Good Books, Bad Editors, and Ugly Language

Duty Calls, courtesy of XKCD.

Oh, noes! Someone was wrong on the internet! In a flash of uncommonly brilliant fail, the editor of Cooks Source [sic] magazine, a New England regional floppy made up primarily of ads, pissed off the entire internet by declaring that everything on it is “public domain.”

It took only hours for what should have been a wee, tiny, plagiarism molehill to explode off of Facebook, Twitter, and LiveJournal, and hit the mainstream press–including, but not limited to, The Guardian UK, The Washington Post, MSNBC, and the L.A. Times–due almost entirely to the editor’s poor manners.

Judith Griggs, the editor in question, has since been Google-bombed by the website Smart Bitches Read Trashy Books, and exposed as a multiple plagiarist who has also ripped off copy from Martha Stuart Living, The Food Network, and Disney, among many, many others. She even has a shiny, new wikipedia entry! There is little doubt that Ms. Griggs will have to change her name in order to ever hold another job in the publishing industry, at the very least. So that’s a lesson for all: Be nice. Also, the internet is not a copyright-free zone.

Also drenched in the sauce made of fail last week was liberal media bastion NPR. The network’s retrospective This is NPR: The First Forty Years leaves out most major contributors of color, including All Things Considered host Michele Norris and the African American Public Radio Consortium. Racialicious pointed out that the book illustrates an essay by Michel Martin with a photo of Audie Cornish. This falls under the category of a they-all-look-alike fail.

Yale University Press has bumped their street cred with the release of The Anthology of Rap, which aims to become “an essential contribution to our living literary tradition.” I wouldn’t go quite that far, but it’s past time that rap and hip-hop were included in academic studies of comparative history and literature, and The Anthology of Rap could fulfill some of that function, which is no doubt why Yale published the tome.

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Matt Labash, over at the Wall Street Journal, gave a The Anthology of Rap a (mostly) good review, but his piece is primarily of interest for the great books on music that he references and recommends. Fans of music, as well as books, will enjoy his selections, from the classic images in Back in the Days by Jamel Shabazz, to Jeff Chang’s hip-hop history, Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop.

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In other news, Joan Walsh announced Monday that she will resign as editor-in-chief of Salon to finish her book Indivisible, yet another “indictment of the fear-based politics that splits Americans and holds the country back.” Executive editor Kerry Lauerman will step up to fill the spot.

Tim Tebow, of the Denver Broncos, has inked a deal with HarperCollins to publish his “inspirational memoir,” Through My Eyes. Lisa Sharkey acquired the property, senior editor Matt Harper will edit, and Nathan Whitaker will write the book. Sorry, Mr. Whitaker will co-write. Right.

Former Alyson Books publisher Don Weise has launched Magnus Books, “an independently owned publisher of LGBT literature.” Last month, Alyson Books announced that they would no longer publish dead-tree titles, switching over entirely to e-books, which left a yawning chasm in the publishing community for LGBT work. Mr. Weise expects to publish his first titles in fall of 2011.

Speaking of queens, Elizabeth II has joined the social network. Her Majesty is now on Facebook, but she’s not your friend, and don’t expect her to post in person. Much like Justin Timberlake and President Obama, the Defender of the Faith will leave administration to minions. Buckingham Palace already maintains a website, as well as Flickr, Twitter, and YouTube accounts, because god forbid one should miss the Queen’s recent trip to Essex. Not only do they make salt in Essex, but Essex is the home of Tiptree Jam, the condiment from which pioneering SF author Alice B. Sheldon took her pen name, James Tiptree, Jr.