Quote:
Originally Posted by charlesatan
Depends on what you mean by the Economics (for me, they are actually similar but I view them as businesses rather than some holy grail of print or eBook is sacred/art) but definitely there are pros and cons for each and the best route to take depends on the situation (and neither is it an either-or proposition).
|
They are business decisions and like most business decisions, the path chosen dictates how revenue arrives:
Trad pub is all about quick up-front revenues: the advance, the first few months after launch. Once sales slow down, the low royalties (especially on ebooks) means author revenue slows to very low levels for most authors. Especially if the contract hasn't earned-out, the ebook long tail accrues mostly to the publisher.
Self-pub forgoes the advance for the higher royalties and a "fatter" long tail so it keeps on delivering revenue to the autor (more or less) indefinitely.
As Lois McMaster Bujold's Mark Vorkosigan might put it: in the best case scenarios, Trad pub is "get rich quick" while self pub is "get rich big".
(Worst case scenario is nobody buys, of course.
)