Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
What makes you believe that? The BPHs are all reporting extremely healthy profits, AFAIK. I see no sign of "withering". Did you have anything specific in mind?
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Sorry if I wasn't clear:
The linked article (from the "woe is us" school of publishing insiders) claims that big-publishing's cash cow is slowly dying. Being squeezed to death by Amazon. (Bestseller, these days, being anything that can muster 20,000 sales?) His claim, not mine. I just summed it up as "withering".
Note that I said *may* be withering, because I'm skeptical myself but I see no reason or need to dispute the industry "insider" assertion as, true or not, it is still proof the industry has Amazon on the brain and all the angst over Amazon's disruptive retailing moves willfully neglects the other, more significant, disruptive moves from other sources.
In my book *if* traditional publishing dies, it won't be Amazon that kills it.
To me, the biggest threat to traditional publishers isn't Amazon; it's Konrath.
We have a reasonably successful mid-list author who was *dumped* by his traditional publisher because of declining print sales (at a time of general print sales decline) who went self-pub and is now regularly trumpetting his success as proof the *established* mid-list authors don't need a publisher and can drastically boost their income by going self-pub. His most recent report of raking in over US$3000 daily--an annualized rate of over $1 million--is bound to rattle some cages. (The best revenge is outliving them?)
Similarly, I see the moves by Open Road and Mysterious Publishing with backlist content as more significant than Amazon amassing a few dozen prominent titles for their inhouse imprints. Amazon is just bringing new content to market that would have otherwise gone to another house; no real difference than if it had gone to some other start-up publisher.
Open Road and the other backlist-focused ventures are instead bringing new *money* to established authors through their backlist.
One could argue Amazon is playing by traditional rules, just adjusting royalties, while the new houses are attacking the core idea that up-front money/sales is what matters. Once word gets out that even mid-list back-catalog titles can bring in six and seven figure revenue, the traditional publishers are *really* going to see a royalty-rate revolt.
That is why I said that whether or not the traditional publishers are withering or not doesn't matter; their dated business model is already being replaced by a new one by smaller, leaner publishers that accept that the future is e-book first, e-book always.
And instead of doing something rational, most (though not all: Carina comes to mind) of the traditional houses are obsessed with supporting their short-term revenue with price-fixing, e-rights shennanigans, and dated royalty rates. Plus lots of posturing (Hachette memo) and angsting (the above-quoted "insider" tale of woe.
I don't doubt the BPHs are reporting good revenue on a quarterly basis any more than I doubt the "insider" report. Both are quite compatible given corporate bean-counters' ability to move money around on a short-term basis.
The real question is how long they can keep the game going with the same old business model. At some point, they'll have to pay the piper. Or face their own Konraths...