scratchdj

It’s really strange having people tell me stuff like this. For me, some of these are years old and I never really thought people would find them funny, and almost all of them mean nothing to me anymore as I’m so used to them. It’s odd that new people are reading these for the first time, but that’s cool 🙂

When that happens, whatcha gonna do? Wasn't Hogan originally offered the George Foreman gig and turned it down?

Thanks again Rick, that’s really good of you 👍👍

It really winds my wife up, but whenever I see Laura Kuenssberg on the TV I shout “Kuenssberg!” I don’t know why I do it or why I think it’s funny, but I’ve been doing it for about 2 years now.

The Magic Bullet infomercial was always on when I’d peruse the shopping channels after the pub. An Englishman (Mick) and his American wife (Mimi) would wow their houseguests in the kitchen with their 20 Magic Bullets that they somehow happened to have. Who needs charades, wine or wife swapping when everyone is so wowed by the quick-and-easy production of a salsa dip, all with minimal clean up? I hate everyone in this. https://youtu.be/w6KNpmRNyJM

He's still a bell.

Thank you, I really appreciate it. 👍

Here’s Run the Risks’ Peter Simon snotting out a big one whilst tempting people to purchase some sort of ring. https://youtu.be/c8XpnCwbVIw This is Anthony Sullivan, hypeman for the H20 Steam Mop. He’s British, but wants so badly to be American and is a bit of a bell. https://youtu.be/nIutuA3daeU

Of course. When you create your project on Kindle Direct Publishing, you pick the dimensions of your book and then start filling it with content. No physical books exists, they’re all print to order and the cost of each unit is calculated based on its dimensions and number of pages. It works out that at 5” x 8” and 165 pages, Amazon charge £3.95 to produce each unit. Postage is added on top, although for Prime Members postage is free. You then specify how much to sell your book for. In my case, the minimum price is £3.95 (thus selling “at cost”) and the maximum is £25. I chose to sell the book NBC CSS for £4 just to make it as affordable as possible, and so that you could order 5 copies at a time and be eligible for free delivery. Last time, I priced my ebook at 99p and sold none. I think that was mainly as people wanted a copy for their coffee table, toilet or for a gift. I’ve priced the second ebook at £4 - same as the physical copy. If anyone really wanted an ebook version, I thought I might as well get something for it as I’d keep most of that. Radio 4 did a piece on Front Row the other week about authors. They said the average earnings of an author in the UK is just £10k per year. 90% of the money in publishing is earned by the top 10% of famous authors, and 90% of that is earned by JK Rowling. Traditional publishers have extremely narrow sights these days (basically to eliminate risk), such is the way Amazon have affected the book market. If you’re not already one of their established authors who has a history of selling, they’re not interested in you. Self publishing means anyone can make a physical book that’s of equal quality to what you’ll find in Waterstones. But unless you’re also willing to spend serious money to also self-promote, it will sell in tiny numbers. Funily enough, this popped up on my Facebook timeline today. The local paper saw something I’d put on Facebook about my first book and asked to do a story. They were surprised at how little I’d sold (naturally assuming that if the book exists, loads of people must be have bought one). When I told them the numbers, they decided to massively over-exaggerate them. Still, it meant more eyes on it and I sold more books as a result. If your daughter has any questions, I’d be happy to try and answer them.

$5.95, 3-5 working days?

Products so awesome that they’re “not available in any shops.” Let’s see your favourite shopping channel products and personalities. Ever wanted to safely sit on an egg? You need an Egg Sitter: https://youtu.be/FP_akuE2CnM Also, I can’t believe this excitable old puffin is still pulling a shift. She’s currently shilling a copper omelette maker. She’s no Chef Tony, but she’s shopping telly royalty nonetheless.

Thanks to everyone who bought a copy, there was a noticeable “spike” in sales yesterday 🙂

Superb, thanks very much Rick - really appreciate it!

Firstly, thanks to @Chest Rockwell for giving me the OK on this. As the title says, I've just published my second book of original jokes and it's available now for £4 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.co.uk/OK-Jokes-Some-jokes-Theyre/dp/1700499416/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=ok+jokes+2&qid=1575626628&sr=8-2 It's called "OK Jokes 2" and is the follow up to "OK Jokes" which was published in 2017. Why is this thread-worthy? Well, partly because I'm quite proud of it and partly because I knew nothing about the world of books, publishing or what may be involved before I set out on this journey. So, as well as a bit of shameless self-promotion, I thought I'd share what I've learnt along the way. Firstly, I'm not a professional comedien, writer and don't feel I have any particular talent for this, so it's really a hobby. Despite that, I've been genuinely touched and surprised by the positive feedback I've gotten from the books, especially book 2. I've always liked a gag, and would regularly be the annoyig one at the bar telling his mates whatever I'd heard or read in the week. About 5 years ago, I started thinking of some puns, and would put the odd one on Facebook as a status. I'd get the usualy "likes" and a few comments, and it started to grow. After a while, I got a bit bored with it and stopped. I was in the pub one night and some people I was friends with on Facebook (but hadn't seen or spoken with for years) made a point of coming over and telling me they really enjoyed my jokes and wondered when I was going to post more. So I started again, and it started to scratch the little itch I had for a bit of creativity. I started posting on Reddit, Sickipedia, Twitter (I even had a joke stolen by Keith Chegwin) and other social networks. Sometimes, I'd see my jokes re-posted and shared, just like "proper" jokes would be. About 3 years ago, someone said that I sould put what I've written into a book. That kind of scared me a bit, just as I had no idea where to start and I've never been into books of any kind. Then, one day, I found a book in my drawer written by FWA alumni John Atkins (who would later agree to support me by writing my foreword). I remebered speaking with him at the time he wrote it, and he told me that he'd self-published his book all by himself. And so that journey began. In 2017, Amazon were still using something called CreateSpace which was clunky as hell. It did however give you the basics for making your own book, with a view to publishing on Amazon. You could pick a page size and download a Word template you could simply populate with your content. The cover designer was terrible, but you had the ability to upload your own artwork if you wished. I wanted a nice cover, and so I turned to Fiverr.com having seen the wonderful things Paul Rose (Mr Biffo) had done with his YouTube stuff. He told me how it worked and I found literally hunreds of people all setup to make Amazon-ready book covers for your self-published work. I stumbled accross a lady in Austria, sent her my breif and she nailed it in her first effort. OK Jokes was published in October 2017 and sold just over 100 copies. I could account for about 8 of those sales, so others came from word of mouth and my basic efforts of pushing it on Facebook, Twitter and a few other places. I also contacted Dave Gorman, having been on Genius some years back. He seemed to remember me well, and I sent him a copy that he aknowledged and again, was kind about. At this point, I have to be honest in saying I was starting to look for a bit of reassurance that what I had done at least had some worth. Feeling rather content, I regained a bit of enthusiasm for it all and kept writing. Someone asked me when book 2 would be out and so I took stock and was surprised to see I had about 200 more jokes that could go in a second book. I picked the "best" ones and started work on OK Jokes 2. OK Jokes 2 came out last week and has just sold its 40th copy. I'm pretty chuffed with that, especially as the feedback has been more positive than my first effort. Amazon now use their own system called Kindle Direct Publishing, which is much more slick than when I did the first book. You may ask why I've done this, and I've been told that I "must secretly be hoping to catch the eye of someone" so that it goes further. The honest truth is, it really is just a hobby and I enjoy it. The thought of doing this professionally scares the hell out of me, and I don't think I'd enjoy being under pressure to do something that's come semi-naturally to me over a period of time. That said, having your own book, printed and in your hand is wonderful. Even if I just had that one copy, it would be worth it, as something to hold and own as a record of something I've done. The fact that many people have read them is great though, and I am pleased that people have. I don't want to be famous and have no expectations to be, but I think we all secrelty like to show off a little? I guess I've done that in a reasonably comfortable space. Here are some tips based on what I've learnt should this be of any interest to you whatsoever. Don't think too much, just do it. I know I'm not a profressional and my jokes don't hold up to the well-known jokers, but I've learnt they're "OK" enough to not cause any offense. If I'd had listened too hard to my own inner-self, I wouldn't have put this out there for fear of ridicule and I no know I'd have missed out. Don't deliberate too much. Often the first decision you make is the best one you make. I promised myself I would go with gut instinct and accept what seemed right the first time. I knew that if I questioned stuff too much, I wouldn't do it. The title, selection of jokes, the order of the jokes in the book, the cover, the price were all my first options. They seemed to work well enough and so I'm glad I didn't mess about tweaking stuff. People are generally more kind that you think they'll be. People that have generally liked them have gone out of their way to let me know. Nobody has said they hated them, so either they don't or they're too kind to tell me. Don't think you'll make money or become the next big thing. You won't. I sold over 100 copies at £4.99 of the first book, making £1.01 on each one. I gave the money to the local lifeboat station, as I just wanted people to read my thoughts, not make money. Book 2 has 50% more pages but is selling for just £4. I'm only making 5p per book, so the lifeboat station will miss out this time, but I'm hoping it just means more folk will read (and maybe enjoy) my work. Fiverr.com is really cheap. The total cost of the artwork for each book didn't break £20, and there are some seriosuly talented folk on there. If you sell books in the US, you have to worry about US tax demands which is a little scary. Anyway, that's me, that's OK Jokes and that's self-publishing in a nutshell.