Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Berk
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It seems to be the same false assumptions as the other one -- publishers will nurture writers and choose quality books over books that they think will make an instant profit, publishers will market books instead of expecting the writer to do it themself, publishers will correct all the spelling and grammar mistakes. I don't know if publishers ever did do any of those things or not, but they don't now.
Then he seems to think that a writer needs to sell millions of copies of a book in order to make a living, therefore you need to get it into airports and the like. That might be the case if you are only getting a tiny percentage of the income, but if you're not giving 95% of it away you wouldn't need to sell anywhere near that many.
That opens up the possibility to make a decent income from small minority interest subjects, which can only be a good thing for readers and writers alike. Katie Price's memoirs about doing nothing at all suddenly need to compete on a level field with a book about dodgy dealings within the snail racing circuit. I know which I would rather read.