Dr. Margaret Reece, author of Physiology: Custom-Designed Chemistry, recently used AI tool ChatGPT to revise her book’s description on Amazon. The following illustrates how the process worked, including a before and after description and the prompt she used. “I did some minor editing of the AI response, but I think it is much better than the original,” she said.
TAA Member Phil Wankat: Archival Articles on Textbook Production From the ‘TAA Report’
The fifth installment of TAA Member Phil Wankat’s curation and commentary of the archival issues of the TAA Report (now The Academic Author), Production, is now available. Articles include “A Production Primer for Authors,” Series: An Author’s Garden of Editors,” “A Production Primer for Authors,” Series: “Manuscript to Bound Book,” and “A Production Primer for Authors,” Last in Series: “Your Index: Does it Help Sell Your Book?,” and more.
Wankat selected articles that have information that is still valid today, and included commentary on each. We will be adding these articles to the web page, “Articles from TAA Report Archives (now The Academic Author) with Commentary,” over the next few months. The articles are organized into 10 categories, including Authors Needed, Cartoons, Contracts, Ethics, Money, Production, Recognition and Rewards, Software, Textbooks as Scholarship, and Writer’s Block.
TAA Member Phil Wankat: Archival Articles on Money From the ‘TAA Report’
The fifth installment of TAA Member Phil Wankat’s curation and commentary of the archival issues of the TAA Report (now The Academic Author), Money, is now available. Articles include “Frustrations of a University Book Author,” “The Simplified Employee Pension,” “The New Paradox of the College Textbook,” and more.
Wankat selected articles that have information that is still valid today, and included commentary on each. We will be adding these articles to the web page, “Articles from TAA Report Archives (now The Academic Author) with Commentary,” over the next few months. The articles are organized into 10 categories, including Authors Needed, Cartoons, Contracts, Ethics, Money, Production, Recognition and Rewards, Software, Textbooks as Scholarship, and Writer’s Block.
TAA Member Phil Wankat: Textbook Ethics From the ‘TAA Report’
The fourth installment of TAA Member Phil Wankat’s curation and commentary of the archival issues of the TAA Report (now The Academic Author), Ethics, is now available.
Wankat selected articles that have information that is still valid today, and included commentary on each. We will be adding these articles to the web page, “Articles from TAA Report Archives (now The Academic Author) with Commentary,” over the next few months. The articles are organized into 10 categories, including Authors Needed, Cartoons, Contracts, Ethics, Money, Production, Recognition and Rewards, Software, Textbooks as Scholarship, and Writer’s Block.
More Archival Topics From TAA’s Print Newsletter with Commentary From Long-Time Member Phil Wankat
Long-time TAA Member Phil Wankat has dug back into his TAA print newsletter archive, this time into the black-and-white early issues published between 1994 and 2010, finding more gold to share with you along with his brief commentary of the value of each article.
We will be adding these articles to the web page, “Articles from TAA Report Archives (now The Academic Author) with Commentary,” along with the other articles he shared from the TAA Report, over the next few months. The articles are organized into 12 categories, including Authors Needed, Bios, Contracts and Legal Comments, Diversity, Managing and Planning, Money, Production, Publishing first book, Recognition and Rewards, Teaching, Textbook Scholarship and Textbooks in Promotion Cases, and Writing and Writer’s Block.
The first set of articles we are sharing, in the Authors Needed category, include:
“Co-authoring a book originally written by another,” by Frank Silverman. “Look for a book that has an author who is retired, or close to retirement or, well, deceased,” says Wankat.
“Authors uneasy over Pearson deal.” “Big mergers ‘reduce the opportunities for new authors and even close the door on experienced authors,'” says Wankat.
10/19 TAA Webinar: Blunders, Bad Ideas, and Bliss: My Experience Writing a Textbook
Are you contemplating writing a textbook? It can be a daunting process but there are many success stories and opportunities to learn from colleagues who have recently published their content.
Please join XanEdu Publishing and Erica Irlbeck, Ed.D, Professor of Agricultural Education and Communications at Texas Tech and author of The Crisis Communication Guide for Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources, on October 19 from 2-3 p.m. ET for the TAA webinar, “Blunders, Bad Ideas, and Bliss: My Experience Writing a Textbook.”