Goodbye Greenstone

It seems fitting to christen our new Seal Press blog with a brief moment of silence for the demise of Greenstone Media. Here at Seal, we've been following Greenstone with interest, excited by the existence of a likeminded organization. I realize, though, that it was the idea of it that caught our imagination. After all, who wouldn't love an organization whose spokeswomen are Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem and whose tagline reads: Women Communicate Differently: Find Out How to Talk to Them. But Greenstone failed to engage its target audience, in no small part because they were either incapable or unwilling to deliver the progressive content that was getting us excited about them in the first place.

It's true, too, that the fine line between success and failure comes down to money. I (Brooke) attended the WAM! conference this year (mark your calendars--next year's date has already been set: March 28-30, 2008), and one of the major frustrations women across industries expressed was the issue of funding. Progressive funding and right-wing funding are two entirely different animals, and progressive media is fighting a losing battle.

Today, in our own fledgling effort to create community, we open up an invitation to submit your favorite resources by way of the comment box so that we can begin to build our blog roll and feature all of you who are doing your part to provide spaces and promote ideas in this increasingly antagonistic, difficult-to-thrive, nearly-impossible-to-survive climate we are up against.

As a book-related aside, this strikes me as unfortunate: Today's nonfiction highlight, featured on the homepage of Publishers Marketplace, is Victoria Beckham's That Extra Half an Inch: Hair, Heels and Everything in Between, a handbag-size style guide for women providing a practical look at fashion, beauty and personal style.