just because you have written a book does not make you an author

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by moonshot

Anyone can write a book but not everyone can write a good book, and it seems as though the weeds are getting into the flower beds.

Always been that way. The carefully pruned and tended garden you're getting all nostalgic about and protective of never existed.

People were dismissing genre fiction (even the stuff published by 'real' authors with hardcovers under their belts and everything!) long before ebooks and indies were around.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Writing makes you an author. Even this post makes *me* an author.

Anybody who creates anything, is an author.

So by your definition, we are all authors. This devalues the word so much as to make it meaningless.

We're all authors if we write an e-mail, we're all singers if we warble in the shower, we're all artists if we doodle on a scratch pad, we're all decorators if we move the living room sofa a few feet this way or that, we're all CEOs if we manage a household. It's silly and pointless.

It's only if you actually make money doing the particular job that you can anoint yourself with the title and have it mean something.

[QuantumIguana]

It's not terribly difficult to find good books. If you need someone else to tell you what books are good, there are a number or sources that will offer you their opinion; pick one or two sources that you trust and read what they tell you.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Always been that way. The carefully pruned and tended garden you're getting all nostalgic about and protective of never existed.

People were dismissing genre fiction (even the stuff published by 'real' authors with hardcovers under their belts and everything!) long before ebooks and indies were around.

Popular fiction has always been popular, that's why they call it popular. It's often derided, and it is not uncommon for what was once lowbrow to be remembered as a classic while the formerly highbrow is forgotten.

[moonshot]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

In all three cases the requirement is to have earned 'x' amount of money over a single calendar year,

At least that is a line in the sand I could agree with.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by moonshot

At least that is a line in the sand I could agree with.

If you wrote a book, you're an author. You may wish that authors that you don't like would go away, but it's just not going to happen.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Catlady

So by your definition, we are all authors. This devalues the word so much as to make it meaningless.

We're all authors if we write an e-mail, we're all singers if we warble in the shower, we're all artists if we doodle on a scratch pad, we're all decorators if we move the living room sofa a few feet this way or that, we're all CEOs if we manage a household. It's silly and pointless.

It's only if you actually make money doing the particular job that you can anoint yourself with the title and have it mean something.

You're correct: being an author means nothing. Being a photographer means nothing either; as soon as you pick up a camera, you are one. By definition, you would be an "author" because of writing a post on this forum, or a "singer" because you sing in the shower, but as you say, it's a meaningless use of the word.

I took pictures for fun starting in 2003, and starting in 2005, I did freelance work up until 2010. I earned money doing that. Now, I only take pictures for fun again. Have I been a photographer between 2005 and 2010 only?

In my opinion, you can call yourself an author/photographer/musiscian/artist/whatever as soon as you are consiously trying to create (or in the case of a musiscian, performing) a meaningful body of work.

[moonshot]

Originally Posted by Catlady

So by your definition, we are all authors. This devalues the word so much as to make it meaningless.

We're all authors if we write an e-mail, we're all singers if we warble in the shower, we're all artists if we doodle on a scratch pad, we're all decorators if we move the living room sofa a few feet this way or that, we're all CEOs if we manage a household. It's silly and pointless.

It's only if you actually make money doing the particular job that you can anoint yourself with the title and have it mean something.

I agree.

I am the author of my shopping list.

[Katsunami]

By definition, you are.

If it's useful or not to be called an author as in "has created a meaningful piece of writing" (apart from listing your groceries) is a completely different question.

Let's say... you have someone who has a personal blog, and he writes about e-readers. He posts 4 articles a day, testing and reviewing e-readers and applications. He does it because he finds it a fun way to spend his free time beside a day job.

Is that person an author now? Using your point of view, that person is not.

Now, that site is bought by a large company, and that same person keeps posting 4 articles a day, testing different e-readers and applications. The only difference is that he is now paid $500 for his trouble. He still needs to keep his day job.

Is that person an author now? In your point of view, he would be, because he earns $6.000 a year now, posting those articles, despite doing nothing different or extra; so, solely earning money makes him an author, or not.

That's not logical. There are quite some (classic) authors/painters/musicians/artists that didn't make a dime on anything they created.

[moonshot]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

By definition, you are.

If it's useful or not to be called an author as in "has created a meaningful piece of writing" (apart from listing your groceries) is a completely different question.

Let's say... you have someone who has a personal blog, and he writes about e-readers. He posts 4 articles a day, testing and reviewing e-readers and applications. He does it because he finds it a fun way to spend his free time beside a day job.

Is that person an author now? Using your point of view, that person is not.

Now, that site is bought by a large company, and that same person keeps posting 4 articles a day, testing different e-readers and applications. The only difference is that he is now paid $500 for his trouble. He still needs to keep his day job.

Is that person an author now? In your point of view, he would be, because he earns $6.000 a year now, posting those articles, despite doing nothing different or extra; so, solely earning money makes him an author, or not.

That's not logical. There are quite some (classic) authors/painters/musicians/artists that didn't make a dime on anything they created.

He is a reviewer. Before the internet if a person said they were an author the next question would be 'what have you had published?'

Now you can miss out the word 'had'. And what you have is self confessed authors.

[Prestidigitweeze]

It's a mistake to attribute intrinsic merit to an arbitrary marker like a hardbound edition or an author's having taken the conventional publishing route. Instead of talking about legitimate and illegitimate writers, let's talk about good and bad ones.

There's something to be said for a writer who maneuvers their way past the panoply of barriers to conventional publishing, and something to consider in the possibility that someone who self-publishes might have been too lazy or egotistical to take the harder track.

But there have been putrid books released by major publishers and life-changing classics that were originally published by vanity presses. The quality of any of those books is down to the individual writer's talent and resolve, not the particular publishing approach that allowed their work to be noticed.

If a writer proves to be an attention-seeking amateur, we can usually tell right off. That writer doesn't represent the important opportunity that self-publishing offers to everyone: the chance for new kinds of writers to be read -- writers whose work is so odd, difficult or conventionally unacceptable that it would never have been presented to us otherwise.

Small presses are often gateways between mainstream and self-publishing, and many of the great writers of the 20th century would have remained unknown to us without small presses.

In the 21st century, I think the same thing might prove true of web sites that promote writers who self-publish e-books.

[Ken.Hagdal]

Originally Posted by moonshot

To me unless an author has had their book published in hardback they are not authors, they are people who have written a book.

Just anyone can publish in hardcover. They just have to register as a publisher (sole proprietor will do. Takes only a couple of forms to fill out) and use Lightning Source. For less than $200 all included, it gives you access to worldwide distribution.

[Lin2412]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

By definition, you are.

If it's useful or not to be called an author as in "has created a meaningful piece of writing" (apart from listing your groceries) is a completely different question.

Let's say... you have someone who has a personal blog, and he writes about e-readers. He posts 4 articles a day, testing and reviewing e-readers and applications. He does it because he finds it a fun way to spend his free time beside a day job.

Is that person an author now? Using your point of view, that person is not.

Now, that site is bought by a large company, and that same person keeps posting 4 articles a day, testing different e-readers and applications. The only difference is that he is now paid $500 for his trouble. He still needs to keep his day job.

Is that person an author now? In your point of view, he would be, because he earns $6.000 a year now, posting those articles, despite doing nothing different or extra; so, solely earning money makes him an author, or not.

That's not logical. There are quite some (classic) authors/painters/musicians/artists that didn't make a dime on anything they created.

*Stands up, slow claps*
This is the explanation I am mostly agreeing with. The author tag in an individual is definitely what I consider something honorable, profession-wise. Personally, I've usually considered someone being an author if he/she has written a book by any type (ebook / hard bound), nothing plagiarized, and is passionate about their work. That's enough for me.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by moonshot

He is a reviewer. Before the internet if a person said they were an author the next question would be 'what have you had published?'

Now you can miss out the word 'had'. And what you have is self confessed authors.

Now you're playing word games.

What have you had published means the same as What have you published. You just want to ignore anyone who self publishes. Fine. Just means you'll miss out on self published authors like the list fjtorres provided at the beginning of this thread and many more that are self publishing today.

I'm still trying to figure out exactly the point of this conversation. Are you trying to convince us that the only real authors are those that use the traditional channels. If so, I think you're failing.

[Kumabjorn]

Forgive a non-native budding in, but isn't this really about the difference between terms like Author - Writer - Scribe - Wordsmith - Essayist? I'm never quite shure where the lines are drawn.

[Prestidigitweeze]

In a way, this is an absurdly literal gloss on what Truman Capote meant when he said, "That's not writing; it's typing."

Many other writers have said the same sort of thing, but it has to do with someone's taste and abilities, not the mechanics of their being an author or having been published.

The same is true when people say that someone is "not professional": The person being criticized is often a professional in the literal sense. People are implying that the person's behavior is not worthy of the profession.

This thread might have turned out differently if the title had read, "Being Published Doesn't Mean That You Can Write."