Steve Jordan: In regards to your first post, POD and Pay to Publish (PTP) already do that. And the current system is just fine as is. It's doing exactly what it was designed to do. IE, It's taking the dreks (as one person called them) and pushing them to the bottom of the stack while (in most cases) pushing the cream to the top. The only thing they really need to do is to change how the filtering process works. IE, instead of taking submissions, they should just let all authors start out in PTP or POD, wait and see how they do, and if they do good, sign them. Same with agents. It'll reduce the publisher and agent workload by leaps and bounds while ensuring that only the "good" authors get picked up. Right now the workload at the publishing houses is causing too many "dreks" to get through because the editors are overworked.
At least that's my idea. Now whether anyone would do that remains to be seen. One thing for certain, it'll make those wanting to hit the top work harder and get better, which in the end benefits us all. It'll also make the wannabes who only want stuff handed to them and don't want to work for their spot at the top just up and quit, leaving room for better authors.
That's just my 2c.