WHAT IS A PUBLISHER?
I thought I would put this question as a post here, on the main page, because of an interesting discussion that went on in the comments of another post. I have always known there is a lot of confusion about what is a publisher, and exactly what a publisher does. So I figured I would try to make some sense of this.
This isn’t really a myth. Just more of an issue of confusion with all the new technologies coming into the mix.
So, in as clear a fashion as I can, let me try to lay this out.
From my trusty Oxford American Dictionary, they define a publisher as “A person or firm that issues copies of a book, magazine, etc. to the public.”
Yup, and that’s pretty much what all legal cases I have read concerning copyright and publication have come down on as a definition for publisher.
So, here I go with a new book, sending it to New York. What am I doing?
Answer: I am looking for a publisher to publish my book. Nothing more.
So say a wonderful editor working for a publisher wants to buy my book and calls me or my agent. What is next?
Answer: We negotiate the terms of the contract between me and the publisher and if we can agree on the terms, I sign the contract.
So, here comes an area that most writers don’t understand because most don’t know copyright. What have I sold that publisher?
Answer: Nothing. (If it is not an all rights or work-for-hire contract.)
That’s right, nothing. The publisher and I have come to an agreement on which rights they will license from me, for how long, and under what conditions. I haven’t sold them a thing. I just sort of rented them the use of my story for certain reasons under certain condition. I get it all back at some point, again determined by what it was agreed upon in the contract.
ARE THERE SUCH A THING AS SUB-PUBLISHERS?
The publisher I sold my work to will often have many, many sub-publishers, for lack of a better way of putting it. In your contract you might have sold them translation rights for a percentage and they then turn around and license that to a publisher in France. All within the limits of the contract you signed with the first publisher. And audio publishers, and ebook publishers and movie rights (which are a form of publication as well) and so on.
Again, you control exactly what they can and cannot do by the contract you sign. No one holds a gun to your head and tells you to sign a bad contract. And no agent is responsible for your stupidity in signing a bad contract that gives a publisher too much and too much control. Only you, as the copyright holder, can say what the publisher will or won’t do. And if you don’t like what they are requiring, don’t sign. It really is that simple.
Okay, to another way of publishing. What is being called “self-publishing.”
(And aside right here: I have always found this term silly in all respects. You see, when I think of sending a manuscript to a New York publisher, I am actually completely in control and therefore by the very act of sending it to New York, I am in essence, self-publishing. But that’s just me being silly with terms. Let me go on.)
Now, along comes secondary publishers focusing on ebooks such as Smashwords.
Just like with New York publishers, I follow some basic guidelines and send my work to Smashwords. They either accept it or not, depending on how well I am at formatting to their guidelines. (Not content questions, just formating questions in a file.)
What is the difference between Smashwords and New York publishers?
Let me see if I can detail out some of the differences between the two types of publishers.
There isn’t much, actually. These days you give your New York publisher an electronic file, you give Smashwords one as well.
In New York publishing, the publisher provides help with the proofing, the art work, the cover design, and they set up the printing and distribution.
In Smashwords, you have to do all the proofing and covers yourself. But their machines dictate the layout for the most part, just as New York publishers do.
There is quality control over content in New York. No quality control on content at all in Smashwords. It’s buyer beware.
New York publisher then sets up distribution or sells it direct themselves.
Smashwords does the same, either sets up the distribution or sells it themselves.
And just like New York, they use subpublishers as well, such as iPad and others. And there are contracts between Smashwords and iPad.
Who is the final publisher for an ebook through Smashwords?
If the copy sells on Smashwords, then they are, if it sells on iPad, then iPad is the final publisher.
Go back and look at the definition of the word “publisher” I wrote above.
If your New York publisher licenses your book to France, who is the final publisher? The French publisher, of course. If New York puts up a Kindle edition, who is the final publisher in the chain for that book sold on Kindle? Kindle, of course.
All these new technologies are just new forms of publishers, taking a cut, just as New York publishers have done for centuries.
As young authors, Kris and I set up a publishing house called Pulphouse. We published a lot of books and got far, far too big before we crashed. Any author now can set up their own publishing house, and many do. Kris and I have corporations, actually, now.
If you set up your own publishing house and contract for a POD version of your book, you will be the publisher on a copy that sells. And just like New York selling to France, if you put one of your books from your publishing house up on Kindle, Kindle will be the final publisher, the firm that publishes the book to a person.
Your company will be the originating publisher and have your name on it, but Kindle will be the final publisher, because they take the content, convert it, and sell it.
New York publishers take your content, convert it, and sell it.
Bookstores and distributors are not publishers, but only distributors of product, sort of like your cell phone or your Kindle machine or your iPad.
“A publisher is a person or firm that issues copies of a book, magazine, etc to the public.”
A New York publisher is no different from Smashwords in that respect. They are both publishers. Big difference is that Smashwords and other ebook publishers have no editor oversight, no filters that assure a certain level of quality of what is published.
And I have a hunch, in the future, there will be ways that the public and readers find to help that quality process some. But that’s not here yet and is a topic for a future post.
Now I have to hit the “publish” button and publish this, which, guess what, makes me a publisher.
Good post, Dean.
You made me think of an interesting parallel between publishers and distributors by mentioning the iPad.
I’ve never checked it out, and I might later today (I have to get ready and drive about 90 miles right now, so I can’t). But I’d be willing to bet that the Apple Store, the distributor of iPad, iPhone, iPod, etc., is a different company from Apple, the creator and manufacturer of the products, at least on paper if not in practice.
The reason is that they are two entirely different business models, and smart business people will often make a new, separate company to handle something like that. The reason? Because distributing products is different than producing them, and smart business people aren’t so arrogant that they won’t hire different people to handle those tasks, people who specialize in them.
Most of the time, when companies try to expand into entirely new areas of business like that, they fail at it, because no one on their staff knows what to do. Or worse, they hire a bunch of extra people, the business still doesn’t take off for some reason, and then the books of the core business are destroyed, and they have to lay off dozens or hundreds or thousands of people to remain solvent.
If my assumption is true, then Apple is sort of the publisher of its products (though the term is not correct for such products), and the Apple Store is the distributor. That’s true either way, actually. But if they are separate companies, then Apple has absolutely nothing to do with the distribution.
I point all this out because the real world often works much differently than it SEEMS to work. Names and brands are just that. But in practice, the Apple Store could be owned and operated by Delta Airlines, and unless we looked, we’d never know.
Dean,
I agree 100% with what you’re saying here. A lot of the confusion in our early discussion comes about as a result of me having to argue with people who want to haggle over what a “real publisher” is because they need to make me a “lesser human being” than them because I don’t have “their” type of publisher.
I shouldn’t have assumed outright that you had the same views and definitions. In fact, I’ve read here before (I just forgot) that you had a small publishing company as well at one time.
That being the case, surely you’re aware of all the people who will argue with me all day long over whether or not I’m a publisher.
A lot of people just cannot conceptualize a publisher creating their own product from start to finish. Even though in any other industry, that’s acceptable. No, self-publishers aren’t “real publishers.” It’s gotta be someone “outside you” telling you you’re “good enough.” IMO writers are all a bunch of masochists for thinking that way.
It’s one thing to choose to go the traditional publishing route if that’s what you want and meets your goals for money and distribution. It’s quite another to NEED that kind of validation to the point you’ll poop on anybody else’s efforts (regardless of the quality of those efforts) if they don’t feel the need to travel through the same gates you do. (And while you may not be like this, this is the majority attitude among traditionally published authors. I deal with it nearly every day.)
And… you know that if I were to say “I’m a published author” people would say: No, you are a SELF-published author. Because people have the need to make other people ‘lesser’ than themselves, lest someone doesn’t oooh and aaaah over how high they’ve climbed in some imagined hierarchy.
If I were to say “Smashwords is my publisher” I would be laughed at even further about how I don’t understand what a “real” publisher is.
You are in a VERY slim minority of people who will recognize what it means “to publish” and not try to layer their own personal definitions on top of it. I never in a million years imagined someone with as many trad pubbed titles under his belt would actually understand what it means to “publish,” “be published” or “be a publisher” in the strictest dictionary definition of the word.
Yup, Zoe, I sure understand. My suggestion to you. Ignore them.
Self-published is such a stupid term anyway. I have been shouting in these blogs, and I do mean SHOUTING (grin) that writers retain control over their own careers and all aspects of it. That writers understand what is in a contract, that they understand what they are selling, that they control what happens to their work. In New York, that’s possible and correct business (except for what people believe in the myths about agents and so on.)
That’s why I think the term “self-publishing” is just so damn silly. When I send a book to New York, what am I doing?
Of course, for New York, they pay me to publish my work, and I believe that New York agents should follow the growing Hollywood model in that they pay me a shopping fee if they think they can sell my book for me. I would NEVER go to a vanity press where I pay to have something published. But when I approach Kindle or Smashwords or a site like Scribd, they pay me every time they sell a book, just like New York, only without the advance. (By the way, in the early days, Fictionwise paid an advance as well.)
So Zoe, just do what you do and stop fighting the definitions. Those are changing so fast, it won’t matter in a few years anyway.
And guess what, I still have a publishing company. It just publishes my own work instead of others’ work. Still a publisher.
On a somewhat related topic, on today’s NINC blog, Judy Gill explains the difference between a publisher and a vanity press, in today’s climate where certain publishers are now steering aspiring writers who don’t understand the business from their slushpiles to their vanity scams.
http://www.ninc.com/blog/index.php/archives/published-author-title
Another useful post as always.
One related question I’ve been considering.
I’m an unpublished novelist, and I have a manuscript that I’m going to be sending out in the next few weeks. Thanks to your post, I have a much better idea of who to send it to, BTW.
Anyway, I can publish it As Is on Smashwords and get a few sales to my friends.
What I’m hoping for is that a bigger house will pick it up, and some editor will help me make it even better, and of course, that the improved version will sell well, all over the world.
Of course, having first and second versions out under the same title is messy to say the least, and I’m unclear about how copyright works when you have two versions under the same title (presumably a new title would be in order).
Comments on this? The general issue is that, if the author becomes the hub and licenses copies to publishers, what do you do with multiple versions, especially if the publishers are editing?
Under copyright law, each version is protected just as the first is, because you wrote it and it’s your work. It’s the “form” that’s protected, not what is in the form, so your edited version is protected just as much as the New York edited version. So not messy at all. In fact, there are doctrines (too complex to get into here) in copyright law that allow versions to be considered the same at certain levels. In other words, for copyright purposes, don’t worry about it.
However, you raise a much, much larger question that’s not decided yet. Will New York publishers be bothered by a personal kindle edition or even a POD edition done by the author?
Let me be clear here: I have heard every opinion on this from “that’s stupid to do” to “no problem at all.” So doing a book ahead of a New York version can flow the money a little, and if it gains great attention, it might even help with the sale. That happens. And so far almost all New York editors I have talked to don’t care. It’s not in the same scale as they deal with. And sometimes early word helps.
But again, jury is way, way out on this. So CAUTION! (If your goal is to sell it to New York.)
FOR SHORT FICTION, I would try all your top markets first before deciding to put it on epub versions. A publication on an epub version first will hurt you at the moment in SHORT FICTION.
But novels the jury is out, lots of opinions, and I have no opinion other than use caution!
Yay, we agree on something! Yeah I don’t really like the term “self-publishing” either. I “do,” however like the term “indie author” cause at least the word gives people some indication of what you’re about because of indie music and film before it.
I think ultimately what should matter isn’t trying to decide who is a “real published author” and who isn’t.
Where exactly would the line even be? It can’t be digital publishing or print, because digital publishing is starting to be legitimized. It seems to me it’s readers who ultimately decide.
If I create and package good work and market it right, I will continue to be rewarded by a growing reader base for that effort.
And I totally need to take your advice to “ignore them.” It eats up way too much of my mental real estate. (I might be able to write faster if I wasn’t spending so much time arguing on the Internet. Then again, sometimes those discussions bring me new readers, people who are wildly curious over whether or not I can put my money where my mouth is.)
I didn’t know you still pubbed some of your own stuff with your publishing company. That’s very cool!
Semantically, academically, in legalese, I think you are correct here, Dean.
On a blue collar, street-wise, common sense level, however, have you just used the Oxford dictionary to equate Simon & Schuster with Publish America?
So many writers give up so early, fold under the rejection and the labor of this business and then construct self-serving theologies to elevate vanity exercises beyond their ghetto that I’m thinking there has to be some nuaunce that goes a bit beyond dictionary definitions.
Am I perhaps not fully reading into what you’re saying?
Is perhaps the “money flows to the writer” benchmark of credibility?
Money always flows to the writer. That’s the top rule.
If you publish on Kindle and Smashwords and Scribd, no money out, money only flows to the writer. Lots of companies these days in POD charge no fees as well, so even that, if you do your own layout, is no cost out.
Money only flows to the writer. Period. Either in New York, or with agents, or with POD or epub.
Cheers
Dean
Dean,
With regards to epub novels vs. short fiction, I’ve actually been toying with the reverse. It may be vanity, but I want to be able to walk into a Barnes and Noble and pick my book off the shelf, so a traditional publisher is the way I want to go for my novels. But I don’t feel the same way about the traditional short fiction markets. For whatever reason, justifiable or not, I don’t have the same sense of awe and wonder directed towards them. Especially the online ones, no matter the quality of material they consistently publish. So for me, it’s a question of economics.
Let’s say I have 25,000 words worth of short fiction (whatever it may be…a novella, a pair of novelettes, a few short stories…doesn’t matter). In pro markets, I’ll get paid 25,000 words * $0.05/word = $1,250 for them if I manage to sell them all, which could be difficult if they are longish in length. There’s always the possibility of reprints, but my understanding is that for new writers professional short fiction markets aren’t really interested in reprints (which is why you kill your chances with an epub) unless they win awards or something and go to a “best of” anthology, so I’m capping out my expected value for the foreseeable future at the one sale (I’ve read your magic bakery post and realize that perhaps this is a faulty assumption, but I have a hard time believing it’s too unreasonable).
If I put them on the Kindle at $2.99 for the upcoming 70% royalty, I’d only have to sell 600 copies to beat that income. The question thus becomes: how likely are you to sell 600 copies at $2.99? The price may be a little high since people are putting whole novels up at that price. At 25,000 words you at about the length of 1/4 of a novel, so you’d be on par with a novel priced at $12. Maybe that means you want to include more short fiction to get your total length up, but the principle is still the same. What’s the likelihood of selling x many copies to beat the $0.05/word rate a magazine will give you?
There are other advantages to the traditional markets. You can get qualifying sales towards SFWA membership, which is again vanity, but I’d like to say I belong to a professional writing organization (though hopefully I will earn membership some day through a novel sale). But I’ve got a couple stories now that have received some validation of their quality (I’ve been a Writers of the Future finalist twice now, still waiting to hear if I won with the second one) and I’m wondering if I can make some more off of some of those stories privately than I could through magazines.
All good questions, Andrew, but let me boil them all down to one point that you might not like to hear, but try.
You are in a hurry. Now, granted, so am I. But as you put it, you have a $1,250 or higher possible payday selling the work to traditional channels. But it will take TIME.
And you did the math about how much it would take to sell to make that same amount ePub.
My questions is why not BOTH. If you don’t get in a hurry, take the long term approach, you can have both incomes if your craft gets good enough to sell to major mags. And when that happens, you also build audience.
So take a year or so to try to sell it major first, then if no luck after 15 or 20 rejections, put it up epub.
Think of it as the Alaska pipeline. Put stories, lots of stories, into one end of the pipeline and then run them through the mix. No need to get in a hurry for anything to flow out the other end. It will, if you keep putting new work into the pipeline.
As for pricing on epub? Your guess is as good as anyones these days. $1.99 for short seems to be a good number for many, $2.99 for longer works like novella and some novels and collections of stories. Higher for other novels. Nothing has leveled out yet on pricing. Again, way too early to tell in this game.
So slow down, don’t kill possible income sources just because you are in a hurry. If you really want to help your income, write more stories and write and mail them faster. That puts more pressure on the pipeline and with more possible sources, more possible income quicker.
I’ve considered the path that heteromeles is thinking about pursuing in regards to going ePub until I get a contract. I have a decent sized tech blog to pub it from so I know I have a way to get the word out.
So the concern is not that I’m good enough, it’s that, as Dean alluded to, that it might hurt me with New York publishers.
The other issues, is that I wouldn’t put out a quality product, from a editing and layout style point of view. I’m horrible, horrible with the little details of things like commas (they are my bane!) So I’d be afraid I’d make little errors that would distract from the readers experience and hurt my credibility as an author. The Internet never forgets and only I am in charge of the brand that is my name.
The cover, on the other hand, I think would be fun and exciting to do. But graphic design isn’t so scary and I have good resources at hand.
Either way, while I’m thinking of that as an option, I’m still writing like mad, and working on my proposal package skills, because even if I take that option, New York publishing houses are still an end goal.
And I like your term “indie publisher”, Zoe.
On “money always flows to the author” what about all the promo authors pay for? Or all the conferences they pay to attend? And workshops? Paper, toner, envelopes, stamps, writing books and magazines. If a writer does any type of book tour, most of the time travel etc. comes out of their own pocket.
Writers spend money on their craft. A little or a lot, but they spend it.
I understand the spirit behind “money always flows to the author” in the interest of avoiding scams. Like if you want a traditional publisher you shouldn’t be “paying to publish” nor should you be paying an agent to “review your work,” etc.
But, you have your own publishing company where you publish some of your own stuff. I assume you’ve published some of this stuff in print, and that it cost you money to do so.
“money always flows to the author” doesn’t apply in many cases. It only applies in specific scam-avoidance.
Putting something on Kindle, someone might have to pay someone to help them format their ebook (if they can’t figure it out themselves.) They might pay an editor to make sure the quality is up to snuff. They may pay a cover artist. All these things they pay for is to put out a quality product. Putting out poorly formatted, unedited drivel with a cover that makes people want to flee the Internet, won’t make someone any money.
By the same token though, if someone can barter for editing and cover art and learn formatting they don’t “have” to spend that money. But one way or the other they have to have something decent and of good quality or it won’t sell.
I think people should be “wise” in how they spend their money, but I think all authors whether trad or self pub spend money to further their career. Hoarding it all and making sure it always only flows to them instead of away from them, isn’t necessarily smart business.
(Though at the same time “money always flows to the author” is easier since most writers don’t have much business sense as a general rule.)
But to me “that” feels like a myth. Cause most authors whether trad pubbed or self-pubbed are spending money to advance their career or craft in one way or another.
All right, Zoe, I should have said “Money flows to the author except for office expenses and continuing education.”
But I have a real problem with anyone paying for a promotions tour besides a publisher. (I do pay for my web site as an office expense.)
And yes, this new world of epub might have some basic costs to it. But those are PUBLISHER’S COSTS, not author costs.
If you move over into the publishing side of the desk, there will be costs. But I was talking about WRITERS. Not publishers.
All money, except for continuing education and office expense, should flow to the writer.
If you move to the PUBLISHER’S side of the desk, all bets are off.
Am I now clear? I talk to writers, not publishers. Even though I have my own corporation and have been a publisher.
A point of interest. Kris and I came out of Pulphouse a half million in debt. How did we pay that back over the next ten years? By writing, of course. All money in this business is in writing. Old joke about how to make a small fortune at publishing: start with a large one. So very, very true.
Do I put my short stories up on Kindle and such? Yes, so in that I am a publisher as we talked about before. And oh, trust me, Kris and I are walking into this brave new world of blurred lines between publisher and writer very, very carefully.
But I stand by my statement of money flowing to the writer (except continuing education and office expense). When you are paying money out for any other reason, you are either being scammed or you have crossed over the desk and become a publisher.
Do you know these facts about this industry?
Writers make the most money by far. (only ones on Forbes lists)
Agents make the second most money from 15% of what the writer’s make.
Publishers (both people and publishing companies or imprints) make the third most.
Editors make the least.
Those are just facts. Something to keep in mind in this brave new world of writers stepping down the ladder to become publishers.
As usual a very interesting and educational discussion.
I’ve looked PODs over but I wondered if there was some hidden cost, not mentioned in the description, that would turn a POD into a Vanity press, evidently there aren’t any.
And when you mention Kindle do you mean just Kindle? There are at least two other e-readers out and more tablet computers are suppose to be coming out. Obviously Kindle was the first.
I am reminded of David Farland’s “Daily Kick,” wherein he has outlined the cost of his self-pubbing IN THE COMPANY OF ANGELS.
For him, it’s been a success, but he attributes that to his name recognition, and advises new authors not to try it, due to all the publishing costs you mention, Dean. He is careful to say it’s not impossible to make money, but it is a challenge. I believe he needed to sell several thousand books to break even, which he has done because the book has won awards and in addition to his name, he’s sold a lot of copies. He and his wife also set up a booth at a couple of events and pushed and sold the book as well, so that cost him money.
It was an interesting experiment, and sort of proves your statement, Dean: How to make a small fortune in publishing: start with a large one.
Reminds me of an old NASCAR joke, which is essentially identical.
How do you make $1 million at racing?
Start with $2 million.
Don’t get me wrong. I am absolutely not crapping on anyone’s desire to self-publish, and I wish anyone who does it the best. But it is not for me, at least not today.
Let me be clear on one thing.
I have ZERO issue with a writer putting up back list FOR FREE on places like Kindle, Scribd, Smashwords, and the like. I have ZERO issue with a writer putting up stories that have been through a lot of rejections and are just not finding a home. Some books and stories are just “hard sells” and putting them up for FREE is valid to get some money flowing to the writer. AFTER A DECENT TRY IN NEW YORK.
I also have ZERO issue with a writer doing POD versions of some books or collections for FREE. Many of the POD publishers now have completely free programs that will get your book out FOR FREE.
But doing POD books FOR FREE means you, as the writer, must learn a few things. You must learn to set up your own web sites. (easy these days). You must learn how to do book covers. (takes a little practice, but easy after you learn it.) You must learn how to flow in your own books into a program like Pagemaker or On Design (must buy program and learn, but after that ramp-up, easy.) Cover art is found easily with your own camera or on the web on sites that give away free photos or drawings as public domain. Millions and millions of images out there for free. Just have to do a little searching.
You can get cash streams set up on your own fiction for free. But it takes a little time and learning first. I now can put a short story up on Kindle in about 45 minutes. For free. Cover and all. And in theory, that story will earn me money and readers for decades to come.
You don’t have to set up as a complete publisher, buy art, spend money. In this modern world, it just isn’t necessary if you have the courage to go learn a couple of things. In fact, come to the New Technologies workshop and learn how to not only do your own web site, but do covers, understand the cash flow of it all, and get stories up on Kindle and other places. And also understand, I hope, after that workshop, on how to balance all this into your writing and what actually can be made.
No issue with Free. But if you are walking full force into being a publisher, fair warning. It gets very, very expensive and the return, if done correctly, is a minor percentage. The only people who made money off of Pulphouse were the writers.
Zoe,
Since your model is completely different from the traditional model, you will wind up paying whatever you have to in order to try and make your books a success. As Dean notes, when you become an all-in-one operation — writer, editor, publisher — you assume expenses for all three phases of the operation.
As for tours, I know a couple of authors who pooled expenses and did a co-tour — shoestring style — across several Western U.S. states. For one of them, I think the cost of the tour is being more than balanced by the sales. For the other, I am not sure, I suspect his sales aren’t as good as he’d have hoped, but I don’t know numbers there, so I am guessing.
There are some big Name pros who never tour and never spend a penny on their own publicity, and they rake in the huge contracts. Others pour all their time and energy into blogging and using their blog to attract attention.
You’re going to have to decide — as time goes on — whether or not you’re getting “bang” for your all-in-one buck. Part of what kills so many all-in-one operations is that they pour a lot of money in, and they wind up spending a lot of time, but there is very little “bang” and so they have to drop it, because they can’t justify the time and expense for so little monetary renumeration.
In traditional publishing, even if a book fails, rarely is the author going to have to wind up losing money. (S)he may not make much money, and may have to suffer through another iteration of career birth, but (s)he won’t be shelling anything out-of-pocket unless there is some kind of clause in the contract stating that poor sales mean the author has to give back part or all of the advance against royalties.
Question for Dean: I went back through my workshop notes on this, and either I didn’t write it down or I didn’t ask the question. How common is it for traditional publishers to have a clause for new writers demanding back all or part of an advance if sales are not up to snuff?
Brad, NEVER. If a book doesn’t sell up to the expectations of a publisher, the publisher eats the loss. That’s part of the contract and an aspect of publishing fantastic for the writers but not often talked about.
I was paid for one really, really stupid project one year over 20 grand and the book sold exactly 385 copies when they stopped sending royalty statements after three years. Thankfully, my name wasn’t on it. And on a project like that, I would have never agreed to share any loses because for any sane person, it was a loss from the start.
Major publishing a sharing of risk never happens. At least financial risk. You never have to repay your advance UNLESS you screw up big time and don’t turn in the book agreed, that sort of thing. I heard one writer who sold a romance series decided to write a mystery for the second book in his contract and then was angry when the publisher not only turned it down, but forced him to replay his advance on the second book. Duh… But unless you do something that stupid, which is lined out in the contract, bad sales are the responsibility of the publisher.
It’s why I hate the myth of self-promotion for big books. A writer can often kill a book or the next book by over promoting a book. Sell a book to New York, trust them that they know what they are doing. It’s their job. Stay on your side of the contract and write the next book unless asked by them to help, and then they will pay for it.
“But I stand by my statement of money flowing to the writer (except continuing education and office expense). When you are paying money out for any other reason, you are either being scammed or you have crossed over the desk and become a publisher.”
After having helped out as a volunteer at a variety of writer conferences, I really really like this rule of thumb to tell new writers–and will do so from now on. I’ve met too many newbies who have either been scammed, or squandered large chunks of money & precious writing time becoming publishers without thinking it through.
I think we’re going to see more publishers follow Hay House, Thomas Nelson, and Harlequin in adding vanity/subsidy press lines in the next few years. So things are going to get even more confusing for new writers, on top of the changes coming when e-readers hit critical mass.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with a writer becoming a publisher, IF they enter into it mindfully and aware of what the heck they are doing (ala Zoe). But I’m seeing too many newbies do this WITHOUT thinking it through, not bothering to put together a business plan of some sort, and not considering the opportunity costs involved.
Okay, that clears some things up. You’re always saying never trunk a story and never send out to less than a pro-paying publisher. I always wondered, what happens when you run out of pro-paying publishers? It appears Kindle and Nook are a good outlet. Though, I’m not sure what the implications for later, professional publication would be. I suppose if you submit a novel to a New York house and say in your cover letter “I’ve sold X amount of short stories through e-publication” showing you’ve got an existing audience, that could go very well. Hmmmm. /ponder
Ahh, Amanda, you assume you will run out of pro paying markets. That also is a myth. One market at a time with short fiction, no chance of ever running out of pro paying markets. New ones come into existence even if you think you have run out of the old ones. The decision to go to Kindle or epub should not be because you think you have run out of markets. Never happens. You just have to be a little creative on where to send your story to.
Hey Dean,
I hear what you’re saying, but like Joe Konrath for instance, he paid for his own author tours early on. He mailed out all kinds of packages to libraries. He spent a pretty penny marketing himself. I realize that for many authors it doesn’t work out well, but it did for Joe. If he hadn’t gotten out there and spent a little money to market himself, he wouldn’t be where he is now.
But Joe has a good business head on him. He’s smart and knows what he’s doing.
I can see someone discouraging “just any writer” from doing the same because most aren’t going to approach it with the same business sense or with a solid plan.
And I agree with what you’re saying by dividing things up into Writer’s side of the desk vs. Publisher’s side of the desk.
I think we can probably agree that a lot of writers spend lots of money on stupid crap, even if other authors are encouraging them to do it to further their career (even if their career hasn’t started yet.)
Zoe, that worry about killing a career by over promoting doesn’t apply unless you are publishing through New York and have publishers watching trends and sales records to make decisions to buy your next book. Many authors I know have hurt themselves with this by pushing one book over another and causing a downward trend in sales from book-to-book.
@Brad I’m turning a profit right now from my self-publishing. Not a huge one, but I have crossed into the black for now. But that’s very normal for a start-up, and I’ve only been in business for 1.5 years.
I also don’t intend to ever do an author tour. I plan to reach all my readers on the Internet. I’ll never run out of people online, so that’s the customer base I focus on.
I’m starting to do pretty well in the Kindle store and we’ll see how it goes over the next few years as I build up backlist and etc.
@L.M. May, thanks! One thing I’m discovering I have to do is “temper my message” a bit. I think being an indie author is absolutely right for some people, and I’ve never been happier than I am right now. But, I think self-publishing is wrong for more people than it’s right for. And not just because of quality of writing, but I think it takes a certain temperament and most writers wouldn’t be happy doing it. (Which is one reason I think most assume it’s a “last resort” and “you weren’t good enough for a real publisher.”)
@Dean Would you mind explaining how an author can kill a book or the next book by overpromoting it? It may or may not apply to self-pub, but if it does, I need to know about it! So I don’t do it.
With regards to cost of self-pubbing, I think I’m in a middle of the road place. I operate on a shoestring much less than people told me I’d have to operate at to “sell anything”. So I think there are a lot of extremes. It can be totally free and most indie authors try to do things as cheaply as possible (or free) by banding together with other indies, learning and bartering services. Etc.
Ah, I see. Thanks for clarifying!