Self-publishing is only going to get bigger: deal with it

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

In many ways, the Internet simply put a press in every home, democratizing it's reach.

Now anyone can publish anything and get immediate worldwide distribution. (And that's just a web page.)

Indeed. And it's not just "amateurs" looking for exposure that are taking advantage of internet-based frictionless distribution. Back during the last Hollywood writers strike, Joss Whedon and friends (all established industry pros) kept busy with a web-only videoseries, DR HORRIBLE' S SING ALONG BLOG, that won massive acclaim, awards, and a fair amount of revenue through DVD sales even though it is (still) freely available via YouTube.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Hor...ing-Along_Blog

Right now, a similar effort is under way in the form of CAPER, a delightful superhero series from established producer Amy Berg and a cast of established actors that has totally bypassed the Hollywood establishment to bring the series pilot directly to audiences.

Veteran TV writer and producer Amy Berg co-created the superhero comedy "Caper" as an online series on the Geek & Sundry Channel -- on both YouTube and Hulu -- to show that not only can superheroes be shown as more than just comic book stereotypes, but the show itself could break the rules set by big networks

At a planned 9 episodes of 11 minutes, CAPER is obviously headed for a compiled DVD release.
I'll be buying.
Hopefully, so will others and even better, I hope NETFLIX or HULU choose to fund a full season or three of this project.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

I'm now firmly convinced that Michael Kozlowski and moonshot are one and the same person. Michael's post (inside jftorres' first link) surprisingly echoes much of what our own moonshot advocates.

I'm not. Moonshot is a better writer, which is to say he/she can actually string a half-decent sentence together.

[latepaul]

More on the topic of this thread, it occurs to me that the so-called "ebook discovery problem" is only a problem for the publishers/authors. Readers don't have a problem finding books to read. It's true some paranoid types might lie awake worrying about the possible gems hidden in the various slush piles that comprise the lower ranks of the online retailers. However most of us realise that there's far more available to read in what is easily "discoverable" than we can ever get through.

And the retailers aren't really worried about discovery. If readers can figure out what they want to read - and they can, see above - then all the retailers need to do is put it in front of them, make the experience somewhat easy/pleasant/cheap and they should make money. From Amazon's point of view the "hidden gem" book is not a problem it's an asset. Because it's an ebook they can list it at virtually zero cost and if it should get discovered they can make some money off it, if not then there are plenty of others to sell instead.

But for the author and/or publisher it's very important to get discovered. For them it is getting harder to get noticed and that is a problem. But so much talk about "discovery" focuses on it as if it's a reader or retailer problem when it's not and there's really not much incentive for either of those two groups to care about it.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

...self-publishing tends to be concentrated, and even confined, to a few genres -- mostly those where research is unimportant and books gain traction without favorable signed mainstream media reviews.

Well, of course.
Indie publishing is all about money.
It's *all* about commercial genre books.
(Or, if you want to sound all insider-like, consumer trade publishing economics.)
(And, of course, all publishing is about money, in the end. )

Authors take on the added functions of a publisher because it makes economic sense to do so. And it makes more sense in the high volume commercial genres like romance, mystery and thrillers, and SF&F, where reader purchases are price constrained so that by bypassing the gatekeepers authors can set lower retail prices and come out ahead thanks to the higher margins of indie publishing. It also makes enormous sense in genres that are vastly underserved by the establishment, like erotica.

Conversely, it makes less sense for genres where sales are inherently low and/or depend on validation by acclaim (awards and such), like litfic, or authoritativeness, as in self-help and non-fiction, to sell. Indie publishing such titles would undoubtedly increase the author's margin but at the cost of the validation conferred by the establishment. And since sales volume in those genres isn't price dependent but rather depends on that validation those authors can't really choose the Indie road until the review and awards establishment worldview changes. Which won't be soon. Most likely, they'll have to wait for the current generation of authoritative validators dies off.

Indie publishing is flourishing because the economics of genre publishing are changing in ways that no longer depend or even require the strengths of traditional publishing houses. Or, more telling, no longer require tolerating the *limitations* of traditional publishers in time to market, formats, genre boundaries, release schedules and what-not. In today's world getting DUNE to market wouldn't require years to find a publisher willing to bet on a giant unitary novel set in some undefined future that drops readers in an unknown culture with neither a guide nor a dictionary. Instead, he could have simply hired a professional editor, picked out a generic desert pic from creative commons, and released the book to slowly build an audience by review and word of mouth, which is *exactly* what Chilton (a publisher of automotive catalogs, not a bastion of literature) did for him. Different times.

The fact that indie publishing is so well attuned to the needs and skills of genre authors is reflected in the extent of its penetration into the genre markets; knowledgeable observers would expect deeper penetration in price-constrained markets where series of relatively short works are predominant and where author treatment and royalties are notoriously poor. One would expect second-tier traditional publishers dependent on genre titles to feel the impact of the new market realities long before the highly diversified multinational monsters like the Randy Penguin. And, not surprisingly, that is exactly what we're seeing: Harlequin is (deservedly) in outright decline and Kensington's Kozlowski is freaked out, running around looking to delegitimize indie titles and authors, or at least ghetto-ize them, trying to turn back the clock.
On the other hand, the multinationals are still doing killer business off the strength of their legacy brand name authors, as demonstrated by Hachette and its latest financial report, propped up by books from authors who made their name (and fortunes) before the indie publishing evolution.

http://www.the-digital-reader.com/20...total-revenue/

From the tone of the email it would seem that Hachette success was attributed less to good business and more to having picked the right best sellers:

HBG profit “was significantly higher than 2012, thanks to several bestsellers,” states Lagardère’s press release. CEO Michael Pietsch said, “following a challenging 2012, 2013 was a strong year for HBG, with 6% growth in net sales and higher growth in profit.” HBG’s digital sales were up 33% over the prior year, and represent 30% of the company’s overall sales. HBG broke its bestseller record in 2013, with 206 print and 84 ebook titles on the New York Times bestseller list, including 52 #1 bestsellers. The major releases driving the company’s sales for 2013 include THE CUCKOO’S CALLING by Robert Galbraith (J.K. Rowling), THE LONGEST RIDE by Nicholas Sparks, ALEX CROSS, RUN by James Patterson and David Ellis, DAVID AND GOLIATH by Malcolm Gladwell, THE HIT by David Baldacci, THE GOLDFINCH by Donna Tartt, and I AM MALALA by Malala Yousafzai.

When people talk of traditional publishers "dying" they aren't really talking of the corporate giants, those will be with us long after they stop publishing anything but celebrity bestsellers. Rather, it is the second and third tier publishers that are at risk of dying or having to sell themselves to the multinationals. The current era of consolidation isn't going to be limited to glass tower gang but will instead mostly decimate every other traditional publisher between them and the "art house" niche players. And the reason for this is that, outside the BPHs, it is genre books that pay the bills in between the occasional "lottery winner" releases.

Indie publishing may be "only" about commercial genre titles but those commercial genre titles is where the money is. And without that money, the dominoes start to wobble.

[fjtorres]

And, speaking of how Indie publishing is destroying the world, here's a view from the litfic camp:

http://thefutureofpublishing.com/201...ing-ecosystem/

How Can Prize-Winning Books Remain Invisible?

Here’s my next datapoint. The Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA) is a not-for-profit membership association serving the independent publishing community. Among their numerous activities they’ve offered the Benjamin Franklin Awards for print books for some time now. They have recently added the Benjamin Franklin Digital Awards to honors innovation in electronic book publishing by individuals and organizations of all sizes. I’m all for it. IBPA is a good trade group and they work hard for their membership. The books that received awards were mostly published in 2013. I made a spreadsheet of the winners. I took each title and found its Amazon Kindle sales ranking (several of the titles also had print editions, but I didn’t include that data). Here’s what I found (rather than attaching specific sales numbers to specific titles let me offer averages): 593,710 was the average sales position of the winning titles on Amazon, varying from about 200,000 to about 1.7 million in the listings. One title, “His Dream, Our Stories” (a book commemorating “The 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech) had hit #8,147 on the bestseller list. But it’s free. The book looks great, but free sure helps move quantities. (Two of the 12 titles had never been listed on Amazon. I don’t know why. ) It’s hard to say exactly what a bestseller is on Amazon because its rating system is based on sales velocity at any one time rather than on overall sales. Gernerally speaking when I see a title at 10,000 or lower I think it a success. Once it slips below 100,000 it has usually fallen into nowhere land.
My point is simple: A reputable publishing group offers awards to some of its best titles yet can’t really move the needle on those books’ sales. If these awards can’t help sales, what can? For this I damn Amazon. Who are they trying to help besides their own ruthless firm? If this is how we must paint the future, I’ll take my pictures from the past. The industry’s worship of this firm makes me ill.

A lot more at the source.
Including some... interesting... math.

It's a fun read, really.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by latepaul

. But so much talk about "discovery" focuses on it as if it's a reader or retailer problem when it's not and there's really not much incentive for either of those two groups to care about it.

All the talk of "discovery problems" is baloney.

Readers don't have a discovery problem: publishers have a marketing problem.
Long ago they stopped actually marketing anything but the most prominent of expected bestsellers and outsourced the job of promoting books to the retailers.
It was all about "stock it and it will sell". And if not... Well that's what returns were for.
Other than front table payola, the publishers and B&M retailers simply don't know how to market anything but bestsellers.

Of course, the retailer that must not be named has no problem coming up with deal of the day, deals of the month, countdown timers (probably patented by now), lending libraries, bundles, and assorted marketing tricks, so their customers don't worry about discovering appealing reads: only about finding the money to buy them and living long enough to read them all.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

And, speaking of how Indie publishing is destroying the world, here's a view from the litfic camp:

http://thefutureofpublishing.com/201...ing-ecosystem/



A lot more at the source.
Including some... interesting... math.

It's a fun read, really.

I don't think this has *anything* to do with the litfic "camp"; it's the view from the indie publishing camp, which doesn't seem to produce much litfic.

In answer to the author's question, though:

My point is simple: A reputable publishing group offers awards to some of its best titles yet can’t really move the needle on those books’ sales. If these awards can’t help sales, what can?

the answer is fairly easy. Don't have *55* categories and give awards in each one. (Maybe it's 54 categories, I kind of lost count). That's not really an award as much as it is a publicity move: they are creating awards that only independently published books can win, *and* they are creating so many awards (55 per year) that a lot of books are going to be "award winners." (And by creating a "digital" award, they've added even more). There is *one* Booker prize each year, and it isn't limited to members of a particular trade group. Other prizes may distinguish between a few categories (fiction/nonfiction/international, typically) - but not 50+.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

The market for SF was very limited in those days: 2-3 magazines and essentially zero books. In those early days the editors valued high concept "scientific" ideas and scenarios over story. A lot of the same writers putting out the "clunky" scientifiction pulps for Amazing were also doing much better in other genres.

SF has long been constrained by the gatekeepers' preconceptions and prejudices. Even the best of editors--Campbell, Boucher, etc--had biases and expectations that make modern readers roll their eyes. Things like "SF is for boys and they won't buy stories from girls" or the near universality of two-fisted east coast WASP protagonists.

I'd say it's a tribute to the writers that so many of their stories remain relevant after a century of social change, considering the editorial constraints they faced.

(One point that is virtually universal among indie authors is the matter of control. Over the decades their lack of control over the finished product has chaffed even more than the predatory contract terms; the contracts being universally bad, while the quality and quantity of gatekeeper support was essentially random luck.)

Most old Sci Fi was short stories back in the day I think like you said and of course it didn't pay very well either from what I understand. a penny or two a word which meant that the writer's had to keep on typing away in order to make enough money to survive (if they could make a living just writing). Dr. Asimov was a college chemistry professor back when he did a lot of his early writing. So you had writers who didn't make a of of money, slow typewriters and writers who had to have day jobs to make ends meet.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

Don't have *55* categories and give awards in each one. (Maybe it's 54 categories, I kind of lost count).

Also, don't charge authors to be considered for the award. I can't take seriously an award like that.

Pay to play, and lots of winners, may go together, since if authors see that there is only a tiny chance of winning, they probably won't compete.

I don't think receiving a respected award would necessarily cause sales to skyrocket. But the next book would probably get mainstream media reviews and then be likely to have thousands of library sales (assuming the book is sold to libraries).

I do realize that there is a problem with funding such an award. A rich person might have to endow it. If unlikely, that's fine with me. A decline in big publishers, resulting in decreasing numbers of nonfiction book proposals being accepted, is not to me a joyous outcome.