Quote:
Originally Posted by speakingtohe
If bloggers and Amazon reviewers are to be the new gatekeepers, then there has to be a fair mix on their sites.
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Neither is or will be a gatekeeper.
There simply won't be *any* gatekeepers in the broader publishing world.
Amazon doesn't refuse any book that meets their terms of service. They're not publishers, just distributors. All they require is that you actually have the right to publish the book, it shouldn't be an identical copy of somebody else's upload, and it shouldn't be illegal or offend too many people.
The blogs are primarily review and/or recommendation sites. They'll tell you what they like or don't like about whatever titles they can cover. They have no say on what gets published.
Our new publishing world isn't one where the fences have moved out to include more titles; it is a world with no fences at all.
If you insist on gatekept/filtered content then you really need to filter it yourself or join a book club/reading circle. (Scary if you're not already resigned to that reality.)
Or stay within the catalog of traditional publishers.
What is happening to publishing is the equivalent of what happened to cable TV since the 80's, when most TV markets went from a handful of broadcast networks to literally hundreds of cable channels (most with original content), *compounded* with what has happened in the past few years with the arrival of iTunes, XBOX Video, Vudu, Hulu, Netflix et al.
All at once. Practically overnight.
We've moved from ABC+CBS+NBC+FOX+ (maybe) a couple of over the air local independent TV stations...
To this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ9qcp6Lcno
We have moved from a world where in 2003 there were about 300,000 books published in the US to one where there were over 3Million new titles in 2012. And then there is the return of the backlist, all the out of print titles that were only available used. Millions upon millions. And that is *before* the new indie titles.
Changes like that require new ways of thinking.
Trying to shoehorn all that content through the old filters, the old mindset, is like trying to get a sip of water from a water main; you're likely to drown first.