Better By Degrees

I try to make it rather rare that I’ll post something that might alienate people.  It’s just something I don’t like to do — everyone’s so hostile in general these days, I don’t see any need to add fuel to the fire.

That being said, I want to talk about something today that’s bugged me for a long time.  The “importance” of having that long-sought-after piece of paper that opens so many doors: the degree.

Before I continue, I want to draw a firm distinction here.  I do not mean education.  I think education is the most vital part of life, second only to love.  Learning is something that should never cease, whether one has that piece of paper or not.

And, it’s that piece of paper that I’m talking about in this post: the degree.  That piece of paper people spend years of their lives chasing, because we’ve come to a point, as a society, where the only way to make a reasonable living most of the time is to have that piece of paper.

I’ll admit it: I don’t have a degree.  I tried for a while, hit some rough financial times and wasn’t able to pursue financial aid (long story that I won’t go into).  I’m not able at the moment — because I don’t have that degree — to take care of things as expeditiously as I’d like, or else I probably would go back to school.

The degree would only be a secondary goal though, simply because I know I’d make more money with it.  When I was in school, I loved just going to class, believe it or not.  I didn’t even have that wonderful of professors for the most part (though there were a few that stand out); I just enjoyed learning the different subjects.

Okay, here’s where I’m probably going to start sounding arrogant, and I’d like to offer a blanket apology for that across the rest of this post.

I am, in the “professional” world, a software developer.  Self taught for the most part, and I know I’ve missed out on a lot.  I took two semesters of it in college, and had to leave school before I could start more than that.

I learned just how much I’d missed out on at my previous job, where they introduced two concepts to me: design patterns and design principles.  Both of those were alien to me when I walked in for my interview; they’re aspects of programming that you’re normally taught in college.  They were wonderful enough to see past that, and they gave me the job.

Several months after I started working there, I learned something that really boosted my ego through the stratosphere.  I’d already known that they’d been looking for developers with a college degree, so I was on cloud nine when I, an entry-level developer with only a high school diploma, was offered the job.  Then I found out I’d gotten the job over candidates with masters degrees.  Can you believe that?  Somehow, I was more qualified people who’d devoted at least six years of their life in professional training to the field.

Much later in my employment there, I was lucky enough to be on the other side of the interview table with the project manager and one of the other developers.  This too served to boost my arrogance, as we interviewed several developers who (I thought) looked mostly decent on paper.  One of these too had a masters degree.

None of them fit.  I’m sure they were (for the most part) excellent developers in their own rights, but they just didn’t have the skills we were looking for.  And we weren’t looking for anything that drastic: object-oriented design skills, web development skills, and a C#, Java, or C++ background.  Or someone who seemed to have the potential to learn what they lacked.

Every single one of them had a degree — at least a bachelors.  And it took us several candidates to finally find one that we thought would be a decent match.  Hell, some of them weren’t even able to correctly complete a fairly simple project we’d use as an interview test.

Now, I’m not going to say that everyone who has a degree is like that.  I know perfectly well that a lot of people out there with degrees are more than competent at their job, and could run circles around me.  But I would think that, if you’re going to use something as a basis for hiring an employee, shouldn’t it be more sound proof that they’re capable of the job?  I mean, seriously, I know there’s a lot of companies — especially in the software world — who would much rather hire someone who’s entirely useless but has a degree than a very well qualified individual who only has a high school diploma.  It’s just flat out stupid.

On the flip side of the coin, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting one individual who I’ll call Joe, who has to be one of the smartest men I’ve ever met.  Seriously, he’s my best friend’s step dad, and when I was in high school, we’d all stay up drinking beer (yeah yeah, teenage drinking is evil, I know) and talking.  He could tell you damn near anything you wanted to know when it came to history, and a damn sight more than most people I’ve met personally about most other subjects too.

Now, I could be wrong — maybe he did have a degree.  I can’t remember for certain, it’s been a long time.  But I do know he did have some college education, and at least he didn’t go as far as he’d wanted to.  But he was (and I say this lovingly, Joe) blue-collar, through-and-through, and a damned fine man. And even if he did have a degree, he wasn’t using it (which is why I don’t think he did have it, but again, I could be wrong).

I don’t know.  Maybe (probably) I’m just bitter because I never finished school myself.  But as a software developer, I know I’ve seen too much damned crap code written by people who are supposedly more qualified than I am, and are therefore paid more than I am.  And I know I’m not alone on this.

Seriously, what’s the importance of that piece of paper?  Okay, it shows that you’ve committed yourself to something for X years.  I’ll grant that.  Does that mean that in four years, I can bring in my marriage license as proof that I’m able to commit to something?  Probably not.

Proof of intelligence?  I call bullshit on that, for the reasons I’ve stated already.  Same with proof of ability to perform a given job.  And if you want to say it’s proof that I’ll work hard, trust me: even from the short time I’ve been married, I can tell you that a good marriage takes a lot more work than a full-time job, so I’ll play that card again.

Maybe I’m the weird one.  I’m a self taught composer (for the most part), a self taught programmer (again, for the most part), and I’ve only had up to a English-102 level education towards any writing abilities I may possess.  I bust my own ass; I don’t need to pay someone else to bust it for me.  Is it so rare for people to be self-taught in a field?  I think that’s a damned shame, if it is.

And there’s another side to the degree also: a lot — not all, probably not even most, but a lot from my experience — of people who have them think they’re high-and-mighty because of it.  They think they’re better people, that they’re smarter, because they have a piece of paper.

It’s crap.  I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts that, for every holier-than-thou degree holder there’s five people mopping floors in restaurants who could tear them to pieces, even in their own field.

Hell, in high school, all of the people I knew that I considered intelligent used to hang out with the stoners, while those with the high grades didn’t have the common sense to cross the street.  They were book smart at best, or more likely they just busted their asses harder than everyone else.  And, when I got to college, I noticed the same thing.  Everyone I spoke with who actually seemed like they knew what they were doing wasn’t terribly focused on their grades, while those who seemed destined to go far would spend all day pushing on a door that said “pull”.

So, those are the two things that are pissing me off today.  Companies who hold a piece of paper more valuable than actual abilities, and people who think they’re Gods gift to society (or, at least to their chosen field) because they suffered through four years of lectures and tests.

One final thing I’d like to mention: I don’t necessarily hold a degree against anyone, contrary to what it may sound like.  You busted your ass, and that’s something to be proud of.  That said, I don’t think that a degree necessarily makes you smarter or more qualified than anyone else in it’s own right.

(Damn, 1500+ words and I could’ve just said that last paragraph…  Oh well, it was a pleasant little catharsis for me and I might even be able to relax for the rest of the day.)

A New Year’s Resolution for the Arrogant

I have (among many) one bad habit that takes up much of my time. I am an admitted Wiki-holic, and, in my regular fix of Wiki-Crack (thanks, Zac — love that term), I peruse the lists of births and deaths for a given day.

I hate to admit it, but it depresses the hell out of me, and not so much the “deaths” section.  It’s the births section that really gets to me.  You may think that moderately strange, but let me explain.

If you haven’t already figured it out, I am rather narcissistic.  I have a web site that uses my name as it’s domain name, and it’s dedicated to everything me.  I know, others do it as well; even after a couple of months, though, I have a difficult time not feeling arrogant every time I tell someone about it or about the contents.

There’s a flip side to this narcissism and arrogance, though, and it’s one of the things that has driven me (literally) crazy over the years.  I’m extremely hard on myself most of the time, because I don’t feel I’ve earned the right to be arrogant.

I’m intelligent?  Big deal, you’re no smarter than a lot of people.  I’ve written a couple of novels?  Yeah, I think there’s a few other novelists out there.  I write music?  Big deal; look on MySpace’s bands section and see how many other people write music.

I don’t have anything to really show for what I’ve accomplished — no awards, no real media exposure.  I don’t have a publisher, and I haven’t heard a public performance of any of my music in almost a decade (and even that was my own performance — it’s not like I could sit back and enjoy listening to it).

Don’t get me wrong — this isn’t a whining post (I’ll probably do one of those in a week or two).  This is a post about my “professional” new years resolution.  I have a few private ones (and no, quitting smoking is not on that list.  Sorry — maybe next year, but don’t bet the farm on it), but this is the one I’m making a public record of, so it can come back and bite me in the ass next December.

I resolve that, within the course of 2009, I will do something of enough notability that I will be “wiki-worthy”.  My goal is that, by 2010, I’ll have a page on Wikipedia that talks about my music, writing, or whatever I’m doing at the time.

I am going to qualify it with this: it will be a good accomplishment that gets me there.  Not murder, not some other criminal act.  Not suicide, nor being in a porn film (although if I weren’t married …. nah…)

It will be through either writing fiction or writing music, at least that I can foresee now, but I’ll be in there dammit.

Trust me, I’ve thought about just going in there, adding it myself, and seeing how long it stays up there.  That seems a bit too much like cheating though, and defeats the purpose.

Okay, so that’s out of the way.  The betting pools are now open as to how long it is before I give up on this.  Vegas is setting the odds of me giving up in less than a month at just over 1.5:1; I’m still waiting on the line for the 2-6 month period…

Catch you on the flip side

–Matt

New Music and New Site Sections

Okay, did a bit more rearranging of the site and added two new sub-sections to the music page.  Now it’s broken up into “Classical” and “Modern“.  I know that the “classical” music isn’t technically “classical” — stylistically, it’s probably more romantic/modern, and it isn’t old enough to be classical or romantic — but I don’t really know what the hell to call it.

The “modern” music section is what I’m calling my “rock” side, because (like the classical stuff) I don’t really know what the hell else to call it.

Anyways, there’s three new pieces up.  You can find Midnight in the classical section, and Evolution and Hands in the modern section.

There’s actually a bit of a story that goes with Hands as well.  My wife has always loved that piece, and she wanted it to be part of the music that played at our wedding.  She’d planned on walking down the aisle (well, technically it was a bridge) to something else — Canon in D, I think — but her mother was playing DJ and hit a wrong button.  She ended up walking down the aisle to Hands instead, and that’s a memory that I’m going to cherish until my dying day: my soon-to-be wife walking towards me to music I wrote.

Okay, enough sappy crap.  Hope you enjoy the music

Catch you on the flip side.

–Matt

Social Networks

I’m working right now, so I can’t write too much, but I wanted to drop a quick line to let everyone know which social networks you can find me on.  Odds are, you came here from one of them, but maybe you’re missing one or two.  I’m always open to new friends/followers/whatever-it’s-called-on-a-given-network, so make sure you hit me up.

Here’s a couple, even though I’m “on” quite a few (well, I use ping.fm to update quite a few).  If the one you regularly use isn’t here, leave a comment and let me know which one it is — if I’m already there, I’ll be sure to let you know where I’m at.

Facebook Profile
Facebook Page (always looking for more fans!)
Twitter
MySpace (I don’t check this one out regularly at the moment, but if enough of you are on there I’ll start paying it more attention.)

Quick Post: New Site Section

If you haven’t noticed yet, there’s a new section on the site, “Music“.  For those of you who don’t know (and if you’ve kept up with this blog to any extent, you should know), once upon a time I was a bit of a musician.  My family was kind enough to give me a keyboard for Christmas, and I’ve gotten stuff set up to do a bit of recording.

Keep in mind that these are hardly professional recordings.  I’m not much of a pianist (well, not anymore at least), and I’m even less of a recording engineer.  What you’re hearing is actually MIDI music that I’ve piped through my keyboard, then back into the computer, where it’s recorded and then saved as an MP3 file.

In other words, if it doesn’t sound like a real piano, it’s because it isn’t.

That said, I hope you enjoy them.  I have quite a bit of other music I plan on “releasing” in the near future, and I’m planning on doing it all for free.  I might release a CD just for kicks, for those of you who like to support starving artists   In the mean time, feel free to download them, burn them to your own CD, put them on your iPod or whatever you use to cart music around on.

Keep an eye out for more classical style music, as well as the occasional industrial/electronic/rock song if I can get that stuff set back up.

For those of you who may be a little concerned that this will tie up some of my writing time, rest assured that Rob’s adventures will continue, and the Vanishing Point series will continue as well.  But you never can have too many hobbies now, can you…

Catch you on the flip side.

–Matt

Broken Peaces Started

Well, so much for taking a break

Today I’m starting in on Broken Peaces (no, that’s not a typo), the third and final installment in the Like Glass series.  This one should be a bit more light-hearted than Shattered or even Like Glass.  That’s the plan at least.

No real details yet, just that Rob’s going to explore the world of music a little deeper in this go-round, now that things have levelled off a little bit from the hills and valleys in the previous two books.

I know already how this one’s going to end (and no, I’m not telling, because it may change between now and then), I just don’t know how we’re going to get there.  Should be fun…

Anyways, that’s all I’m going to say for now.  I’ll try and keep you posted as much as possible, but I also know that’s a good way (for me at least) to kill a WIP.

Catch you on the flip side.

–Matt

Revisiting A Past Life

Well, I’d hoped this wouldn’t happen, but at the same time, I knew it would…

My sister-in-law and her husband got me an electronic keyboard for Christmas — which is super-cool, trust me.  I’m really thankful for it; I’d actually asked for one, and didn’t expect anyone to shell out the cash for it.  It hooks up to the computer via USB, and it (literally) is just plug-and-play — no configuration, no drivers, nothing.  Plug it in and it’s ready to go.

So, today, I hooked it up and started going through a lot of my old music.  I mean, music I’d written, and a few pieces I’d transcribed so I could mess around with them.

Oh yeah: if you didn’t already know, I used to be a bit of a musician.  Way back before this whole writing thing came to play, and even before I was a software developer.  Some people used to say I was halfway decent; I’ll leave that up to you though, if you ever get to hear anything I wrote.

Anyways…

So I hooked it up, started playing some of the stuff I’d written, and man did it hit me hard.  All the energy I’d put in to it, all the time I’d spent, all the hopes and dreams I’d had of getting my stuff performed (or even just heard).  Damn near put me In the Fight.

I know, it probably sounds stupid: why would that depress me?  Shouldn’t those be good memories?  Shouldn’t it be pleasing to hear something that you’d spent so much time and energy on?

Not really.  See, some things went awry with all that, and I closed the door on that part of my life.  I tried really, really hard — harder than anyone would ever think made any sense at all — to put musical creativity out of my life.

Why?  Because I always wanted more from it.  I didn’t want to just plink around at home on a keyboard, or write stuff on the computer and listen to it later.  I wanted to be a composer, in much the same way I want to be a novelist.  Not a hobbyist composer, like I don’t care too much for the idea of writing as a hobby.  I wanted the same thing everyone else wants: I wanted to quit my day job, or at least get something set up to get it performed publicly.  And, like everything else you do on your own, I had no clue what to do to get that ball rolling.

Seriously, if you think it’s hard work trying to get a novel read by an agent, try getting an orchestral piece performed.

Maybe I just looked in the wrong places, but I had absolutely no luck in getting anything performed.  There was other stuff involved too — like trying to get involved with a band a friend of mine had with absolutely no success.  It just seemed that every door I tried was locked solidly.  Maybe I tried the wrong doors, and I’m sure I gave up too easily, but it’s really disheartening to make no progress, no matter how hard you try.

So I gave up, and I tried like a son of a bitch to put it out of my life.  And it worked.  Kinda.  I’ve been really bitter about it since I gave up, but I’d succeeded in finding other avenues to pursue — like writing.

Why am I posting this?  Not just to whine, although I’m sure it probably seems like it   Now that I have a means to get the music out, I’m hoping there might be a little bit of an audience here on the inter-tubes.  As soon as I figure out some logistical problems (i.e. recording and mixing a MIDI file to MP3), I’m going to start posting my music here, as I do with my writing.  For free, of course, and there should be a fair mix of “classical” music and some rock/industrial instrumental tracks.  Trust me, you do not want to hear me sing (besides, I’ve got a little experience with home recording, and getting a good vocal track is a bitch and a half).

In the meantime, you can check out one of my pieces, Evolution.  There’s no story behind the name; it just seemed to fit.  It’s kind of a rock-ish/techno-ish/classical-ish piece that, like my novels, I can’t seem to fit into a genre.  Hope you enjoy.

Ross Perot Would Be Proud

I’ve done way too much thinking today, but here goes some more.

FWIW, I am not (again) quitting on anything.  I might take a bit of a break — I’m emotionally drained, as it’s been a rather trying couple of months (personal reasons, mostly).  But I am going to write as much as I’m able to write, and I’m not going to pull the plug on anything.  Well, unless you really piss me off…

Anyways…

If you’ll direct your attention to this site, you’ll notice that I have lowered the price of Like Glass, from $15.95 (USD) to $9.95 (USD).  Like Glass is now available for less than $10.  Okay, it might as well be ten bucks, I know, but still, that nickle you save can find lots of uses, like throwing at your co-worker’s head when they’re not looking.

I would like to apologize to everyone who’s recently (i.e. the past couple of days) bought a copy of the novel at the previous price.  If I had a way to reimburse you, believe me, I would.  Unfortunately, for whatever else CreateSpace has going for them, refunds and the like are not an option.

I do have a list though, and those people who bought a copy of Like Glass within the past week will receive a free copy of Shattered when it comes out.

I am planning on revamping Like Glass in the near future, to make it a little easier on the eyes (not the content, just the typesetting).  I’m also going to be working on some new promo materials too, for both it and Shattered, so keep your eyes peeled.

I’d like to thank everyone who puts up with me — I’m a damned difficult person to keep up with, and each one of you who doesn’t just bail out on me deserves to be canonized.  Well, after they canonize my wife — she’s got you all beat hands down on that front

–Matt

After A Little Thinking….

I’m sure that, if my wife knew I was writing this post, she’d be a little upset with me.  She prefers that I keep my “public persona” as clean as possible, and I admire her for that.  But, at the moment, I’m a little upset and I’m going to shoot myself in the marketing foot.

Now that I’ve had a little time to think about what happened this morning, I’ll be flat honest: I’m pissed.  I wasted an entire month of my life thinking that this would play out to be a fair start to a career, time I could have spent marketing Like Glass on my own, time I could’ve spent looking for another publisher.  Hell, I was actually going to give up when I got the email from VHP, and I could’ve been working on my software development skills in this time, instead of worrying about building up an audience.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not going back on what I said earlier — I’m still very grateful to both Ms. Williams and Ms. Quast for what they’ve done for me.  I’m mad at myself.  Instead of making sure that everything was signed, sealed, and delivered, I kicked my feet up and trusted that things would take care of themselves.

It was my own stupidity/naivete, and it bit me in the ass.  Now I know better.

I don’t think I’ll be spending any more of my time pursuing agents or publishers.  I’m satisfied with the job that CreateSpace does for production, and I’ll be a little arrogant: I like to think that I can do a fine job in creating the promotional materials myself.  I won’t turn down a reasonable offer if whatever Gods there may be decide to send me one, but I’m not going to waste my time to pursue it further.

I also think that I’m going to leave the series with Shattered.  I had originally intended there to be a third, final book in the series, but as much as I hate to leave it at two books, I feel my time is better served looking elsewhere for financial support (i.e. actually trying to do well at my day job, instead of just putting up with it until I get that “big break”).

Note that I reserve the right to change my mind at any time, and I probably will once I get over this.  But that’s where I stand at the moment.

So, here’s the current plan:  Like Glass is still available at CreateSpace; you can find info on getting a discount if you go to the Like Glass page (click the link at the top to get there).  Shattered is undergoing review by some friends of mine, and further information will be forthcoming once I’ve received their opinions.

I may pull the plug on Like Glass at the first of the year, and I may not release Shattered to the public.  I haven’t completely decided yet.  But, as of this moment in time, what I just wrote is the closest thing there is to a plan, for better or worse.  Just don’t take it as the gospel, at least not until you have a copy of Shattered in your hands and you see Like Glass still for sale in Febuary.

I need to get back to pretending to work.  Again, thanks to Kimberlee and Mary — it was fun while it lasted.

–Matt

Like Glass No Longer a VHP Title

The title pretty much says it all; officially, as of today, Like Glass will not be published by Vanilla Heart Publishing.  I will continue to distribute it via the current channels (i.e. Amazon and CreateSpace) at least until the first of the year, though I’m unsure whether I will continue to pursue it after that.

I’m at work right now, so I can’t really discuss the subject too much; suffice to say that it’s better for all parties involved that the novel finds a different home.

I would like to sincerely offer my thanks and gratitude to Kimberlee Williams, the editor at VHP, for the time and effort she and her staff put into what work had already been done on the novel, and for putting up with a rather tedious client.  I’d also like to once again thank Mary Quast, the author who introduced me to VHP in the first place; even though it didn’t work out, it was still a wonderful experience that I wouldn’t have had without your assistance.

Okay, back to the rat race.

–Matt

Next Page »

• On Twitter Too

  Make sure to follow @MCoryAuthor on Twitter to keep up with the latest new on Like Glass, Shattered, and everything else that's going on. Heck, sometimes I even have something quasi-useful to say that has nothing to do with anything else.

• Recent Posts

  • Will Work For … Well, Anything.
  • Quick Update on Like Glass and Shattered…
  • Very Superstitious
  • An Open Invitation
  • Wanting to Clear Things Up a Little
  • A Time to Change
  • Great First Day – Keep ‘Em Coming!
  • Writers Wanted!
  • ChocolateForDogs.com Author Pre-Registration
  • ChocolateForDogs.com Down to be Revamped

• Networked Blogs (on Facebook)

  

  Follow this blog