Don't hate me for saying this...

 I know, I'm blogging a bit about self-publishing vs. traditional publishing a bit much but it's been an obsession of mine for the last few days.  I honestly find the whole debate fascinating.  Which way will it go?  Will publishers drop like flies?  Is self-publishing viable? And so on and so forth.

In all of this, there is one thing that has stood out to me.  Multi-level marketing.  Now, I don't know about you, but I've been suckered into going to these meetings or parties or whatever they are calling themselves nowadays, more than once.  It usually stems from having a friend that's doing it and I don't want to be rude by saying no.  Yes, I torture myself.

They all have one thing in common:  Enthusiasm.  But it's not just a nice amount of enthusiasm, it's a truck-load and they run you over with it.  They try to get you to get so hyped up about it that you'll join up with dreams of being super rich and going on these company vacations on yachts in the Bahamas where only the top sellers can attend.  Or a pink car.  They also like to pull out copies of other people's insanely huge checks and tell you, "this could be your name!"

When I read about all these success stories in self-pubbing, that's kind of how I feel.  Not because I don't believe in their success or that I'm not happy for them.  I do and I am.  But go to enough of these MLM meetings and you quickly become a skeptic on anything that remotely stinks of it.  I'm being bombarded with all these stories of the now wealthy authors that it's kind of gotten to that point.  The excitement has gotten so hyped and huge and I see people getting carried away on that wave of dollar signs that I can't help but feel that way.

I understand that self-pubbing isn't MLM and I'm not actually comparing to MLM.  It's the feeling and tone I'm comparing it to.  This whole campaign for self-pubbing sure is starting to sound like the same sales pitch.  The enthusiasm has gotten to such heights that I simply can't bring myself to not imagine the MLM marketing pitches or the Shady Preacher/Healer on the Pulpit scenarios.  With shouts of "I'm a believer!" coming out of the woodwork, how can I not?

Let me also say that it has not affected my decision-making process and I most definitely don't blame anyone for their excitement.  I would be excited, too and I would probably be shouting it from the rooftops with them.  So don't think I'm judging anyone.  I still don't know what I plan to do when I'm done with my wip.

I believe that many people are doing very well with self-pubbing.  I also believe that many aren't.  There are plenty of factors that determine why a self-pubber can or will do well.  The most important thing, and I think this holds true for self or trad published, is the writing.  Right now, I'm just hoping I'm good enough to do well whichever way I choose.

I hope all self-pubbers do well. Who knows, I might be one of them someday. I also want to be able to support myself comfortably as a writer -- what writer doesn't?  But are writers riding that wave into a cliffside?  Is it just too early to know what kind of long term success anyone will have?  I'm sure if you asked the successful ones they'd tell you, "Well, at least I made money while it lasted which is more than what someone that didn't do it got."  Which would be true, of course.  Maybe these aren't even viable questions.

I think it's all this talk about money that is affecting my delicate senses.  Writers want to earn a nice living because it frees us up to write more and it's great to know there is hope for that, but have we lost some semblance of propriety in the process?  Hard to say since money is an important aspect of life.  We all gotta pay the bills.  And it's not like I'm not interested in knowing the details of how well they are doing.

I guess it's just one of those things where you want to know but feel like it's an incredible intrusion in someone's private matters.  We've always been taught that it's impolite to ask.  Now we are faced with a lot of people just offering it up and we're taking it all in and then rifling through their underwear drawer.  When inappropriate suddenly becomes appropriate, I have a hard time switching gears.

Where's the downside?

The talk of self-publishing has been rampant.  JA Konrath posts near daily of his success and the success of others.  He has no problem telling you how much money he makes and really, it's a lot for an author.  Many mid-list authors published traditionally still have day jobs, so you can see how appealing his numbers look to an aspiring author.

There's a lot of talk about what you gain in self-publishing:  money, creative control, and quicker release.  A lot less heartache from rejections, editors that like your work and then disappear when it's time to turn it in, imprints closing, etc.  Books don't stop getting published because the house decided they didn't want to print it anymore.   The list is dauntingly large and certainly makes one think twice before they decide to go the traditional route or not.

But what do you lose by self-publishing?  There are the known things:  time to write because you have to spend so much time marketing your book and making your presence known, in store placement, traditional review methods, etc.  Don't forget the mighty TV commercials that a very limited number of authors get.  But what about the things people  don't want to talk about?

How many self-pubbed books have been optioned by film studios?  Eragon doesn't count because he got the agent and publishing deal before the option (I'm guessing the option came because of the agency).  Authors like to say they don't care (it's all about the book), but really, they do.  They dream big just like anyone else.  They hope for a blockbuster movie so they can become the next Stephanie Meyer, Stephen King, or JK Rowling, rolling in the dough of licensing merch and such.  Even if they don't get the blockbuster they hoped for, they at least get a two hour commercial for their book on someone else's dime.  Karen McQuestion's A Scattered Life has been optioned, but anyone else that was a complete unknown?  Konrath seems to believe this too, shall come.

How many have gotten a jacket blurb by an established traditional author?  These actually sell a lot of books.  Lot's of people read something based on another author's recommendation.  Which also leads to the question of other self-published author blurbs, do they have a network where you can approach other successful self-published authors in your genre to ask for a read and a possible blurb? I'm sure they do.  I don't know anything about it but it seems like the top selling self-publishers are supporting each other.

One reason many authors choose not to self-pub is legitimacy.  Some authors just can't stand the thought of not being viewed as legitimate.  Vain, but true.  We are human, after all.

But.

There's now a rather large but.  In November, the NYT revealed that they will now have an ebook bestseller list.  The details are sparse but it's supposed to start rolling out early this year.  The odds of legitimacy just went up a great deal.  Before, a self-pubber had no chance of ever saying they were a NYT bestseller.  It's no longer out of reach.  I think that if anything is going to turn the agency-model on its head, this is it.

Another interesting thing that I dont' see talked about:  the self-publishers that have agents.  These agents generally do things like film rights, foreign rights, audiobooks, etc. for the self-publisher.  Clearly, there are agents paying attention to these sales records.  But now with Podiobooks, you can do your own audiobook and keep 75% of the profits, so is their role shrinking?  Are they snagging these self-pubbers to gain a much-needed foothold in a market they've shunned?  Will the nature of queries change from MS representation to representation of works in other markets like film?  I would have thought that impossible just a year ago.  It doesn't seem so impossible now.

The publishing world is changing, no doubt.  It's going to be interesting to see where it all lands. I can't deny that with the NYT bestseller list coming, it's looking mighty attractive.  The idea that I might actually be able to make a living at writing?  Whodathunkit?  Very few traditionally pubbed authors accomplish this feat.  There are bestselling authors that can't even accomplish this without a movie deal.

I've always planned to try the traditional publishing route but the whole climate might be much different by the time I'm ready to publish. And seeing some of those sales numbers of unknown authors is like bait on a hook.

Thoughts? Comments?

Are you good enough to even self-publish?

I know some very happily self-published authors. No agent, editor or publisher telling them what they can or can't do, what needs to be cut, what needs to be changed or how many pages they can or can't have for acknowledgments. All the money from sales is theirs to have and the success or failure of a book rests squarely upon their shoulders (and, more importantly, defining what they would call a success or failure).

With the rise in self-pubbed works, the future of publishing is changing and where it will land is anyone's guess.

But what I really want to know is:  what possesses an author to self-publish?

Oh, I know there are plenty of valid reasons to do so. There are those that have queried and queried with nary a bite and there those that never got past partials and fulls and I know of some that were published, dropped and decided to self-publish said dropped book. There are those that are just happy to write and hope others might enjoy reading unknown authors enough to buy it and like it, too.  But what about the (I hate to say it because we all start somewhere) bad writer? I suppose if you knew you were a bad writer you wouldn't self-publish but it's amazing how many still manage to do it, presumably because they simply don't know they are bad.

And please don't confuse the issue, I'm not saying that all self-pubbed books are badly written. Not by a long shot. I'm only saying that with the rise in self-publishing, anyone is able to do it. Like the guy/gal who decided that their New Year's resolution should be to start, finish and publish a book in one year.  Sure, some succeed beautifully, but the majority don't. That same guy/gal poured lots of love, time and energy into getting it done. Love, time and energy, I might add, that may have been better served learning how to write. Yanno, like basic grammar and punctuation, never mind the craft as an art form. 

I've perused the self-published titles and while some of them look like they are well written, a large portion could have used the benefit of research on how to write, a critique or two or twenty, and an editor. Do they simply not know? How can they not know?  

There are many fine authors that go undiscovered and rejected yearly. I suppose knowing if you are one of those fine authors isn't easy, what with all the rejections. But wouldn't you know if you weren't at least passable if you were going to self-publish?

I certainly don't think that anyone should be denied the right to self-publish, but I definitely reserve the right to not read it and I can't help feeling bad for the author every time I see one of these books floating around.  Readers are just as harsh critics as agents and editors. If they think ridicule in an agency is bad, ridicule from the entire known web-verse isn't likely to be any better.  Is it bravery to put yourself out there like that or is it just (as Miss Snark used to say) nitwittery?