I like reading old newspapers, it makes me feel prescient. This news, however, I have not heard about, and apparently, the actual event took place more than three months ago.

In last Saturday’s New York Times, there was an article about the J.K. Rowling case (where she and her publishing, Warner Bros. Entertainment, are suing and blocking the publishing of a book about Harry Potter, written by a librarian, fan, and webmaster of a popular Harry Potter website) and how Standard Law School’s Fair Use Project is defending RDR Books.

Fair use, as my limited understanding goes, is what allows my favorites shows, The Daily Show by Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report to take footages from FOX network, make fun of them, and not having to ask for permissions from the network to do so. And if you blog, draw, collage, design, or express yourself publicly in any way - then fair use is probably important to you.

Somewhat related articles: Judy’s take on fair use; The ecstasy of influence: A plagiarism, the infamous article by Jonathan Lethem; and his Promiscuous Materials Project.

Getting some attention online is often the first step when you’re starting up your business and creating a blog leads to connecting with a community of like-minded people. Amy of Greenjeans and Rena of Rare Device gave some wonderful advice on this at their talk during the American Craft Council’s “Blogging the Handmade.” Click here for Amy’s recap, tips, and links. And if you’re looking to get some print-on-paper limelight, you’ll want to put together a press kit with samples of your work. Gabrielle of unfold uk reviews some press kit samples  and offers quite a few good pointers.

I’m still contantly astounded by the wealth of information that’s floating around on cyberspace and at the generosity of so many people in sharing what they know so that the rest of us can put together the different pieces and make something of our own little businesses. Thank you to all of you who share so kindly!

I think it took me over three months to finish this book. Unless you really like looking at numerical charts and graphs about consumer behavior, this isn’t exactly what I recommend for comfy couch reading. But it did put some business-related things into perspective. Cakes aside, here’s what I got out of reading the book:

1) People buy a luxury item (anything in the realm of art and design easily falls in this category) not just for the product itself, but for the experience ~ “Everybody everywhere wants to feel special” (pg. 247). So things like personalized greetings and thank you’s, good customer service, nice wrapping and packaging, any little extra step, the process of it all is just as important as the product itself.

and 2) People like buying things that have stories behind them. They give a personal, human link to the product and whoever created it. 

I can’t say that any of this is new to me or any of you who are already running your own businesses, but it is nice to see it all spelled out so clearly (in scientific terminology like we’re all little colonies on petrie dishes) so at least we know we’re doing some things right!

You might want to pick up a copy of Meg Mateo Ilasco’s new book, Craft, Inc: Turn Your Creative Hobby into a Business. And if you’d like to generate some buzz on the internet about your products, swissmiss offers some do’s and don’ts. Great advice!

I now have new promo postcards and business cards! I packed up a bunch of them with three big orders that were shipped out today. I quite like how they turned out ~ I had them made through Greener Printer, so everything was done with soy-based inks on recycled cardstock. I highly recommend, especially with the reasonable rates and really quick turnaround. The only drawback is their heaviest cardstock is not as thick as I’d like for business cards, and that their image print has a slightly green tinge to it (but that can be easily compensated for if I’d warmed up the tones of the submitted image, which I’ll do next time). For those of you who get a hold of one of these new promo postcards, I’d suggest you admire it under warm lighting, flourescent lights tend to be a bit unflattering.

Some other news on the business front is that Five and a Half is now trademarked. It’s a lengthy process (lots of online forms and things to submit, not to mention a fee) and it’s supposed to take almost two years before it’s finalized but it’s now registered as mine. I figured that Five and a Half is going to be around for quite a while (I hope) so it was time to stake my claim in case someone else made a run for it. If you’re thinking of getting a trademark, take out your reading glasses, get comfortable, and start reading here.

A business card. That seems like one of the first things you would need when you’re starting your own business, to send along with samples of your work and to give to like-minded people you meet. That and a promotional postcard.

Somewhere in the busy hubbub of making journals, filling orders, and befriending artists and designy folks, I skipped that step, and now, a year and a some-months later, I’m working on printing my first set of cards. I was completely befuddled as to where to start, and it’d be a very daunting task if I didn’t have Shawn helping me.

The process has really pushed me to think more about what Five and a Half is, how it’s perceived, and what I’d like it to be seen as. Musing over those things, I’ve been looking around to see how other businesses define and shape themselves, and here are my favorites: Muji, Russell + Hazel, and MarieBelle.

Summer orders have been rolling in, and so have an enticing string of events to attend and places to visit, making each week fly by in a frenzy of work and play. Now that Five and a Half is in its second year of business and chugging along nicely, I realize that I’m in this for the long haul (and very lucky to be) so I’m learning to better balance my time. I think those of you who have your own business can relate, how sometimes it can be very difficult to “unplug” after a day of work ~ you find yourself still going through your to-do list in your head when you’re having dinner with family and friends, or right after waking up on the weekends you’re scurrying to your computer to see if there are any pressing matters that await you in your inbox.

We have a few rules in our home to help me get me out of work-mode ~ no e-mailing after 7pm each night, and absolutely no turning on the computer on weekend mornings. We’re outdoors a lot these days because of the gorgeous summer weather, but the thermostat’s rising a bit too quickly, so I know we’ll soon be hiding at home with the big air conditioner. I’ve got books to read (I’m currently working on Anna Karenina, in need of some proper old-fashioned literature after going through a bunch of contemporary novels that I didn’t take a liking to ~ Under the Volcano, A Personal Matter, and The Black Book), things to learn (I’ve been searching for neighborhood cooking classes and I’m also considering taking a class or two for sewing — with a machine, that is, and maybe even swing dancing), and things to get back to (painting, swimming, and experimenting with our gocco printer). It must seem strange to some, how I have to actually list each of these things that I could do. But ever since my hobby (making books and stationery) became my work, I’ve had to bump everything up on my list of other fun things to do. Not to say that designing and making journals isn’t great, because it is, and sometimes I wish there were more hours in a day so I’d have more time to work on them!

If you want to read about a designer who really knows how to balance work and play while making the former almost just as fun as the latter, there’s an awesome interview with Aaron Draplin over at Hear, Hear (and if you like dashchunds, you really shouldn’t miss it); via swissmiss, a++ , things that I wish I could own though I can’t read a word of the descriptions; and cool customizable notebooks by start here.

People wait in line for hours to buy boxfuls of peculiar-shaped donuts, triumphantly toting them home to share with family and friends. It’s the Japanese phenomenon called Mister Donut. We wanted to see what the hype is all about, so we joined the line and when it was our turn at the counter, picked out a few to try. Mmm … my favorites: the chewy chocolate moji ring and honey-glazed.

They’ve put an Asian spin on the American donut, red bean filled, green tea sugar powdered, and chocolate frosted and peanut sprinkled, just to name a few of the other mouth-watering flavors they’re serving up.

It seems that the masterminds behind Mister Donut spent just as much time thinking about the actual experience of buying and eating a donut as they have on concocting each donut-inspired pastry. In the pristinely clean, bright and warm storefront, new batchfuls of freshly made donuts are constantly being added to the shelves. Every little detail is tended to, including packets of sugar and creamer and a stirring rod for your coffee, and a piece of wax paper wrapped around your knapkins so they won’t get greasy in the donut bag. Lest you forget where you are, Mister Donut’s distinctive logo and bright colors appear on each and every thing in the store.

Why are these donuts so popular? Without a penny spent on newspaper or television ads, it’s all been from word of mouth. The local media featured it because of the incredibly long lines and huge purchases that customers were making, and people travel far distances to try it, simply because friends have told them these donuts are really good. The ingredients for Mister Donut’s success seem simple enough ~ great donuts, great branding, great packaging. It’s how they got all three of those things right that takes a lot work.

I just learned this: if you’re setting up an online site to sell things, try to avoid the word “store” in your URL ~ it’ll most likely get blocked by corporate firewalls that are trying to prevent their employees from doing online shopping when they’re at work.

Early Saturday morning, while much of Manhattan was still fast asleep, we were sitting in the Florence Gould Auditorium at the AIGA conference “Body/Language: Fashion Meets Graphic Design,” ready for a full day of presentations by a star-studded lineup of designers. I’m still overwhelmed with everything that I saw and heard — suffice to say that the first speaker was fashion mogul Isaac Mizrahi, that one of the other speakers was Etienne Mineur, the mastermind behind the mind-boggling Issey Miyake websites, and that the closing speaker was Andy Spade — think Jack Spade and Kate Spade, yes, of the bag empire.

Since they turned the lights off in the auditorium for us to see the presenters’ slides and images better, we couldn’t take any notes, so I’ll do my best to recount from memory the highlights of Andy Spades’ talk on how he and his wife keep the Jack and Kate Spade brands fresh, fun and personal.

Have some unexpected items in your product line, was one of his first pieces of advice. He pointed to the mix of quirky items that we see in the stores and online. A fly swatter and a slingshot are rather unexpected additions, as are the slew of art and design books. Outside of the Greene street store in Soho, he’s added a little shelf of books for borrowing that’s based on the honor system — more of a curiosity than an functional library cart. At Kate Spade, we find a selection of colorful little booklets made by the creative department, a Kate Spade CD (they commissioned a band to create original music that they felt defined the feel of Kate Spade), and a series of handbags decorated with only the words of their favorite ice cream flavors — a collaboration with Haagen Daaz.

Andy Spade also shared his thoughts on how to keep Jack and Kate Spade growing without losing focus on their original concept and style. We all recognize the little black-and-white sewn labels as a defining mark of Jack and Kate Spade bags. He explained that for one season, they actually tried to remove those labels so that they would be different from the old bags, which were proliferating in numbers on the streets as counterfeiters profited from selling knock-offs. The bags without the labels sold badly, so the distinctive labels returned and they had to think of other ways to change things up — updated logos, seasonal patterns, and a mix of different materials.

Drawing from his background in advertising, he started making short films and commercials to mold and define how he wants us to perceive Jack and Kate Spade bags and the type of people who use them. Have a look at Blondie – a clever mix of childhood nostalgia and 70’s glamor. One of Andy Spade’s other projects grew into the film Paperboys. And a fun publicity stunt that he did a while ago was the Readymade project where he placed the signature Jack Spade signage on a bunch of different storefronts, like a chess shop, a magazine stand, and an art gallery, to temporarily create his own imaginary empire of stores.

To sum it all up, what I learned from listening to Andy Spade was: don’t lose sight of who you were when you started your business, continuously define and redefine how you want your products/business to be seen, don’t be afraid to work on other seemingly unrelated projects because that adds character and quirk, and most importantly, always have fun!