Connor Coyne

Earlier this week I wrote a piece in response to an article in the New York Times responding to the migration of the young from blogs to other social media.  The article is a worthwhile read:  Blogs Wane as the Young Drift to Sites Like Twitter. My response is that blogs have advantages that other forms of social media do not, and that they shouldn’t be discounted as a powerful tool. But I didn’t get into a discussion of the specific advantages blogs can offer writers.  That’s today’s topic.

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Elisabeth Blair and I are composing/editing a Gothic Funk novel to be titled Hollywood. However, it is set in Chicago.

I’m taking charge of the writing, and Lisa of the music, but we’re looking for additional collaborators. In addition to a tangible application of the “gothic funk aesthetic,” Hollywood will also be a teen noir (or at least a 20-something noir) for those of you familiar with that term… think of an episode of Veronica Mars codirected by Baz Luhrman and David Lynch. It will also be a hypertext novel a la Judd Morrissey, Shelley Jackson, and John Cayley.

Let me know if you’re interested in contributing writing (or something else) to this piece, or if you’re interested in more details.

It isn’t a paying gig, but you will get credit for publication via the Internets.

Thanks,

Connor Coyne

Malware removed.

Now I have a long process of repairing the website, although the blog appears to be minimally impacted.

For the last month, I posted a blog in exile here: http://blueskiesfalling.wordpress.com/.

Posts there included Martuz!, No Exit, Event: The Marketplace of Ideas.

I’ll post more tomorrow about what I’ve been up to for the last odd month.

…

It has been a very odd month.

On May 15, 2009 my personal website (connorcoyne.com) was infected by a malware program associated with Martuz .cn that inserted scripts into dynamic and static files at over 1500 distinct sites. The bug is discussed at http://blog.unmaskparasites.com/2009/05/18/martuz-cn-is-a-new-incarnation-of-gumblar-exploit/. Evidently the infection isn’t the result of any specific action on my part. I was setting up a book review blog through WordPress (using the toughest password I’ve ever come up with) and this was what the program targeted. The infection caused Google to blacklist my site for viewers’ protection, and when Twitter picked up on the Google listing, it suspended my account. So far Facebook has not responded, but to say this is a major headache would be an understatement.

Sam from Forge 22 (http://forge22.com) has helped me with these problems — he’s a great guy and a great designer, and you should throw him some business if you can.

Bottom Line: connorcoyne.com, connorcoyne.com/blog, and associated sites are safe to visit, but Google has not lifted their warning yet, and I don’t know what the timetable on that will be. Until it’s lifted, however, there isn’t any reason to visit. The damage was extensive and will take time to repair. In the meantime, I suggest you check back from time to time, and I will post an announcement as soon as things are a little bit more normal around here.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

~ Connor

In the worst of St. Seger.

So. The blog is live again, no thanks to my old server Simple Host, who 1) lost a large number of files one two occasions, only attempted to restore them on one and even then threatened to charge me a $50 penalty for their trouble (nevermind that I was paying roughly 50% higher than what I’m paying now), and 2) failed to update my account information after two attempts, meaning that my domain registration expired. This is how I lost hereisnowhy.

As for my new server, Bluehost, it’s early in the relationship and they just got my money. However, they’ve already presided over a difficult and time-consuming content transfer, helped me change domain names, and have been professional and efficient throughout the process. A good sign of things to come.

Hereisnowhy.com was not a great domain name to begin with. People didn’t know if it was “here” or “hear,” “no” or “know,” “why” or “y.” It wasn’t clear what it stood for. My wife suggested urbantasm.com as an enticing alternative… and I thought about it seriously… but I ultimately went with the ever practical connorcoyne.com. I figure that if I can keep the content of the website interesting, it doesn’t matter how boring the url is.

It would be nice if I found a way for this website to cover its own expenses, which is currently about twenty-five cents a day. I’m planning on starting up a parallel blog which will maintain book reviews (some of which I’ve already written) and feature ads. It will be updated as needed, but since it’s supposed to earn a quarter a day, I don’t intend to sink a lot of time into it. When I have this up and running, I will let you know.

In the meantime, there is another route to a self-sustaining site, and one which is ultimately more important because it also applies to my career as a writer. I need to effectively use this site to promote my writing (specifically my novels and fiction) and as a way to obtain writing commissions. I’m not a freelance writer per se, and this is a very particular niche I’m filling: Talented Literary Experimentalist and Opinionated Guy.

With this in mind, I humbly request any Friends / Advocates to update / add links to connorcoyne.com, and to just generally share the blog and website with anyone you might think is interested. The same goes for individual posts of interest, etc.

And of course, your comments and suggestions are always welcome.