Self-Publishing and the “Q-word”
It’s been fascinating to watch the growth of the number of self-published authors and with it the number of service providers springing up to support them (think every thing from Amazon’s CreateSpace and Lulu to Bublish, BookPulse, and the legions of freelance copyeditors).
A recent post by Eugenia Williamson in the Boston Phoenix.com called “The Dead-End of DIY Publishing“ caused a bit of a dust-up over the future of self-publishing and whether it was really a viable option for authors who wanted to get their work to readers and make some sort of meaningful income. The discussion got picked up by Porter Anderson at “Writing On Ether,” bringing more light to the conversation (thanks to Porter) and more heat (thanks to most of the folks offering comments).
I’ve noticed in these and other debates about the value of self-publishing that it’s more than a bit emotionally charged and the premises of the discussion are not very well defined. I’d like to suggest a few that I hope most reasonable people can agree on:
- For an author, it’s always better to have one’s work available to readers; better yet, to actually have it read; and better still, to have it paid for.
- The value that traditional publishers can provide to most authors is diminishing every day, as more and more bricks-and-mortar bookstores close. After all, the single most important thing traditional publishers did (and do) is to get their authors books into physical stores. With the advent of profoundly powerful direct marketing tools like social media, email marketing, content marketing, and pay-per-click online advertising, the marketing value of getting physical books into physical bookstores goes down and down.
- Fewer books (whether traditional or self-published) are being purchased than in recent years. (I exclude here dramatically under-priced or near-free books that are intended to prime the market for the authors work). The data from all major retailers on units sold is down a bit.
- The number of books being published, in print or eBook form, has sky-rocketed (from 300,000 to 3 million in 2010). Porter offered the following data via Laura Dawson‘s (of Bowker): “In 1998, there were roughly 900,000 active titles listed in Books in Print. And today there are 32 million.” It used to be that the creation of a book and its distribution were something only traditional publishers could do effectively. Now these processes are trivial.
- The number of people paying for books is not going up. And this is the nub of it, to my way of thinking: regardless of how your work is published, the likelihood of getting paid for what you write has gone down and will continue to go down. Why?–same number of eyeballs, but vastly more books.
While maybe we can all basically agree about the above, what no one wants to talk about is the “Q” word: quality. Self-published authors and the folks who supply them with services for a fee may disagree, but the traditional gatekeepers—agents, acquiring editors, publishers—are in the business of discerning quality and monetizing it. I’m not saying they’re always right–far from it, in fact. But all the rejection letters of worthy books don’t alter the fact that these traditional gatekeepers were and are better guarantors of quality than the authors themselves.
Regardless of who ascertains the quality of the content, the fundamental question facing authors, publishers, and agents is how to connect people with quality content in an era of profound content abundance. Lots of people will argue that “the cream always rises to the top.” I’d counter that publishers and authors – to extent the metaphor – are now swimming around in a vat of milk that is growing so quickly it is starting to make their books look more like tiny specks floating on the surface.
For any of us who care about quality books—that they continue to be written, read, and paid for—the issue isn’t who published a given title or how but how prospective readers can trust that it is of quality worth paying for and reading. Whatever you think about the filter of traditional publishing, it helped assure prospective readers that the book was worth its cover price. What we need is a very different way of demonstrating quality.
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6 Responses to “Self-Publishing and the “Q-word””
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Peter: I’ve been reading your pieces of late and finding them thoughtful, provocative, informed, and civil. Making them rather extraordinary amid the noise. This one is particularly lucid. The simple fact is that it is very hard to write a good book. Just as it is very hard to bring a good piece of work to the attention of its potential audience. Only the tiniest percentage of practitioners can do both well, which is why the selling infrastructure (agents, publishers, booksellers) grew up around the community of writers, leaving them free to do what they (should) do best.
Unfortunately, as is the case with most human constructs, the infrastructure grew to elephantine proportions — becoming the driver of the marketplace, rather than its servant — just at the same time that ascendant technology made that infrastructure’s so-called competencies irrelevant.
What we need is a new set of skills and professionals surrounding the writer — to perform the same task as the old set: to bring the best work to the attention of its intended audience. You put it very well above.
One further note. Like you, I don’t subscribe to the theory that the cream rises to the top of its own accord. One need only read THE SWERVE to understand how easily great work can be neglected and sometimes even lost forever. Fashion, greed, religion, ideology, laziness — all conspire to drown good work. We must guard against passivity in the face of the sea of garbage that threatens to engulf us and be unafraid to point to the good and the true. As you so often do.
Paul Kozlowski
Thank you, PK, for your kind words and for your contribution to the conversation. I really loved “Swerve,” because it demonstrates the shear serendipity that has gone into shaping culture. I rather wish that Lucretius had had his day in the sun.
In terms of the dynamics of self- and traditional publishing, your comment about publishing infrastructure “becoming the driver of the marketplace, rather than its servant” is interesting. I wonder, regardless of who does the driving, who decides where to go, that is what is worthy of being published. I think the argument that many self-published authors would offer is that traditional publishing rejects many works of great merit, which is certainly true.
I think the overarching issue isn’t whether cream rises to the top or not, but the ratio of quality to “not-so-much” and how that influences the likely hood that quality content can be discovered. This is an issue all of us should care about: readers, writers, publishers, etc.
Thanks again, PK, for your comments. Please join in any time!
Peter Turner
The realities you outline here can be difficult to swallow. Worse, watching some of the bad decision making that has occurred as a result of panicked publishers staring these truths in the eye, is frustrating. In some cases, I believe publishers have contributed to this decline in quality by publishing books that do not meet their traditionally high standards. They would do better to hunker down and play to their strengths. One need only look to long form journalism as an example of how the marketplace slowly turns back toward quality once it has fully recognized its absence. Yes, it’s a slow turn, but it is coming in journalism and it will come in book publishing as well. Then, the question will be which publishers have maintained the editorial and production talent, the relationships with authors, and clear minded focus on quality to take advantage of that inevitable reawakening among the reading public.
Kathy Meis
Thank you, Kathy, for your comments and your insights from the perspective of a former journalist. Just to be clear, I’m not saying there are less books of quality being written. I’m guessing that there are more than ever. The problem is that these quality books are floating on an ever-growing sea of poorly written, poorly edited, stuff–much free or cheap.
Peter Turner
Thank you for the clarification Peter. I completely grasp what you are saying and hope you are correct about more quality books being written than ever. I am not so confident. The point I wish to make is simply that self publishers are not the only group filling the vat of milk. In this time of immense economic pressure, some publishers have resorted to not only offering the tiny specs of quality floating atop the vat of milk, but rushed to market and helped fill the vat with milk. As someone who has immense respect for the collective editorial talent of the publishing industry, it is a worrisome trend with negative and far-reaching implications. I’m really enjoying your blog posts Peter. They’re incisive and thought provoking. Keep ‘em coming!
Kathy Meis
I quite agree,Kathy that quality, as a watch word, has seen better days in traditional publishing.
Peter Turner