Toby Young Knows How You Feel

…Unfortunately, I got to Housing Works just as Toby Young (left) was wrapping up the audience questions after reading from his new memoir, The Sound of No Hands Clapping, but I’m sure it was a fun time, and not just because it was an official mediabistro.com party, although that never hurts! Mostly, I’m thinking the Q&A was probably a lot like his recent interview with our Rebecca Fox, where he talked about how he dealt with the sophomore jitters:

“I knew that people would be gunning for me after the success of the first book and that made me much more self-critical. I’d write a chapter, read it back, and then screw it up into a ball and hurl it across the room, saying, ‘It’s going to have to be a lot better than that.’ In the end, after several deadlines had sailed past, I just decided to get on with it. I realized there was no point in worrying what the critics would say because they’ll all say the same thing: ‘I loved the first one, but this one sucks.’ And, of course, some of the critics saying this will be the same ones who said that my first book sucked five years ago.”

Create a social media strategy, launch your campaign, and track the results in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. The online event and workshop will feature speakers including The Onion‘s Baratunde Thurston (left), Facebook’s Morin Oluwole, and bitly’s Tim Devane. Register now.