Caught up in Pottermania, WFP geeks out with writer, editor, and game designer Wolfgang Baur.
- 0:25 - At Third Place Books, buying Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows.
- 2:07 - Wolfgang Baur takes a break from training his hordes of clockwork ghouls to have a word with us.
- 2:39 - From gamer to writer to editor at TSR.
- 5:50 - The subject of fiction comes up, and Wolfgang is apprised of the “not getting laid” rule.
- 6:26 - The day job: technical and benefits writing.
- 8:35 - Breaking into the tech writing field with relatively little tech experience.
- 12:20 - Nuts and bolts: juggling multiple internal clients and budgets.
- 16:08 - Freelancing in the games industry.
- 16:29 - Wolfgang plugs his new books Expedition to the Demonweb Pits and The Forge of War.
- 16:55 - Nuts and bolts: how a role-playing game book gets made.
- 19:24 - We discuss the difference between game design and game writing.
- 22:06 - The sad realities of work for hire.
- 22:42 - Finding freelance work.
- 24:54 - I can’t for the life of me pronounce “Wingardium Leviosa” correctly.
Wolfgang Baur’s Web site: www.wolfgangbaur.com
Publications by Wolfgang Baur:
Music by Morgansorange
August 9th, 2007
Wade restrains himself from diving right into his new Harry Potter book and interviews writer, editor, and game designer Wolfgang Baur. Part one: technical and HR-type writing at the day job, and freelancing in the games industry.
Show notes at http://writingforpay.org
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August 9th, 2007
WFP comes out of the gate strong with guest Jaq Greenspon, an old friend and a versatile freelance writer.
- 0:30 - Intro: An explanation and mission statement
- 4:00 - Jaq Greenspon graciously consents to an interview.
- 5:14 - Additional reporting by!
- 6:30 - Jaq almost breaks the “not getting laid” rule by talking about his red carpet interviewing gig.
- 7:22 - Not all magicians are men, but they’re pretty much all geeks.
- 8:00 - Adventures in writing for the tabloids. Wade recognizes none of these celebrities.
- 8:32 - OMG IMDB.
- 9:00 - How Jaq got started as a writer.
- 10:33 - How do you get work?
- 15:07 - Using your interests to break into particular industries.
- 17:13 -Asked which projects he likes best, Jaq almost breaks the “not getting laid” rule AGAIN. He saves himself with a Paddy Chayefsky reference.
- 18:09 - Projects Jaq likes least. It turns out that he does not enjoy being belittled by famous actresses.
- 20:27 - Advice to budding professional writers.
- 23:20 - Favorite and least favorite words and phrases. Yngwie Malmsteen’s dramatic return to the spotlight.
Jaq’s Web site: www.jaqgreenspon.com
Jaq’s published books:
Music by Morgansorange
July 29th, 2007
On his Micro Persuasion blog:
Almost every white-collar job today requires good communication skills. There’s nothing new to report there. However, what is new is that much of the way we communicate today in business is in writing through email. So even if you’re not a scribe by trade, you’re a still a writer by default.
I would say something insightful about this - provide a value add, if you will - but I have a wedding to go to and I’m still in my pajamas.
(Via Hugh MacLeod)
July 21st, 2007
Game designer Wolfgang Baur talks about the “muddle in the middle” of large projects in his essay Why Writers Get Paid (which he describes as “a bit of a rant.”)
The early stages of a project are always sunshine and unicorn giggles, laughter and frolic, all the tasty outer frosting of the writing cake. I love the early stages. I don’t have to make any hard choices yet. I don’t have to yank entire sequences, or worse, rewrite them to fit new continuity. No, there’s just the Good Parts of writing: making stuff up, setting NPCs in motion, doing up the fun stat blocks and the clever bits of readaloud.
Unfortunately, at some stage the Good Parts dry up. Every writing cake, as it turns out, has a railroad spike hidden in it, and you have to [eat] the whole thing. Once the frosting is gone, there are dull dry bits of iron left, and even those don’t fit together.
My interview with Wolfgang will appear soon in an upcoming episode. Maybe two episodes. We talked a lot.
July 18th, 2007
