Weekend Publish A Book And Grow Rich Bootcamp

Just last weekend, I re-attended the Publish A Book And Grow Rich (PABGR) bootcamp. As an author with Gerry Robert and his team, I was invited to attend any of them anywhere in the world.

Although the majority of the content was similar, it reminded me of the things I needed to do and why I started the journey of writing a book in the first place.

On top of that, he offered a programme in which he would coach and mentor a group of speakers in every country. How phenomenal is that, to be mentored by one of the leading speakers in the world.

As much as I would have loved to jump at the offer, I'm afraid that my brain wouldn't be able to handle yet another major project. Yes, it's like leaving money on the table, but some of us have limited capacities to push projects through.

As it is, my two biggest projects are near completion but not quite there yet, and it's always the final league of the journey that requires the most energy and brainpower. 

I'm nearly there and I'm glad that you made the journey along with me!

The Weekend Flu Past And I Had A Mall Experience

You get a lot of time to think when you're not feeling well enough to go out and do stuff. The alternative is to simply occupy your attention with mindless videos and games. I did a fair bit of latter, to the point that I figured that I'd better do something more productive.

I headed down to Golden Mile Complex to get some Thai brand goods on Saturday and saw many locals there. I've always thought of the building as a seedy, dank place. Once there, however, I realised how wrong I was. The place was not the swankiest of malls, but it had a definite character - something sorely lacking in our mainstream malls.

Having heard news of how bad the retail environment is, I cannot help but wonder if it's simply the generic nature of almost every mall we see near the MRT stations. Though they are brightly lit and sparkling, they feel uninspired and insipid. 

The same products (usually from the same brands) are repeated in every other mall, making consumers wonder what the point is of travelling all the way to the city area if their heartland malls have the same goods.

Perhaps, in order to 'save' our retail sector, we need to allow malls to build a 'flavour' of their own. If there isn't anything remarkable about it, why would people bother going there? 

I'm still a fan of some of the old malls: Far East Plaza, Lucky Plaza and Katong Shopping Centre (which I hear may be sold soon). Now, I have Golden Mile Complex to add to the mix. 

A Conversation About Games

I recall a conversation I had with someone not too long ago. We were talking about social media and it shifted towards online gaming.

One of the things that caused me to remember this conversation was when he said that games today try very hard to have an active online community playing and interacting with one another.

A very good example is 'Clash of Clans', where, in order to progress well, a player should find a clan and participate in organised 'wars' against other clans. The player would also ask for and receive units from their friends and clan members to further their cause.

I never played the game precisely because of what seems to me to be an over-reliance on other players. If I wanted to play a game on my own, I should be able to do so without being penalised for it. As such, I refuse to play community-driven games like these.

Yet, what my conversational partner was telling me was that this is the direction that online gaming is taking. If it's not a community-driven game, it wouldn't do well and people don't take to it. I find it ludicrous but it seems to me that he is almost certainly right.

It got me wondering why I don't like participating in community events in a game. I figured that I already have enough community events in real life and don't need to be forced to be take part in yet another one when I'm gaming at home or on my phone (which I very rarely do because many phone games "encourage" communities).

It is rather an odd thing, too, that games are going the way social media is heading - towards large communities of acquaintances who barely know one another. I can't say that I'm pleased about this, yet I can't say that I'm surprised. 

Copyright belongs to Clash of Clans by Supercell

The Real Work Begins

With only a few weeks ahead of me to get my book out of the layout stage and into the final, printing stage, I'd better get moving.

Once the book is printed, I'm going to have to organise the book launch. It's going to be slightly daunting, to be honest, but I'm going to have my publishing team guiding me along the way.

Hey, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, I need to approve the layout changes, and there are quite a few! The slightly annoying thing is that some of these changes are changes back to what I originally wrote, but was changed during the editing process. Essentially, I'm doing two times the work for the same result.

Point to learn here: We need to better communicate with our team to make sure things like this don't happen to waste time and energy.