Sunita, writing at Dear Author, posits, in a well-argued and considered post, that the increasing lack of reliable information about the quality of books available to potential purchasers is creating a “market full of lemons”.
Old Possum’s piece of publishing wisdom
Philip Jones over at FutureBook serves a useful reminder to publishers: adapt or die. “The shift to digital challenges this whole system, because publishers only get the cash after the sale, and only get cash on books that sell. As Evan Schnittman noted way back in 2009, if e-books become the dominant medium then this publishing ‘Ponzi scheme’ collapses. ‘Clearly ebooks aren’t free – they are perhaps as expensive or in some cases more expensive than print – yet they do not create large, short term cash flow to cover their costs. Ebooks, if successful, will sink the trade publishing industry.'”
Self-publishing for $500
In Nick Thacker’s latest “self-publishing answers” podcast, he explains how he would go about producing an entire, full-length book with professional edits and cover art, plus interior formatting and marketing on a $500 budget.
The Empire Strikes Back: but is it doomed?
Brian O’Leary with another incisive dissection of the ongoing “spat” between self-publishing and traditional publishing: “Right now, publishers are walking away from what is arguably the single largest experiment in the history of publishing. Independent authors are electing to sidestep the supply chain, publish without identifiers, and test new forms and new platforms that look nothing like a book. If they aren’t the farm team, they are a window into what the future might look like.”
Book Rights And Licensing: An International Overview For Authors
Joanna Penn and Tom Chalmers of IPR tell you what you need to know about selling your books around the world: The fact is that many indie authors don’t just own a potentially valuable book, they own the rights to their work and these can be licensed to produce the same book, in English, into different territories around the world – whether US, Australia or India. And rights can also be licensed for the book to be published and translated into different languages – French, Spanish, German and, back to India – Hindi, Marathi, and many more besides.
Lessons from India – libraries, licensing and lined up by Amazon
Tom Chalmers, writing in Digital Book World experiences first-hand how Amazon is building a solid base in India, as the eBook market is poised to take off
The Fallacy, and the Truth, of “Big Publishing”
Matt Blind’s contention, writing in Nate Hoffelder’s The Digital Reader is that so-called “Big” publishing is a mere sideshow for their corporate overlords who make most of their money in other media (film, TV) and that, although Amazon should get some credit for encouraging new talent, they are ultimately the same. What next for publishing then?
New AuthorEarnings report for Barnes & Noble
Hugh Howey’s new report on Barnes & Noble is now up on AuthorEarnings. The figures are based on the top 5,400 of Barnes & Noble’s top genre fiction eBooks, so they obviously do not include every self-published author in the Nook store, but it does indicate that, collectively, they are becoming a very powerful force in publishing.
Common Ground in the Debate of Self vs. Traditional Publishing
Jack W Perry finds some things that those on either side of the debate between traditional and self-publishing can agree upon
How self-publishers can sell film and TV rights
In the wake of the economic crash and rapid developments in publishing technology, both the film and book industries have been adapting to significant changes in the way they tell stories. A measure of the way things have changed is that self-published authors are now being considered for page-to-screen adaptations, something that publishers and studios had not previously envisaged.