In my last post (making a living as an expert Digital Inhabitant) I talked about how expert Digital Inhabitants might make a living from a new type of publishing via the digital world.

Here’s then the whole thought from beginning to end.

I start out as a Digital Inhabitant with some kind of expertise in a certain area. I want to share my expertise with the world and I want to make a living doing it.

Traditionally that would have been done through print publishing – shaping my expertise into a physical object, for reading on paper. The immediate future of print publishing is part of something called digital publishing – bundling up the contents of print publishing, or creating new material in the style of print publishing, for reading on a screen.

Now, because the digital world exists, I think there is another way of doing it, called freemix publishing.

Based on my previous post – which has the derivation details – here is my first attempt at a definition:

A non-fiction freemix publisher is a Digital Inhabitant who has a free, continuously updated blog, sharing information, in a network, about their particular area of expertise, generating an income from activities related to that blog.

A measure of community could be the RSS numbers and a measure of success the Alexa ranking.

The primary types of blog could be a written blog or a video blog.

I offered Trent Hamm and his blog The Simple Dollar as an example. Then I found Gary Vaynerchuk and his video blog wine library tv. He, too, it seems to me, is a great example with his site having an Alexa ranking #35,181, as of this writing.

Three big questions and a comment that immediately come to mind:

- I was generating income from my area of expertise before I started the blog. Am I a freemix publisher?

If you start a blog and give away your expertise, freely and without reservation and you make additional income through activities associated with the blog, then I would say, yes, you are a freemix publisher. Not only, of course. It’s just something else you are, as well as all the other things.

- I am an expert, I have a blog and tell all, but I don’t make income from it and don’t intend to try. Would you call me a freemix publisher? Well, no, I don’t think so. A great contributor and thank you, but not a freemix publisher.

- Can a corporation be a freemix publisher? No. By definition a freemix publisher is a Digital Inhabitant, a single person. We are down to the individual, now. I’m not sure how the concept of freemixing applies to larger entities.

- I don’t like the label “freemix publisher.” Then don’t use it, then.

The authors of current print publishing seem to me to be a natural fit for this type of publishing, but any expert can start from scratch. And I don’t know what a fiction freemix publisher would look like.

It’s interesting that in the article (4/10/09) in the WSJ discussing Mr. Vaynerchuk’s book deal, this is reported:

Mr. Vaynerchuk — for so many an aggressive, persistent voice in the ear that counsels “going for it,” whatever it is — suggests his fans will buy his book as a “thank-you play.”

which fits, for me, perfectly with the idea of the freemix publisher, for whom the print book is one element of the overall publishing effort. In the same way, I could go to The Simple Dollar, Mr. Hamm’s site and, through the Donate button, donate $26.95.

I also like the word “freemix” because it has a ring of “remix.” Right now I don’t know exactly why. But I do.

So there we are. Freemix publishing. Sweet.