How many authors can the consumers sustain?

[Phogg]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Publishers are in the business of selling books, and creating readers is an inherent part of that. The more readers there are, the more books they can sell.

Readers on the other hand just want to read enjoyable or informative books, and if writers with a day job fill that need adequately at a fraction of the cost...then that is what will happen.

[apbschmitz]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

Somewhere there is a limit to how many authors can make a living out of their IP alone. An increase in the number of authors means that less of them can afford it, and the same thing happens when there is a hugely popular book.… What is the option for authors?

I suppose there are writers out there who think they're going to make their fortune with that next e-book. But most of us know we'd be better off financially if we devoted the time toward collecting aluminum cans and recycling them.

It's great to get that occasional check from Amazon or Smashwords, but I don't count on quitting my day job anytime soon. I take the writing seriously, but not the prospect of imminent wealth.

Money is one measure of value. Most writers should also have a few other measuring tools at hand.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by howyoudoin

Old Ella Mason keeps cats, eleven at last count,
In her ramshackle house off Somerset Terrace;
People make queries
On seeing our neighbor’s cat-haunt,
Saying: "Something's addled in a woman who accommodates
That many cats."
— "Ella Mason and Her Eleven Cats" by Sylvia Plath, 1956

"Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea." --Robert Heinlein

[caleb72]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

FTEs?

It's a resource measurement. It stands for "Full Time Equivalents".

[GlenBarrington]

Economically? There have always been too many authors.

Emotionally, it doesn't take that many readers to keep an author going.

[xg4bx]

"The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing; every one must be an author; some out of vanity, to acquire celebrity and raise up a name, others for the sake of mere gain."
Martin Luther

[howyoudoin]

Originally Posted by Catlady

"Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea." --Robert Heinlein

Of all the blatantly sexist things to say....

[patrickt]

How many readers are there? In the U.S., with our current educational system, it's a shrinking pool.

[QuantumIguana]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20381678...oks-last-year/ This poll, from 2007, claims that 1 in 4 adults read no books in the past year. That means 3 in 4 did adults did read a book. It also claims that older people are less likely to read books. If the educational system was really as dire as some claim, it would be the younger people who were not reading. E-readers are popular with older people, and this could reverse some of the trend of not reading, as they can make the text as large as they want.

I keep seeing claims that 80% of adults hadn't read a book in the previous year, but they tend to be poorly cited.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by howyoudoin

The market 'lays him off', so to speak. Self-employed people shut down non-profitable ventures when they reach the point where they decide they're not getting what they wanted out of it. It's the underlying risk of the venture that was my point.

The economics of book writing don't seem that straightforward to me. Every book could be considered a venture, and writing a new one can give new opportunities.

Originally Posted by howyoudoin

My apologies to Sil_liS for taking the thread off-track. I'll stop.

No apologies necessary. I don't feel like joining the off topic discussion, but there's no need to stop on my account.

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

That being said, if we restrict it to fiction (I am not sure about technical books), both books and shorter fiction, then only a fraction of one percent of writers seem to be able to sustain a career where being an author is their only job. My guess is, in all genres that the number is probably under a few thousand at any given time.

But does that mean that any writer that makes it to the self-sustaining zone takes the source of income from another author that is in the zone?

Originally Posted by Joykins

You can't. In fact, the only thing that the market can do is post sales so disappointing the writer gives up, at which point the writer may or may not be laboring solely out of love or some sort of hypergraphia.

Is this how some blogs start?

Originally Posted by Joykins

From the point of view of the publisher, though, each title represents a certain amount of sunk costs. So selling 10 books of the same title represents a much greater profit than 1 sale of each of 10 titles. The effect is magnified for the author, though, as (perhaps) 9 of those 10 titles sales don't feed the author's revenue stream at all.

This means that it is in the publisher's best interest to limit the number of titles on the market.

Originally Posted by apbschmitz

Money is one measure of value. Most writers should also have a few other measuring tools at hand.

Like the numbers of readers or maybe fan mail?

Originally Posted by caleb72

It's a resource measurement. It stands for "Full Time Equivalents".

Thanks!

Originally Posted by GlenBarrington

Economically? There have always been too many authors.

Emotionally, it doesn't take that many readers to keep an author going.

More readers would benefit the author both economically and emotionally.

Originally Posted by xg4bx

"The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing; every one must be an author; some out of vanity, to acquire celebrity and raise up a name, others for the sake of mere gain."
Martin Luther

Interesting point of view, but I've always liked seeing shelves filled with books. Am I evil?

Originally Posted by patrickt

How many readers are there? In the U.S., with our current educational system, it's a shrinking pool.

I don't think that that is necessarily true. People do read, but many just don't have the patience or the time for books. The fact that the number of blogs keeps growing would indicate that the number of blog readers keeps increasing as well.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

But does that mean that any writer that makes it to the self-sustaining zone takes the source of income from another author that is in the zone?

I would say no. An author can't take that income from anyone else. All they can do is to persuade the reader to buy their books. It is the reader's money until the reader decides where to spend it.

This means that it is in the publisher's best interest to limit the number of titles on the market.

If there were one publisher, yes. But with multiple publishers, they want to shove the other publishers books off the shelves. Look at Coke and Pepsi, they put out so many variations of their products, and one of the reasons they do this is to dominate shelf space.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

"The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing; every one must be an author; some out of vanity, to acquire celebrity and raise up a name, others for the sake of mere gain."
Martin Luther

It is ironic. Luther was complaining about the same printing press that allowed him to radically transform religion in Europe. There were many in Europe at the time that looked at Martin Luther's books and had much the same complaints.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

I would say no. An author can't take that income from anyone else. All they can do is to persuade the reader to buy their books. It is the reader's money until the reader decides where to spend it.

If I would have otherwise bought a book from author A, but now I'm buying a book from author B, then author A loses a source of income to author B.

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

If there were one publisher, yes. But with multiple publishers, they want to shove the other publishers books off the shelves. Look at Coke and Pepsi, they put out so many variations of their products, and one of the reasons they do this is to dominate shelf space.

If their interest would have been shoving the other publishers off the shelf they would have lowered the book prices. Coke and Pepsi dominate the shelves especially when they have sales.

[StephenM]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

Professional, to me, means that you are paid to do it. Not that it constitutes the majority of your income.

A good many people in the USA work two jobs. It would be fallacious to say that their second jobs makes them not a professional at it. (Indeed, how many professional models, actors, comedians, etc. joke that they aren't going to quit their day job?) It would especially be fallacious to argue that a 2-job worker is not a professional at either because neither job constitutes a "majority" share of the income.

I agree completely. All that is required is that you earned something for your writing efforts.

Here in Canada, an athlete can only be considered an amateur if he/she earns less than a certain amount, and that amount is not enough to live on. But anything earned above that amount in a year means that the person is now a professional athlete. If I recall, the amount is somewhere around $14,000 per annum. The same concept would apply to others as well. Earn money from your artistic endeavours, and you are a professional. Earn a lot of money, and you are a very fortunate professional.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

If I would have otherwise bought a book from author A, but now I'm buying a book from author B, then author A loses a source of income to author B.

Author A may have lost sales, but author B didn't take anything from author A. The reader did. If I make a better mousetrap than someone else, I haven't taken anything away from anyone.

If their interest would have been shoving the other publishers off the shelf they would have lowered the book prices. Coke and Pepsi dominate the shelves especially when they have sales.

That is one way to compete. Another way to dominate the shelves is to have more products. By putting out many titles, you can potentially get as much of the pie as you can.