Another Success Story (A Response to Kelsey)

This post is sort of a response to Kelsey's post about online success stories.

The more I learn about how digital culture works the more I realize that my use of it is going to impact my endeavors. Dr. Burton's lecture two weeks ago about crowdsourcing opened up the possibilities for me. The Compose site sounds really interesting because I have one or two ideas for musical scores for fantasy stories, but I don't know the first thing about composition. More importantly, inviting an audience to critique something, like an excerpt from a potential story, is  a good way to edit a story before/without going through an editor. And, most importantly, using social media and free online excerpts is, I have it on good authority from other authors, a good way to build a fan base.  (Sigh) My only excuse for not working on my fan base right now is I'm trying to finish my education.  But I'm starting to see how it all fits together.

A fan base to an author that not only contributes to his/her work but helps promote it to the public is, because of the internet, capable of doing things that an individual writer could never do alone for himself/herself, for instance, preventing piracy of  copyrighted material.  Sometimes, there are incentives for their support such as free autographed book copies or other such trinkets.

However, for the fans of Stephanie Nielsen, the only incentive was wanting to do something good for someone who inspired them.

I used to see Stephanie Nielsen around BYU Campus sometimes my freshman year.  Then I recognized her in the following Mormon Message:

That was how I learned her story.  Then about a year ago, her book Heaven is Here came out.  I read it this summer, and I would be quoting from it directly had I not loaned it to my grandmother.  Yes, it is a memoir, and Stephanie might be considered an amateur, but it is one of the most intense books I have ever read, it is very well-written and has some mystefying spiritual and literary elements.  I have an aunt who read it who said she was crying every three pages.

So, to summarize: Stephanie is a Provo native who always wanted to be a stay-at-home mom. When her family moved to New Jersey--at a time when the blogosphere was just emerging--she began a blog to keep up with her family back wes, the The Nie Nie Dialouges. Her blogs is quite interesting, really: the writing on  is more like loose free verse than prose. Her blog became a DIY/ homemaking/ mothering/Mormon living blog, and began to attract a fan base.

Then, in August 2008, she and her husband were in a plane crash outside of St. Johns, Arizona. Both were terribly burned, and Stephanie was in a coma for the next three months.  When she woke up, her family informed her that her blog fans--thousands of people from across the country--had banded together to raise money to finance her hospital stay: I don't recall the exact details but there were charity concerts and benefit dinners, at least.  (Please correct me if I'm wrong, please check the comments below if someone corrects me). It was pretty impressive. And it was all because they liked her blog, they were touched by her words and her expression of faith, and they wanted to do something for her.

So ever since, Stephanie's blog has documented her journey to recovery and her gradual return to a normal life. She also continues the DIY portion and posts frequently about her material interests, the causes that she supports, and her family life. She always posts links to other websites where her readers can get more information about other people's stories and products, her other projects, and the church website.

In a recent blog post calling out for support for children with cancer, she wrote the following:

"I know the amazing outreach the blogosphere and internet has!!

My family and I have been tremendously blessed by it.

I know we can do the same for this family and others who 

are in the same situation!"

... If you want to tie this in to Moby-Dick, then I will. Stephanie's blogging for support for other people in need reminds me of Ishmael's visit to the church in New Bedford where he sees all the memorials to missing sailors. And in another chapter, he makes the following dire statement on behalf of his fellow whalers:

"For God's sake, be economical with your lamps and candles! not a gallon you burn, but at least one drop of man's blood was spilled for it." 

Moby-Dick could be called Melville's/Ishmael's "blog" or website for the awareness of the perils of whaling and the perils of life in general.  Unfortunately, Melville never found a fan base in his life time, and people didn't realize what he was saying until it was too late. So the key to a successful "blog", book, or anything, is making sure that other people can connect with it.