[SifJar]

OK, but pretending that the world hasn't moved on from these niche publishers seems naive to me.

Perhaps I should have said "in the modern world, word of mouth doesn't work..."

Today, chances are those niche publications & communities are going to be online. And how do we determine the trustworthy ones from the ones that are just trying to exploit us? I guess we need to rely on word of mouth to determine which mouths we should listen to words from...

[KittenInABox]

When you're talking about niche interests IME facebook just plain isn't good enough. You have to go to old-school forums, and from there word-of-mouth of the regulars of these forums.

[nickthegreek]

Depending on the niche, you don’t even need to go forums. a simple YouTube search gets you reviews and opinions from niche professionals along with a comment section and a like/dislike count.