Generational Dynamics Forum - New Site

I have discussed the book idea with John privately in more detail. What it comes down to is that it takes a lot of time/effort to write even a rudimentary book, and I (and I think John is in agreement with this) do not want to spend roughly a hundred hours (my rough estimate for a simple draft book on what to do and how to do it) and get almost nothing in return.

I have written a book before, and it ended up with me spending probably a thousand hours on a quality product, spending about $10K on printing, and getting basically nothing in return. I am not going to repeat that mistake.

I also have published military simulations, and came out quite well there. The publishers in this niche field have a system for ensuring they don't lose their shirts. They require customers to commit to a product and put the money up front before they produce it.

I figure it would take about 400 people putting up $20 apiece to make this worthwhile for myself and John. The target would be $8k, and if someone wanted to put up a lot more than $20, that would be fine. (I once published a part of a work and someone was so anxious to see the rest, that they paid me thousands just to have a hard copy of the draft of the complete work - so I think something similar here might be possible). If the product doesn't happen by some deadline, you would get your money back (minus the transaction fees).

John could set up an account on Paypal or GoFundMe or something similar to take the funds, and periodically report back how it is going.

The end product would need to be distributed in some electronic format that hinders sharing and posting. I once bought an ebook that came in some unusual format that I could only read on my computer using a key. John could look into how to do this. But this would take Amazon or similar out of the equation and allow John and myself to keep the vast majority of the proceeds.

Bottom line for me is that I don't want to waste my time on something that has no benefit to me. And I think that $40 an hour or so for my time is reasonable to expect.

If this appears to be viable I could post an outline of the ebook here in about a week.

I encourage you to produce the outline. I think I have a reasonable amount of common sense, but I would be love to have some advice from people with real world experience, and I would be happy to contribute significantly more than $20. John may well run the lowest-BS site on the internet, and I would love to see what advice could come from him and some of his experienced users.

Navigator - I'm for $20.
I Enjoy your posts
regards
Jack

** 25-Jul-2020 World View: Writing a book

Navigator wrote: Fri Jul 24, 2020 3:58 pm > I have written a book before, and it ended up with me spending
> probably a thousand hours on a quality product, spending about
> $10K on printing, and getting basically nothing in return. I am
> not going to repeat that mistake.

Dave, how much do you want to write this book? I've been doing this
for almost 20 years, and I can tell you that you will never make
money on a book telling people how to prepare for the coming
war with China.

On the other hand, if you REALLY want to write this book, then just do
it for your own self-fulfillment, without expecting any money, except
a small amount in donations. In that case, I could still do the
editing, fact-checking and formatting for you, as you've requested.

The only other possibility is to get a sponsor. Perhaps you know a
person or an organization who would be willing to give you a grant to
write this book. But be careful, as there are a lot of people out
there who may be looking for a way to mislead, use, humiliate and
screw you, as happened with me and Breitbart.

This might be a good time for me to mention that for the last three
months I've been working on a book on Vietnam, in the same style as my
books on Iran and China. There is a company that's interested in
investing in Vietnam and who are giving me a small amount of money to
write this book. It's not a life-changing amount of money, but
combined with the occasional donations that that I get, it's enough to
keep me alive for a while longer. And it will be nice to have one
more book in the "Generational Theory Book Series."

By the way, Vietnam is a very interesting country from the point of
view of Generational Dynamics. The history of Vietnam is a lot more
complicated than the history of China. Historically, Vietnam has been
the focal point for clashes between Chinese culture and Indian
culture. Vietnam's population today has 54 ethnic groups. Most of
the 54 ethnic groups hate several or all of the others, and would be
only too happy to see them exterminated, if that were possible.
America's "Vietnam War" was actually one of many periodic wars of
reunification, and America was almost completely irrelevant, as these
groups were really just fighting each other, using American soldiers
as collateral damage. Today, with its prominent position as guardian
of the South China Sea, Vietnam is going to be a very important part
of the next war.

So the bottom line is that unless you get a major sponsor, then you'll
have to decide whether you're motivated to write the book anyway, for
no money. You'll still have to spend a hundred hours or a thousand
hours, but at least you won't have to spend $10K for printing, since
you can sell it through Amazon with no printing cost. So that's the
choice.

I will look into what it will take to set up a pledge site for the book. If it gets enough funding, I'll make the effort to write the book. If not, I won't write it. But people will have to put money up front on the pledge site.

It won't happen in the next two weeks because my wife is having her knee replaced Monday. She had the other one done about 2 months ago. We are taking care of optional, but needed, medical procedures, because, once war starts, most of the doctors will be involved in the military (read a WW2 era newspaper about all the doctors going away for reference), and you can forget about almost any kind of "optional" medical treatment.

BTW, this is the kind of stuff I would get into in the book.

Saw this on the Drudge report this morning.

China sending unknown seed to people at random. Appears to be agricultural warfare. No Joke.

https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/nat ... 79272.html

26-Jul-20 World View -- Kremlin shocked by large anti-government protests in Russia's Far East

China's strategy continues to suffer geopolitical reverses


** 26-Jul-20 World View -- Kremlin shocked by large anti-government protests in Russia's Far East
** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ ... tm#e200726



Contents:
Kremlin shocked by large anti-government protests in Russia's Far East
History of Khabarovsk and Vladivostok
China's strategy continues to suffer geopolitical reverses


Keys:
Generational Dynamics, Russia, Far East, Khabarovsk,
Sergei Furgal, Vladimir Putin, Mikhail Degtyaryov,
Vladivostok, China, Hong Kong, Aigun Treaty,
South China Sea, Ukraine, Crimea,
Uighurs, Belt and Road Initiative, BRI,
Wuhan Coronavirus, Japan, Taiwan, India

Having briefly looked into options for book funding, I think the best way would be to just use the site for John on GoFundMe.com. If and when John's fund gets to $8K, I would actually write the book. I trust John to set aside half for me.

So we will be able to see if there is enough funding/interest.

I will commit to doing the work, but only when the funding is there.

I could probably come up with a rough outline over the next couple of weeks.

I find the prepper videos on YouTube interesting, but usually far off the mark. I have fought on the losing side of two wars (I served in non-NATO armies), and the civilian population around me suffered horrendously. 'Bugging in' was rarely an option for people. Most ended up as refugees walking down muddy roads. At first carrying a lot, but by the end of the first day of travel, much less. I travelled in their wake as my unit advanced towards the enemy, or retreated from them, and the sides of the roads were littered with clothes, bags, suitcases, and backpacks.

The first war I fought in had international aid available, so people could eventually eat, if they could escape to certain areas. The second war I was in, there were no foreign aid agencies, and people starved.

If there is a civil war in America, 'bugging in' won't be an option for certain groups.

Only people who know which roots, mushrooms, and even types of grass to eat survived. Also those who could hunt, kill, and butcher wild game lived.

In America, the country people can do those things. The city people and suburban dwellers, not so much. And the young Americans I encountered, not at all. If war comes, maybe Americans can survive. If civil war comes, only the country people will survive. On time delivery means food stocks in the cities will run out in a single day.

The only well organized non-governmental groups I encountered in war zones were religious groups and criminal gangs.

To be honest, if people haven't acquired survival skills by now, it's too late. They will die. Not even a machine gun and a lot of bullets can get food from empty stores. The only option for many will be cannibalism. And I have seen that too.

Which two wars did you fight in?