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Originally Posted by DiapDealer
No, it's not nothing. It just happens to be irrelevant in this case. I love everything about books: hearing about them, researching them, finding them, buying them, reading them (and reading about them), talking about them, tweaking them, etc... I enjoy the entire process. I've always done a ton of vetting before deciding to commit to reading a particular book, and I don't consider that process at all onerous. In fact, I enjoy it. So a "competence check" isn't something extra I have to do all-of-a-sudden. It's just something that my normal vetting process would likely weed out anyway. I've never felt that books I love should just fall into my lap from the heavens. And since competence is no consolation to me for books I dislike, I fail to see why incompetent works (that won't likely find their way through my vetting process anyway) being published should stress me. Cream rises.
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Ah, well...some of that certainly makes sense to me. I admit I'm not as diligent as you (at least, I haven't been...the new-normal is changing that for me) in pre-screening books to read. I'll look at a cover, of course, but then review the description, read the first 1200 words or so, and if I think it will float my boat, I'll try it.
I don't want anyone to think I'm painting all self-pubs or small imprints with the same brush--I'm not. But this attitude, that it's okay to publish a book, for sale, sans any sort of competent editing (whether done by the author himself, or a third party) just irks the crap out of me.
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I don't really know, to tell the truth. "No," I guess?  I just know that incompetence isn't something I typically have to worry about when paying for anything. I've always been a careful person. I'm a very caveat emptor to kind of guy. If incompetent hacks want to hang out shingles and see if they can get any bites, it's no sweat off my back. *shrug*
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In general, yes, I admit, it irks me. FWIW, it also infuriates me to see incompetently-formatted eBooks that some author paid some bozo to format, too. I guess I'm not wild about incompetence masquerading as a commercially-viable service or product, in
any form. I'm an EEO disliker, :-).
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Not really my bailiwick. I'm one of those rare readers who have absolutely zero aspirations to write (and I don't quite follow how it relates to the question at hand), but I'll bite ...
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Wasn't the question at hand about whether or not we preferred a book to be published, or not, sans proper editing? Did I miss a seque in the thread? My comparison was simply about the expectations we have, for a product for which we've paid. Seemed a reasonable comparison? No?
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I'd be unhappy. I wouldn't pay for such work. Just like I wouldn't pay (as a reader) for an incompetently prepared ebook. But (and here's how I'll bring this back to the topic at hand) I wouldn't ask you to fire Jane. Nor would I expect you to black-ball Jane so that she could never try to get paid for doing that type of work ever again.
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I don't think I
ever said I'd blackball Jane, or any author foolish enough to publish sans competent editing. Did I?
Granted, I'd probably not buy another book by Jane the author, not without good reason to think that she'd overcome her no-editing-handicap. I mean, right up there with caveat emptor is ye olden "fool me once..." eh?
(n.b.: back in 2010, I
did have an author client, that claimed to teach graphic design at a local community college, DEMAND that I fire one of my bookmakers, for using a sans-serif font for headings with a serif body, in an eBook layout. Literally SCREAMED at us, in writing. I ended up firing him as a client, because while a client can scream at me, if they wish, calling a crewmember a moron is out of bounds. I wonder if he's actually seen a book in the last decade, given how common that layout is now? Anyway, I digress...)
Hitch