Hi, Tumblr. It’s Tumblr. We’re Working On Some Things That We Want To Share With You. 

Did not know this was in the works and I am extremely EXCITE

Hi Diane, I was wondering if the audio books for your Young Wizard series would eventually be available for the Australian marketplace on Audible. I found some of your books on my regional Audible but sadly none of the Young Wizard books. 😢

I don’t think they will be, at least for the time being, as the YW publisher doesn’t hold any audio rights but those for North America (and the Philippines: one of those weird postcolonial things). Sorry not to be able to be of more help on this.

I’m making initial plans, though, for a read-by-the-author series, and those will be available internationally, as I’ll hold rights on those personally and will be able to publish them where I please. Investigations into the costs of studio time and other aspects of production are ongoing at the moment. I’ll post about it here when it starts to happen.

Anyway, thanks for asking!

I feel like this is actually a great fit for LMM, especially since the Lone Power takes on so many different forms, so it doesn't have to be LMM forever (I say this as a fan of LMM but not particularly a fan of LMM-Lee Scoresby :/ )

the equivalent exchange of your favorite childhood book series (his dark materials and percy jackson) getting the adaptations they finally deserve but the price is that one character must be played by lin-manuel miranda

What is this about the tumblr staff wanting to sell art data to midjourney?

An ex-colleague of mine mentioned yesterday that there may be contacts between Automattic and midjourney in that direction, but nothing is public yet and I don't have any more info. They probably won't have anything specific to share either, since they left the company weeks ago too. That being said:

I have no reason to doubt my ex-coworker word, they are a trustworthy person.

Tumblr's CEO has been absurdly enthusiastic (comically, even) about AI, and is a big fan of LLMs and 'AI' companies.

A deal with midjourney could solve tumblr financial issues (not the same company, but openAi is paying up to 5 million/year to news companies to use their content as training data... tumblr generates several orders of magnitude more content than any newspaper or any media company and it only would need a 20 to 30 million per year deal to be profitable)

So I don't have any extra info yet, but I'm keeping my ears open.

WTF… it’s The Day That’s In It and we may as well get this over with. :)

For 24 hours (…or no, let’s tell the truth: actually until local midnight on the 30th, because what’s the rush? – and also, there’s always somebody finding out about this kind of thing a bit late…), get our whole DRM-free Ebooks Direct ebook store (35 novels and short works!) for USD $44! The info’s right here:

https://bit.ly/WholeStore44ForCyberMonday

(…And then I can sit back and stop worrying about the fecking Marketing Season, and get back to writing and cooking.) 

(…Actually, I tell a lie. My true intention for “after I finish work today” is to activate one of these lovely gifts I’ve been sent and completely flood my screen with crabs. And then screencap the results and post the video. …So as soon as this post achieves (picks a random number) 250 reblogs, I’ll do that.

(So go forth, y’all, and act accordingly.) :) 

If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading

HEY!

Back up your computer!

Go get the external drive you bought specifically for this purpose and then left in a drawer somewhere and RUN A FULL BACKUP.

There are lots of posts that make the rounds reminding us to sit up straight, stretch, drink water, refocus our eyes, take our meds, etc. But while this may not be about your health, it's still super-important.

Back up your whole-ass computer. If you can afford a second backup drive, buy one so that you have one SSD and one HDD, and back up to both of them (you can back up just the current important stuff to the SSD and let the HDD do the heavy-duty lifting).

Do not rely on 'the cloud' or the internet to keep jack shit.

AND BACK UP YOUR GMAIL AS WELL HOLY SHIT. The last thing you want is a catastrophic issue where literally every single thing you have in gmail is gone. It's happened. It happened to a friend of mine and basically her entire life was in there and now it's all gone. 20 years of it.

Reblog to save a life.

All throughout childhood, while my peers were socializing and making friends, I studied the blade read so many books that I am now almost legally blind, which left me with vast and deeply instinctual understanding of English grammar - and next to no ability to explain how it actually works. Friends will often ask me to proofread their writing and then get very mad when I say things like, "You need to completely reverse this sentence and cut this clause entirely; no, I'm sorry, i don't know why, I just know that the way it is now ITCHES 😭"

Now, what I want to see is a fantasy story where this plays out with MAGICAL grammar. Someone from a backwater town deeply steeped in folk magic arrives at Wizard Uni where all their fellow students are like "What do you mean, we should add another '𝞯∘⋇𝞿' to the incancation because it 'sounds better'? What do you mean, 'it could just be a regional thing'?? WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'THIS SPELL JUST FEELS LIKE IT NEEDS A LIVE RAT'????"

tumblr needs a hug button. sometimes you wanna just give a mutual a hug

One more day

Just a reminder that these (ebook) prices will be on offer for only 23 hours or so... until, at 23:59 Irish time on New Year's Eve, all prices in the store go back to their pre-discount levels.

So there’s nit much time left to duck in there now and get a whole heap of reading while it's still cheap… while also helping to keep your local online semi-indie author afloat. :)

Here's the link:

Ebooks Direct

Ebooks Direct Whole Store Bundle

By popular demand! This ebook bundle contains our complete inventory of non-new-release* works. All our ebooks are DRM-free, and come with t

Don't want the whole store? No probs. There's always the "All The Wizardry" bundle...

Ebooks Direct

Young Wizards "All The Wizardry" Bundle

This bundle contains all the Young Wizards material in the Ebooks Direct inventory. That's nineteen ebooks, containing:: The nine New Mille

...or the 2023 Pride Bundle, with all our LGBTQ-centered works (naturally including all the Middle Kingdoms works).

Ebooks Direct

2023 Pride Month Package

This package contains all our Middle Kingdoms material—some of the first LGBTQ-representing epic fantasy in the 20th-century fantasy field,

So if you've been thinking about grabbing something at a lower price... time's running out. Come visit us and check out our full inventory in detail, if you like. And if you've already taken advantage of one or more of these offers, please reblog for the attention of others who might have missed what's going on? Plz & thank you!

(Adding here our usual sorrowful caveat to our British friends: we can't sell directly to you any more because of Brexit. Our apologies.)

Thanks, all! :)