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Earlier this month, it was announced that DreamWorks Animation had purchased the YouTube channel AwesomenessTV for $33 million in cash. Factoring in earning and performance targets, the sale has a maximum earnings potential of $117 million.

An online aggregrator-network aimed at young male entertainment consumers, AwesomenessTV was founded as collaboration between TV producer Brian Robbins (Smallville), United Talent Agency and law firm Ziffren Brittenham. According to the May 1st press release, it “has already signed up over 55,000 channels, aggregating over 14 million subscribers and 800 million video views”.

“Awesomeness TV is one of the fastest growing content channels on the Internet today and our acquisition of this groundbreaking venture will bring incredible momentum to our digital strategy,” said DreamWorks head Jeffrey Katzenberg. “Brian Robbins has an extraordinary track record in creating family content both for traditional and new platforms and his expertise in the TV arena will be invaluable as we grow our presence in that space.”

Under the new partnership, the network AwesomenessX, that will offer “original sports, gaming, comedy, pranks and lifestyle content” targeted toward males in their teens and 20s. Robbins, who has stayed on to run the company, has also been rewarded with an executive position at DreamWorks to develop a DreamWorks Animation-branded family channel.

AwesomenessX will pick up some AwesomenessTV faves like The City – Basketball, Sk8 Spotterz, That Was Awesome and How To Be Awesome as well as launch a new series around Winter X-Games gold medalist David Wise and videos of choice game moves and swimsuit model photo shoots. Shows like Frank the Dog, Baby Gaga and Fingerlings – which provide pop and web culture commentary from a dog, a baby and finger puppets, respectively – will also be featured.

“[AwesomenessX] will attract some girls as well,” Robbins added.

(Cross-posted from Violet & Ruby)

Violet and I just found out that there may be someone out there posing as "Violet & Ruby." Though this may just be a big misunderstanding (we hope so, at least). But please be sure that when you're looking for us, stick to this website and this website only (other than our twitter account and each of our separate pages) until further notice.

Sorry about any confusion this may have caused . . . we are both profoundly confused ourselves. But it's safe to continue to visit this site for any updates about the real deal Violet & Ruby :)

Have a good night, all!

Best idea ever, which just came from one of my regular customers.

"They really need to make a pop-up book version of No, David!"

And yes, yes they do. Just think about how AWESOME that would be, and oh, the possibilities with those pull tabs...


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I loved Cory Doctorow's Little Brother. I loved that it was entertaining, compelling and that it taught me about a wide variety of geeky tech things I didn't know a damn thing about. I loved its honesty about scary things like government, sex and violence. I loved its moral compass. I loved its idealism. I loved the way it textured my life after I read it, how I couldn't help but think of the things I'd learned when I made a withdrawal from the bank, used Fastrak, bought Mac products.
But I loved For the Win even more.
When I was in high school and was forced in my senior year to take economics, I HATED IT. It was a close second to my least favorite subject of math (at the time statistics) which makes sense. Both disciplines require attention to detail, number crunching, formulas. Things I do not like. And my continuing near complete ignorance in regard to all things money related has come back to bite me in the butt on numerous occasions, not least of all raising its head during the entire economic meltdown, which, when asked about it I would have to say things like: "It's just bad news all around," and/or "Um yes, I guess the president should fix this... how? Oh wow, look over there!" [runs away]
So, despite what several reviewers cited as didactic passages, I loved how much I was able to learn from this book. Yes, I understand that this book is meant for teens. Yes, I know I should have known a lot of this stuff going into this book. Yes, I get that for people who already know all this, the "here's what's happening when people sell you stock" passages may feel overly didactic. But for someone totally ignorant (me!) it was great-- Doctorow makes all this stuff that made me want to stick glass in my eyes during high school totally interesting, fascinating even, and most of all cool. His comparisons are fresh, humorous and intelligent. The passage about the Coase cost utilizes light touches of neuroscience to help people like me engage, and feel clever for being able to do so.
If there's anything I cared about less than econ, it's online gaming. I'm a total nerd for some things (...I keep a blog of kids' book reviews...in my adult life) but online RPGs are just past my threshold. And by just past, I mean way past. And just like econ, Doctorow was able to pull me in, despite overwhelming prejudice. I still don't want to play the games, but I have a new found interest in the people who do, and the meta-markets they support.
Set in 4 different countries, with an epic cast of characters, Doctorow puts a face to globalization in a way that is undeniably cool, without glorifying the characters--there's a great moment of self-awareness when one of the 2 main American characters, a white kid named Leonard who goes by Wei-Dong (in order to fit in with his remote Chinese gamer friends) is forced to remind himself why he's gotten involved with the burgeoning online-revolution, and the loneliness inherent in his lifestyle. Each major character has a moment when they question fighting for a cause with people in countries they will never go to, and comrades they will never meet, to fantastic effect: the "real world" becomes an outmoded term, and the world of the gamers asserts itself.
These elements in conjunction with Doctorow's strong use of inte

Anyone who knows me sort of a little knows that I love MT Anderson's books. And now I love his website! Check it out. Awesome graphics, representing an awesome author. Oh yeah, and there's a dirigible. And who doesn't like dirigibles?

So, yesterday was one of those great days at the store where everything went right. Teachers came in to buy mass quantities of paperbacks to keep their students reading during the summer, Love, Aubrey (a fantastic middle reader I reviewed in may) came out in hardback, new kids I'd never met came in and bought books I'm passionate about and to top it all off with a big fat scoop of awesomeness, I picked up 5 (5!!) new kid reviewers.
The Kid Reviewer program at my store is simply this: kids who really love books come in and talk to me about the books they like. I make them write a little staff pick card (with the word "staff" covered up with a handwritten "kid") and then I give them a free Advanced Reader Copy for their effort. Best case scenario, they come back in and and write a review for the ARC, but it doesn't always happen that way.
The best thing about the Kid Reviewers is that the only kids who even WANT to do it (it is offered way more than it is done) are kids who are passionate about books, kids who really, really love to read and who are, always, way more intelligent than kids their age have any right to be (which really just means smarter than me). Which are, of course, the kids that are the most fun to talk to.
I finally made a little notebook, in which I can compile things like contact information, birthdays and books reviewed to really keep track, since it's a rapidly expanding program. So hopefully, in the fall we can start doing events.
I left the store yesterday unable to stop smiling. There's a reason working in a bookstore is awesome, and for me, it's kids like the kids I got to talk to yesterday. One of my coworkers suggested a career in teaching. I told her that was a terrible idea. In teaching, you're put in the position of assigning reading, forcing it upon kids, making it a task. At the store, I don't have to do that. The ones who actually WANT to read, and are really passionate about doing so find me. Of course, I love to work with reluctant readers too. If you can hook a kid on reading, it feels fantastic. But there's something so warm, so validating, so heartening about the kids who love it all on their own. Whether or not they're reading books I like (which much of the time they are not) they're reading, and in the age of youtube, Kindle and twitter, it's particularly meaningful. To me. Career nerd.

Dan and I are pretty low-key about Valentine's Day. It's just a month after our anniverary, which is right after the winter holidays... but, we ARE going to brunch tomorrow at a brand new restaurant in Arlington, which I'm very excited about (I didn't even know it was open yet!)

The DC area is very into Sunday brunch.

BUT! It's Valentine's Day, and here are 3 things to make you fall in love:

If you live in New England, I hope you got to check out Kids ♥ Authors Day!

Also, the Cybils winners are up! Be sure to check them out and get reading! (Um, but MG/YA nonfic doesn't seem to be listed? I know what the winner is! Neener. Hopefully we'll get that up soon.)

And, as if that weren't enough, to honor Valentine's Day, Amazon is offering a FREE download of Let's Get It On by Marvin Gaye.

Enjoy!!!

So, I'm a bit of a nerd. That really doesn't come as much of a surprise to anyone at this point, does it? No? Good. Let's continue.

I was quietly, happily working on edits for Draft 3 of GOODHALO when the ol' pager went off. Turns out some poor soul wanted to check off of our mortal coil, didn't fare so well in the attempt and we were called out to save the day.

Day? Saved.

When I got back from the fire station, I thought about just shutting down the works and calling it a night, but I typically have a hard time getting to sleep after a fire or EMS call. It's like the adrenalin or something still is running around inside me, going:

Hey...is there more action? Are we gonna drive fast again, TKT? Huh? Huh? Can we? Should we?

So, I decided instead to plug away at the book a bit longer. As I was working on it, I realized a few things:

One of my main characters shares the name of a police officer/paramedic on the Woodbury Police Department. COMPLETELY coincidental, I think. My character's first name (who is one of my favorites in the book) is this guy's last name. It's funny because I said the guy's name before we headed to the hospital and it didn't dawn on me until I was home that I'd done that. Don't care. I'm keeping the name. It's too perfect IMHO.

Secondly, I've been thinking a lot about the second GOODHALO book that I'm hoping to work on soon...like in the next few months. I think that's a good thing. It's getting me to make subtle changes to Book 1 to make Book 2 that much more...robust?

Is that the word?
I don't know.

I like the word robust, so yeah...

Anyway, I sort of already know how Book 2 is going to go, at least the skeleton of it, but to make myself even geekier/nerdier/a bigger dork, I went ahead and made myself a 'teaser' sort of poster for the new book and I gotta tell you...I am STOKED to get working on this thing.

Seeing the font, my title and the little picture I added made me get all tingly inside and I was again reminded of how much damn fun I have writing my goofy books. It was like a little inner pep talk and affirmation all rolled up into a simple little mini poster thing-a-ma-jig.

Can I share the poster? Unfortunately, I can't. The title and the picture I use sort of gives away the big 'reveal' at the end of Book 1 and that's just not a good idea.

But trust me when I say to thee...

It's gonna rock.

*end self indulgent post*