Author Archive: Eric San Juan
Eric San Juan
February 22, 2016
Imagine for a moment that you want to hire chefs to prepare food at your chain of restaurants, but you don’t want to pay those chefs. You want them to volunteer. And when asked why you believe that’s a valid way to do business, this is what you tell people: “If I was paying someone to cook something because I want to draw in customers, that’s not a real authentic way of cooking. When somebody cooks something for us, we know it’s real, we know they want to cook it. It’s not been forced or paid for. I think that’s something to be proud of.” You’d be laughed out of the room, and rightfully so. A few chefs might even be inclined to throat-punch you…
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Eric San Juan
February 19, 2016
Justin Keller, the founder of Commando.io, some tech company that I can’t be bothered to look into because screw this guy, recently ranted about the homeless in his neighborhood. But his rant wasn’t a plea to help them or a rant decrying the conditions that have made them homeless in the first place. No, it was a rant explaining why he doesn’t want to see those disgusting people. A quote: “I know people are frustrated about gentrification happening in the city, but the reality is, we live in a free market society. The wealthy working people have earned their right to live in the city. They went out, got an education, work hard, and earned it. I shouldn’t have to worry about being accosted. I…
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Eric San Juan
January 28, 2016
After never being away from a book for more than a few days at a time my entire life, the last year has been devoid of finished books. What went wrong? If that sounds like the setup for a piece that is going to explore some interesting ideas about reading, let me spoil it for you: It’s not. I genuinely ran into a wall. Not for lack of trying. I read on a daily basis, often for work (research, etc.), and regularly for pleasure. I subscribe to a number of magazines — yes, print magazines are still a thing! — and have my face buried in text for at least a portion of every day. Actually finishing a book, however, has become near impossible, and…
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Eric San Juan
January 24, 2016
Jason Dixon was the best artist in my 6th, 7th and 8th grade elementary school classes. He was that kid who just had it. He’d doodle these cartoon characters that got people crowded around his desk to admire them. While I made crude comic strips to entertain friends — “Step Off” was my big hit, and by “big hit” I mean it used to crack up my friend Abdul — Jason drew the shit out of stuff as easy as you or I pull up our pants in the morning. Cartoony characters, superheroes, kickass tanks and stuff. He was good. What he was not good at was blowing his nose. To this day, the thought of a snotty nose brings Jason and a jingle I…
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Eric San Juan
January 14, 2016
Self-publishing a book is a lot of work. Doing it right is a lot more work than doing a book the “legitimate” i.e. traditional way. (I’ve done both.) It’s a lot more work than most writers are willing to do, in fact. It sucks. And sadly, a great deal of self-published authors don’t do the work they should be doing. The number of shoddy, poorly-written, error-filled hackfests on self-pub services are legion. Were they to develop a unified mind they’d form a giant cube and hassle the United Federation of Planets, but alas, they are mostly like me: dudes and ladies who don’t want to lift shit for a living. Which is fine, really. I do it, and by “it” I mean I don’t lift…
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