[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

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.

I don't insist on gatekept content in fact I don't care for the term. I admit to concluding from other posts in this thread that the new gatekeepers are perceived to be reviewers and bloggers etc. and that they will do a better job than the publishers are doing now and have done in the past. I may have misunderstood, and maybe I didn't

I'm not convinced that they will be better although some will be excellent. Excellent or not a thousand or so dedicated and intelligent people would have a hard time sorting through all of the available books, both Indie and Traditional.

As to your statement

There simply won't be *any* gatekeepers in the broader publishing world.

it seems a bit at odds with your statement in post 112 of this thread.

In the world we live in, *we* the readers are the gatekeepers.

Although perhaps I am misunderstanding what you are saying.

I'm definitely unclear as to the TV analogy. Sure there are quite a few stations, but most are pretty clear on their content, and there is a lot of youtube etc. video and has been for years. But looking for a video on how to fix your sink, or the latest episode of your favorite show or a sporting event seems pretty easy these days. Compared to finding a book by an unknown author without a trusted source of information (see I didn't say gatekeeper), that you are willing to fork out cash for finding video seems trivial indeed.

Helen