Sam Harris on the Future of Publishing. This is a great article recommended by one of our members. Some of the quotes I liked:
While my website has since become the hub of everything I have accomplished as an author, it took me years to understand its utility, and I only began blogging a few months ago. Clearly, I am a slow learner. But many other authors are still pretending that the Internet doesn’t exist. Some will surely see their careers suffer as a result. One fact now seems undeniable: The future of the written word is (mostly or entirely) digital.
…Vanity Fair has a print circulation of around 1 million copies; the current issue has a fresh photo of Angelina Jolie on its cover; and Hitch is one of the best writers to ever draw breath. However, I’m reasonably sure that this blog post, or the next one, will reach more readers than his latest gem. For bloggers like Ferriss and Godin, the future arrived long ago: Publishing in Vanity Fair would be tantamount to burying their work. This is astounding. Given its range of content, and the costs of acquiring this content, a magazine like Vanity Fair should get much more traffic than any one person’s blog. And this brings us back to the problem of money: Apart from my occasional use of a webmaster and a graphic designer, my blog employs no one—not even me. Where is all this heading? I can count on one finger the number of places where it is still obviously better for me to publish than on my own blog—the opinion page of The New York Times. But it’s not so much better that I’ve been tempted to send them an article in the last few months. Is this just the hubris of the blogosphere? Maybe—but not for everyone and not for long.
…I’ve started to think that most books are too long, and I now hesitate before buying the next big one. When shopping for books, I’ve suddenly become acutely sensitive to the opportunity costs of reading any one of them. If your book is 600-pages-long, you are demanding more of my time than I feel free to give.
…One thing is certain: writers and public intellectuals must find a way to get paid for what they do—and the opportunities to do this are changing quickly. My current solution is to write longer books for a traditional press and publish short ebooks myself on Amazon. If anyone has any better ideas, please publish them somewhere—perhaps on a blog—and then send me a link. And I hope you get paid.
New Ways to Sell Short Stories. Alan Rinzler shares some new ways to get published for people with shorter works:
Both established authors and self-publishing newcomers with short-form pieces that once appeared only in places like literary and news magazines are finding brand new markets with Kindle Singles and other digital venues like Byliner and Atavist.
His tips include pricing flexibly, making sure you’re not signing away your IP, good marketing, and — most importantly — good writing.
Good Day Sunshine for Writers. Rinzler injects hope into the future by reminding writers of the great opportunities we have now:
Authors today can reach their market without an intermediary. Not through the publisher, not through advertising or the mass media. Authors now have the technology to connect directly with interest groups, book bloggers, websites, to use Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other social networking channels to reach precisely the readers who might be interested in knowing about their work, whether it’s fiction or non-fiction, whether it’s an ambitious literary novel or genre romance, sci-fi and mystery, paranormal or super-wholesome faith-based inspirational stories.
You can connect with these readers through the new art of self-marketing which has its own etiquette and best practices, which does require time and effort, but which can be done powerfully and effectively without every leaving the house, while still in your pajamas.
For years publishers have preached “platform, platform, platform” but now they realize that this platform is not built only on media or celebrity status, but most importantly on the author’s ability to reach readers and create visibility and connection online.
But while he mentions how self-published authors now get picked up by agents/commercial publishers, he does remind us of one important reality:
[Myth] #3 It’s easy to succeed as a self-published author
Absolutely not. Here’s why:
You still have to write a good book. No mean feat. Successful writers I know – whether they’re published commercially or self-published – need to write and rewrite their books many times, usually with the support of a developmental editor, not someone who does spelling and punctuation but a creative partner who is able to identify and solve problems with the story, structure, characterization, dialogue, visual description, literary style, pacing, the narrative arc – with a first, second, and third act that engages the reader and reaches some kind of epiphany or denouement that entertains, illuminates and provides emotional satisfaction for the reader.
But he’s overall upbeat and the message is encouraging — writers have more opportunities than ever.
The Future of Publishing. Jane Friedman wrote a book on this, and here’s a thought-provoking excerpt:
You can’t be just a writer of stories or books anymore. You have to be a creator of entire, immersive, interactive, multimedia realms of experience—at least four per concept, but half a dozen is ideal.
Purely text stories are two-dimensional and déclassé. Neither kids nor adults will be satisfied or engaged unless you create movies, TV series, and online interactive games to flesh out alternative or supplemental story lines. You should also be thinking about developing theme parks, and buying islands (near Dubai), and developing theme parks on islands (near Dubai) to give your audience the real experience of your story world.
So, if you want to simply write books, limiting yourself to flat words trapped on a page, go ahead, but you’ll be the lowest of the low. That is, you’ll be a mere writer. The big money goes to the transmedia specialists, and MFA programs now offer transmedia degrees. Most English and creative writing departments were subsumed, quite some time ago, by Colleges of Informatics.
This is, however, one of fourteen possible future scenarios Friedman postulates.
What do you think? What have you found about the future of publishing? Are you upbeat or worried?
