Is this a horrible time to be a writer?

[Worldwalker]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

Before I joined MR, I had never heard of Steve Jordan. That's a much bigger problem than piracy. No one is going to buy a book if they don't know it exists. Once that's solved, then we can worry about piracy.

Quoted for truth.

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our pirates, but in our promotion.

This is the one big benefit of the current commercial publishing model. It's far from perfect, but it puts books where readers can find them better than any of the other available models.

Yes and no. It puts some books where the readers can find them, but at the cost of condemning other books to unpublished obscurity or the shame of the vanity press.

I read a wonderful mystery a while back -- Lacing Up for Murder (buy it and tell her to write more!) -- which I bought from BookView Cafe. According to the author, the book was rejected by mainstream print publishers. I don't know why, but it really comes down to the fact that they can only publish X number of books a year, and have to pick the X books that they (shaking their crystal balls) think will make them the most money. They don't always guess right, at least as far as my tastes are concerned. Why someone would think "Carpe Demon" was worth publishing and "Lacing Up for Murder" wasn't escapes me entirely, but someone did ... and if mainstream print publishing was the only way to sell a book, I would never have read that book which I enjoyed so much.

[starrigger]

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

Back in the print only days, how often did you see one book bought, and then passed around to 20 other people?

This reminds me that piracy was alive and well in the heyday of mass market paperbacks. Remember all the little corner shops that sold stripped paperbacks for a dime each? Piracy, pure and simple. And that was definitely piracy where someone was making money from stolen goods.

I remember once stopping at a yard sale, where I saw someone selling one of my books with the cover ripped off. It was a downer moment: first someone bought a stolen stripped copy, then they were trying to sell it for a quarter at a yard sale. But I left it there, thinking--well, maybe someone will buy it and like what they read, and become a new fan. You never know.

Success is not about how many copies you sold, or how much you earned, but rather how well you did your job, and how happy your readers are when they're done with your book. That's true success.

Very good reminder for everyone.

Steve, my advice to you is, lighten up.... Give away some of your stuff. Share it with others. Offer it DRM free.

To defend Steve, he has done all of those things. And if you look at his contributions to the board over the last year, I think you'll see that this particular expression of frustration was atypical. At least I hope that's an accurate appraisal.

That said, I agree with most of your points.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

Yes and no. It puts some books where the readers can find them, but at the cost of condemning other books to unpublished obscurity or the shame of the vanity press.

That's why I called it far from perfect, there are lots of good books that slip through the cracks; often while books many of us would consider less good get through and onto shelves.

Still, and this is despite all its faults, the commercial industry does a better job of putting the books that get into its system where readers can see them than any of the alternatives.

I'm not saying it's great: but when it comes to making readers aware of books and authors, the alternatives are worse.

[Worldwalker]

I remember, back in the day, when the closed online services (CompuServe, Delphi, GEnie, America Online, etc.) touted the ease of finding content on their services as a crushing advantage over the disorganized mess that was the Internet. That appeared, at the time, to be a decisive advantage -- until the development and popularization of the full-text search engines. Remember what a miracle Alta Vista seemed? I think the ebook ecosystem is in a similar state today, where you have your choice of using a closed service (any ebook store) or wandering around the trackless wasteland hoping to stumble over something you want to read. The rise of the search engines changed the Internet and the Web (which are not, by the way, the same thing), and someone could, at any moment, roll out whatever will do the same for ebooks.

Personally, I'm hoping for something like a public version of Amazon's recommendation system. I could train it, as I have Amazon's, by telling it that I liked Lacing Up for Murder and hated Carpe Demon, and it would cross-check to see what other users who felt the same way about those books also liked. There are systems like that for music, etc., already. Someone just has to figure out how to make one work for ebooks, and operate it independently of the content providers. I had some hope for Google doing so once, back before they realized that to run a multi-billion-dollar company, you do in fact have to at least approach being evil. But whoever does it, I think that will be the critical factor.

One thing it should do is allow the user to search for lesser-known authors (less than some floating number of recommendations, perhaps), for indie authors, and various other ways to discover something new. That's one of the things that I've enjoyed about being around MobileRead: the chance to find authors and books I would never have heard of otherwise. I'm sure there are people like me who would eagerly click on the "show me books by people I've never heard of" button.

[starrigger]

A pandora.com for ebooks.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by starrigger

A pandora.com for ebooks.

That would be great, but it would have to be open to people outside of the United States too.

We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.

[Joebill]

I know an author who writes excellent books, but because his publisher considers him 'mid level' they don't advertise him much.

So I don't think much of publishers who claim they know better than others.

Maybe they just don't like puns...

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by Steven Lake

Agreed. An income from writing is nice, I won't deny that. But it should never, ever be the primary reason for doing something. Too many people have lost that vision, always shooting for what makes them richest, not what makes them happiest. I've seen people who collect garbage who love doing it and are happy with what little they make. Well said, Moejoe.

...

And I'll say this again, I like earning a living from my books. It's sort of a monetary thank you for all my hard work and dedication. But if I never, ever earned a dime off my books, so long as people were entertained and loved the books, I'd be happy. That's the kind of attitude you need to succeed in writing. Success is not about how many copies you sold, or how much you earned, but rather how well you did your job, and how happy your readers are when they're done with your book. That's true success.

My sentiments exactly. It'd be nice to pay the power bill with my time at a computer writing, or doing anything creative with said computer. But is that my only reason for writing? No. It never has been. Probably never will be.

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

Personally, I'm hoping for something like a public version of Amazon's recommendation system. I could train it, as I have Amazon's, by telling it that I liked Lacing Up for Murder and hated Carpe Demon, and it would cross-check to see what other users who felt the same way about those books also liked. There are systems like that for music, etc., already. Someone just has to figure out how to make one work for ebooks, and operate it independently of the content providers. I had some hope for Google doing so once, back before they realized that to run a multi-billion-dollar company, you do in fact have to at least approach being evil. But whoever does it, I think that will be the critical factor.

LibraryThing tries to do something similar. And I think there may be one or two others out there, but for an indie or a self pub'd author, you may need to add yourself or have an ISBN.

[NickSpalding]

Originally Posted by jaxx6166

My sentiments exactly. It'd be nice to pay the power bill with my time at a computer writing, or doing anything creative with said computer. But is that my only reason for writing? No. It never has been. Probably never will be.

Can it ever truly be someone's motivation for writing?

I'd find it hard to maintain enthusiasm over the course of 80,000 words, if all I was thinking about was how many Aston Martin's I could buy at the end of it.

The joy of writing's about making up a story and running with it (followed by the hours upon hours of necessary editing, of course)

[Joebill]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Well, since simply saying so does not make them false, either, feel free to explain why, and we can continue to discuss it, or take one side or the other as settled and move on.

Regarding what I'm sure is your main point of contention here, you must take into account the role society plays in encouraging people to "do the right thing," as well as the documented cases of human behavior that is exhibited when society breaks down, or takes a clearly immoral turn. And again, I'm not saying all people do society's bidding, nor that all people turn into homocidal maniacs when society's back is turned. There are degrees of dishonesty, just as there are degrees of lying, and when given a moment of opportunity that seems harmless enough, many of us will pick the low-hanging fruit from the orchard as we happen by.

It is this trend, in the current lawless environment of the web, that has encouraged digital piracy in otherwise law-abiding people.

I have never engaged in such, and I never will.

I have a bachelors degree in computer programming. I don't like pirated software either.

I think a more accurate view is that some books are over priced. Note the word 'some'.

A few people I have met over the years claim that 'such pricing' is why they do it. I point out, if you don't like the pricing, don't buy it, don't pirate it. get a web site, there are still free sites out there, and post calmly why you think a price is too high.

I do feel that if a book costs too much, like some computer books I saw recently for $150.00, absolutely over-priced. I wont pirate it, I wont buy it. They knocked an entire 5 dollars off the pdf download. Absurd.

[Joebill]

Originally Posted by NickSpalding

Can it ever truly be someone's motivation for writing?

I'd find it hard to maintain enthusiasm over the course of 80,000 words, if all I was thinking about was how many Aston Martin's I could buy at the end of it.

The joy of writing's about making up a story and running with it (followed by the hours upon hours of necessary editing, of course)

I read Robert A. Heinlein's autobigraphy a few years ago.

He said he started out writing short stories, he did need to make just a few bucks. Some magazine was having a new writer's contest. Prize was $75.

It felt good when he won.

He discovered as time went by that it was like a 'monkey on his back'.

He had to write novels to assuage that monkey.

[jaxx6166]

Originally Posted by Joebill

I do feel that if a book costs too much, like some computer books I saw recently for $150.00, absolutely over-priced. I wont pirate it, I wont buy it. They knocked an entire 5 dollars off the pdf download. Absurd.

You know, I was on LuLu the other day and there were some books that people were pricing for TPB or HC at $250 USD.

These weren't trade or specialized writing. A few were actual fiction.

[ficbot]

Fwiw my dad has written a non-fiction book and he told me that in the first year, he sold 500 copies of it---and his publisher was very happy with this result and considered the book a success.

I had someone tell me that they resented being told they were greedy for expecting a greater slice of the pie of their own book. I responded that I absolutely did not think they were greedy---but I did think they were being perhaps a bit unrealistic if they truly thought they could pay their bills off a handful of indie books. I think the real threat is not piracy, it's that not enough people read very seriously. Part of that is competition from other forms of media part of it is that it's a much larger time commitment. Even someone who reads one book a month (which is a lot, comparatively) is only looking at a dozen books a year...

I'd love to see something on Smashwords (for example) where every author who uploads a book is given a screen of choices---check up to 3 boxes for genre, up to three boxes for mood, up to 3 boxes for best adjective to describe your book etc. And people could run a search for things like 'mystery AND humour' or 'paranormal AND NOT vampire' to see various choices. It would help readers find new authors and books they might enjoy.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by Joebill

I know an author who writes excellent books, but because his publisher considers him 'mid level' they don't advertise him much.

So I don't think much of publishers who claim they know better than others.

Maybe they just don't like puns...

I hate publishers. I hate them almost as much as I hate editors. And I only hate editors about a tenth as much as I hate literary agents. My hate is boundless for those wasters. I hope the whole damned system crashes into the ground.

[Joebill]

I can see a research heavy book; like details of an archeology site, an in depth study of a historical figure, pure research in some field.

But not a work of fiction, costing that much.

If it isn't a book that is old or a signed first edition, I beleive prices for fiction over $40 is just plain wrong.