Thursday, April 19, 2012

Blogger Has New Look, So Does Amelia Bedelia. I Guess I'm Supposed to Learn Something Out of This.

Is there no piece of technology we work with that has to be continually redesigned. Our email newsletter, our Facebook page, and now blogger, are subject to frequent updates. When you change technology, why does that often seem to involve changing typefaces and tool location? Why did the compose/html tab need to move from the right side of the page to the left.

A commission rep once told me that a new sales manager is trouble. Why? Because he or she wants to show action, and how do you do that? By replacing the rep groups. Or moving to telemarketing.  Good thing that there's always another sales manager somewhere else who is showing action by replacing telemarketing departments with commission reps.

And I suppose you could say the same for Google, which paired with indie bookstores not too long ago, but now is dumping them to sell books exclusively on Google Play. A new sales manager, perhaps?

But today is not supposed to be an advocacy post, but one of those posts where I talk about how I'm too busy to write a blog post. I just came back from a very nice event at the Greenfield Public Library with Herman Parish for Amelia Bedelia's First Vote. Boy did Peggy look a lot like the original Amelia Bedelia. And she carrued a purse everywhere too.

At one point, Mr. Parish asked, "what kind of pie did Amelia Bedelia bake that saved her job? and immediately a kid called out "lemon meringue." Another teenage boy had drove down from Mequon to hear Mr. Parish talk. "Amelia Bedelia was the first book I owned," he told the librarian. Now there's an icon for you.

We learned that Amelia Bedelia could have been called Amelia Dedelia, among other variations. But that made her sound dumb, and she's not dumb, just literal. And a good baker.

Amelia Bedelia also has a new look. In particular, she's now in first grade. We learned a lot about Amelia Bedelia's First Apple Pie, which is being used in an iPad commercial. Who would have guessed she's so cutting edge? And coming soon are Amelia Bedelia chapter books, where she is in third grade, or maybe fourth.

I think this is a lesson in reinvention.

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