your assumption is of our intelligence, I would suggest to dial it down a few notches. Just because. It will pack its punch anyway, I know you couldnt avoid that However, given that, anything that increases the real audience (not the target but the readerbase that actually reads it) is good.

[East Coast Hustle]

depends. If you're willing to sacrifice the extremely unlikely possibility that you could end up on the NYT best-seller list for the marginally more likely possibility that it would attract the interest of potential employers, it might make more sense to not dumb it down at all.

anyway, if you dumb it down much you'll just be trying to attract an audience that in all likelihood either won't be interested in the first place or won't be able to interpret the information given in a manner that will make them understand the material.

[LMNO]

Cain, I've always liked your essays regarding fascism, and how it is misunderstood, mislabeled, and misued.  I'm pretty sure the topic will be included in at least one of the chapters you mentioned, but perhaps you could address it more directly?

[Cain]

ECH raises valid points.  I wont assume much knowledge on any given topic, but I'll assume a certain level of intelligence or abstract ability.

Just so you all know, it is going to be written under an assumed name.  A contactable one, but still.  I have the impression that if my IRL name could be linked to things I have said or advocated here, it would probably be used against me in one way or another.  Highly unlikely to happen, but I'd rather protect myself a little.

There will probably be sub-chapters to any particular topic, since I'll want to put three or four angles on anything I write.

[LMNO]

A nom de plume is completely understandable.  Pehaps even mandatory.