[Elessar]

Publishers are a dying species. With infinite shelf-space, online retailers can stock any and all books. They do not need to be curated by some value-added middleman in order to ensure only the likeliest successes will become books.

I'm a big supporter for Amazon on this one. There are plenty of authors that the publisher will deny the opportunity to even put a book on the shelf. Amazon is not doing that, and it is not a personal attack on any author despite what media spin they might try to put on this story.

[IBM]

Publishers are a dying species like music labels are, as in not at all and only as a techie trope. They're in business because they provide value to the authors and artists they represent and that will continue being the case as long as authors and artists don't want to deal with the burden of the business side of their craft and figuring out how to commercialize it.

Keep in mind that Amazon is also a "value-added middleman".

[HelloMcFly]

I know the tech crowd in general seems to correlate highly with the crowd the endorses the future of self-publishing, and I get it. Yet, I cannot help but think that many of these "let the people decide" self-publishing advocates have not waded much into the work of the self-published author.

I'm an avid reader; honestly, given my nighttime reading patterns, I probably read too much. I've been to the deep ends of reading self-published work (much of it "acclaimed") and I'm not satisfied. Perhaps one day we'll arrive at a place where crowd-sourced reviews adequately filter the wheat from the chaff in an editor- and marketing-less world, but I'm not convinced we are there just yet.

Short version: I've read many (i.e., 10+) self-published works, and few of them have me looking forward to a world without publishers. I appreciate "elitist" filters that still allow pulpy sci-fi and fantasy through. I'm not ready to see them leave quite yet.

[salvadors]

> Perhaps one day we'll arrive at a place where crowd-sourced reviews adequately filter the wheat from the chaff in an editor- and marketing-less world, but I'm not convinced we are there just yet.

As more and more authors are simply buying dozens of 5* reviews for their books on sites like fiverr (or outsourcing it to Book Marketing companies who do the dirty work on their behalf), then I think we're moving further from that world, rather than closer to it.

[will_work4tears]

>and few of them have me looking forward to a world without publishers

But some do, correct? I've been reading quite a few (more than 10, probably more like 20-30) lately and I've ran across more than a few great finds. Granted, maybe our "Standards" are vastly different - I admit freely to being spat upon by literary purists for reading Science Fiction and Fantasy.

I've ran into more than a few utter piles though. I'm more selective based on total reviews, so I'm not getting anything cutting edge (10 reviews - 4.5 stars, no thanks, 180 reviews 4 stars, sure). I don't have friends or contacts of any sort that read what I do, so unfortunately that's all I can do.

[sheepmullet]

"Perhaps one day we'll arrive at a place where crowd-sourced reviews adequately filter the wheat from the chaff in an editor- and marketing-less world, but I'm not convinced we are there just yet."

How do you find books to read?

My techniques are: Amazon suggestions, browsing at the library, blogs, forums, and following my favorite authors websites.

None of these require a publisher.

[ghshephard]

The difference is - for every 1 book that a reputable publisher puts out, they reject 1000. Now, perhaps 500 of those books might have OK, and maybe 50 of them might have been quite good, and it's entirely possible that the 1 book they did chose to publish, was not as good as 10-15 others they rejected - but, on the flip side, it's highly unlikely that the publisher is going to chose one of the 500 dogs that never deserve to see the light of day.

The problem with Crowd sourced reviews, is that quite often, other people might like quite crappy books. The job of a publisher isn't to just find a book that they like, but that the general reading population will love.

I appreciate and respect what the publisher does as part of their filtering - I just suspect they are extracting more value than they are worth.

Hopefully established authors are able to negotiate increasingly more lucrative deals as a reflection of both the reduced risk, as well as the increased value they bring to the equation (as well as the reduced value that the publisher brings. I can't tell you who Stephen King's publisher is...)

[TheOtherHobbes]

It's true that a whole lot of important filtering goes on.

Otherwise we'd have to put up with Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey, when we could be reading polished high-quality titles that twinkle with the elusive literary aura that only publishers can add.

[snerk]

Here is The Thing: publishing used to be an educated middle class business catering to educated middle class readers.

Self-publishing opened the market to less-educated writers producing work for less-educated readers. Amazon basically reinvented the old Victorian penny dreadful market in digital form.

Does this matter? Not really. The penny dreadfuls didn't kill literature. In fact, in a round-about way, they eventually launched science fiction and fantasy as genres.

Publishers gave up on real literature back in the 80s, when all the old small semi-amateur publishing houses were swallowed by corporate sharks. So don't look for not-crappy there.

There is some basic filtering to eliminate people who can't write at all. But Amazon reviewers are getting pickier, so it's not obvious the can't write at all crowd will survive for much longer.

Meanwhile, many not-quite-mainstream writers have pulled themselves out of publisher-enforced poverty by selling direct.

Is this a bad thing? No, it really isn't.

[efuquen]

Let's be honest here, I would say most publisher's aren't filtering to keep the quality of writing high but to publish anything they think will sell a certain amount. If they rejected a book because it wasn't written well but it was then self-published and ended up being very popular and selling well I would imagine most publisher's would wish they had signed the author, regardless of how bad the writing is.

A publisher filters to find books that will sell, not to find great writing. In some instances great writing will sell quite well, in others that crappy romance novel can be a hit with a lot people. Publisher's release garbage all the time, it's not like they're some guardian angels of good writing. Maybe it would be awesome if we could just let the readers decide whether a book is good to them or not?

As a side note, the assumption here is that reviews are legit and not bought. To me the non-ideal situation of fake reviews is a separate issue vs the principle of whether legitimate customer reviews can serve as a good filter for readers. My experience has been that they certianly can.

[sheepmullet]

"The problem with Crowd sourced reviews, is that quite often, other people might like quite crappy books. The job of a publisher isn't to just find a book that they like, but that the general reading population will love."

I don't care about the "general reading population"; I want books that I will enjoy. Recommendation engines provide a lot more value in this area than publishers (at least for fiction).

[jseliger]

Amazon suggestions, browsing at the library, blogs, forums, and following my favorite authors websites.

I usually go in this order: recommendations from friends, reviews, browsing bookstores or libraries, and books sent by publishers or authors (I write a blog about books and ideas at http://jseliger.wordpress.com).

One question is how that initial seeding group happens; right now it tends to through Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and related means. But that gets towards complicated questions of how information and ideas propagate through a society, and I think we're going to be sorting that out for a long time.

[deong]

> None of these require a publisher.

I'm on the side of Amazon here, but let's not get carried away.

The books in your local library have largely come through a traditional publisher. Those blogs, forums, and author websites are going to be biased (not in the perjorative sense, but as in selection bias) toward titles that have come through traditional publishers as well.

The closest we can come to seeing a world without the influence of a publisher is Amazon's self-published titles, and they're really not good on average. I don't have a huge number of data points myself, but I haven't heard anyone rave about the quality of a randomly selected self-published title.

I think there's still a valuable role for the publishers to play. However, that role is quite a bit smaller than it once was, and the publishers are currently entrenched in a position of taking the same high cut of the profits that they've always taken, and that's going to have to change in order for them to do well in the longer term.

[TheOtherHobbes]

>They're in business because they provide value to the authors and artists

Publishers provide value to themselves, not to authors or artists.

Argument from quality: nope. Most publishers won't touch quality writing, because they know the market for it is limited. Joyce would never be published today. Austen might, but Austen is a bit difficult, so probably not. Lessing was turned down by a major publisher when she tried submitting under a different name, just to see what happened. I have my doubts if Pynchon or Vonnegut would be taken on today. (Has anyone of equivalent ability been signed in the last twenty five years?)

There's a huge market for ghost-written celebrity blather nonsense, landfill SF and Fantasy, and two-glasses-of-wine-and-a-billionaire chicklit, and a much smaller market for self-absorbed litfic. But quality literature?

Argument from services provided: nope again. Editors aren't quite two a penny, but good ones are available for hire. Likewise cover designers. Because you're paying them direct, you'll find that an editing process that takes publishers 18 months can be completed in a few weeks.

Argument from marketing: Publishers literally won't lift a finger to help any author who isn't already selling in the millions.

Argument from financial support: A couple of $k up front if you're very lucky, in return for losing 85% of future income. And you'll probably be offered a crappy work for hire contract.

So - what is this 'value' that publishers provide?

[ganeumann]

> Has anyone of equivalent ability been signed in the last twenty five years?

Whether they're of equivalent ability is subjective, of course, but plenty of difficult but beautiful literary works are published every year. And I would bet that their first run is a lot larger than Ulysses' was :)

Authors I've read in the past couple of years that were not mainstream but were published recently include Roberto Bolano, John Banville, Tom McCarthy, Eduardo Galeano...and I'm not much of a fiction reader. There's an enormous number of books published and almost all of them are not mainstream.

[TheOtherHobbes]

Most of those have had established careers for a long time. McCarthy is relatively new, but he was soundly rejected by all the big pubs, published by a tiny house, and then the big pubs reconsidered when he started shifting copies.

Which is almost exactly what happened to JK Rowling, only her books are slightly more accessible.

The big pubs do not take risks. If a writer can show evidence of critical interest and existing strong sales, they suddenly become interested.

Signing on the basis of a strong, original manuscript? Not any more.

I'm sure there's an exception every year or five, but it's a good bet that unless you're incredibly lucky and/or know commissioning editors personally already because you all went to university together, the odds of getting in through the front door are not good now.

[res0nat0r]

Then why do so many authors keep using a publishing house? This is the same tired argument used for the music industry on HN.

Yes, publishers do provide a value. Also one of the best selling books of late is a 700 page non-fiction book about finance, which reached #1 on Amazon's non-fiction list, published by Harvard University Press.

Saying that all publishing is just mass media crap is a just plain false.

[TheOtherHobbes]

Authors keep using publishing houses because too many authors are insecure dilettantes and want a pat on the head from someone to reassure them they're Real Writers - and therefore people of cultural weight and import.

And it remains true that top-selling established authors do okay out of trad pub. The 1% of writers in that category get decent enough advances and some PR support.

Everyone else is wasting their time and getting screwed over. Including a tragically large number of people who write for university presses. (I really hope Piketty got a lawyer to look over his contract.)

Writers are not, generally, minded to think of writing as a business full of business people doing business people things.

But some do - in increasing numbers. If you know anything about the industry, you'll know that where ten years ago it was taken as read that you needed an agent and a real publisher, otherwise you were just some noob with a vanity contract, the reality now is that writers are stampeding away from the agent+publisher deal package.

Agents are literally panicking about their jobs.

The charge has been led by romance writers, who have a terrifyingly efficient business and support association (the RWA) and not a few self-made self-pub millionaires.

The problem with a site like HN is that most people posting here know very little about the industry. But when you're in it, and you've been following developments in detail for a few years, the picture doesn't look the same as it does from outside.

[justincormack]

Harvard UP did not promote it, or indeed print enough copies. It could have been self published and done just as well. It was written in French after all and still succeeded, with the interest starting before it was translated. Academics use academic publishing houses largely for historic reasons.

[res0nat0r]

So HUP or the original French publisher provided Piketty no benefit?

[justincormack]

I doubt it. Academic publishers do not really do much promotion, other than sending lists of books to academic libraries (where there is a reputation effect however, which does help, but for Piketty those sales were nothing compared to retail). Academic bestsellers are extremely rare.

[mcguire]

I don't know about HUP but Springer certainly doesn't. The only editorial support is answering questions about providing camera-ready copy and the only marketing support is ensuring libraries get copies of their catalogs.

[NaOH]

A friend recently published a Kindle Single, about 16,000 words. It's done quite well, largely because of three factors: Amazon marketing, the popularity of the subject matter, and timely external events tied to the subject matter. The piece is currently in the top 120 of the Kindle store.

I'm certain that Amazon marketing has played a significant role in the initial success of this piece. On the other hand, I proofread the final draft that the author had before approving the piece for publication. The Amazon/Kindle person he had been working with as a proofreader supposedly had 25 years experience proofreading at the NY Times. I probably found 100–200 errors, not the "I would do it like this: kind, but the "this is wrong" kind.

When I spoke to my friend/author later on, he said that the proofreader is simply overwhelmed with work. I can't remember how much she once described to him she'd have to do in short order, but it was a ridiculous amount of work.

So while there is a value add to a middle man like Amazon, I can see how there are shortcomings to what they offer since the grunt-work side of publishing isn’t their focus, even if they do a bit of it. That’s not to suggest the long-standing publishers are better, just that there are shortcomings to what each style of publisher offers, and it may be difficult for a new author to learn the shortcomings before it’s too late.

[Semaphor]

Many self-published authors with their first novel out I read comments from on Reddit (fiction) say that for their next novel, they are planning to use a dedicated editor/proofreader.

[jonnathanson]

Can you clarify what you mean when you say "Amazon marketing?" Do you mean being featured by Amazon, or algorithmically suggested to readers of other books, or something else altogether?

I am not asking snarkily; I am genuinely curious. I'm contemplating self-publishing, but I'm aware that Amazon is a pretty noisy landscape. If there are ways to power one's signal through the noise, I'm interested in learning about them.

[NaOH]

Maybe there's been algorithmic marketing from Amazon, but I meant featuring. I know they did at least two email blasts promoting the book (maybe others, too, I don't know).

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

Music companies have already lost all of their storefronts. I think the last time I was in a record store was the early 1990s. The big record company executives aren't as rich as they once were, and they're starting to lose their grip on the recording and manufacturing process.

The labels really are dying. They'll hold on a few more decades, but only because they'll not let go of their venue monopoly willingly.

And books? When's the last time you were in a Borders? How long before all those old Barnes and Noble storefronts are just Halloween stores for 2 months out of the year?

They too are losing control of the publishing and distributing process.

[Consultant32452]

That's because people don't understand that publishers do a lot more than just "publish." They also provide editors, professional typescripting/page layout (whatever you call that), connect authors with artists for covers or other graphic work in/on the book itself, and marketing. Those are huge value ads that will continue to be important forever.

[justincormack]

Authors can buy those services directly. Most of those people are freelance, publishers do not actually employ them anyway. Now some authors do not of course, perhaps disclosure of editors and artists and typographers might grow more.

[Consultant32452]

Authors can buy those services directly but why bother trying to source and vet those things yourself? Some might, and I know the HN crowd is very much of the "I can do everything" mentality. But most people will be happy to pay an intermediary to do those things that are outside of their wheelhouse.

[justincormack]

The intermediary does not have to do it for a percentage of the sales though, these are jobs that are charged by the hour normally. Most freelancers do not want equity in your book, they want cash, so a sane intermediary would just charge a fixed fee.

[czr80]

What if the book doesn't sell? Who absorbs the loss on the upfront costs?

[kansface]

Music sales have seen negative growth for the last decade. The major labels don't exist because they provide value; they are just dying, slowly, as billion dollar businesses do.

[sytelus]

Publishers are the one squeezing the writers thin by throwing them only breadcrumbs and made publishing as some kind of privileged activity despite the technological advances. Amazon is doing the right thing here.

Having said that you may not want to discount them completely. Here are the few things publishers did do:

1. They would give advances to writers so the writers can focus on writing full time or even visit the places to get that extra reality experiences.

2. They had this huge networking with newspapers that allowed books to get significant publicity. It would be almost impossible to get individual writer featured by themselves.

3. They managed events like book signing at popular venues that again added in to significant marketting. Today its not uncommon to have publisher fly out an author to 50 city tour across the country on their dime.

4. They provided cover designer, editors, art work etc although these services now have become much cheaper to get elsewhere by independent writers.

5. Many publishers have great relationships with TV channels and popular bloggers. When you see a book featured on Colbert Report you can almost bet some publisher pulled some strings and their wallets.

I think eventually above kind of book marketing activities would become services provided by companies and publishing books becomes like little startups with investors and what not. That way relationship is much more transparent and authors can own biggest chunk of pie. At some extent this has already started on Kick Starter.

[icelancer]

I am a somewhat well-read author and certainly a subject matter expert in my niche, so let me chime in:

1) Advances have gone to absolute garbage. This means the author has to actually develop and maintain and online presence that is a renewable source of leads and other income. This is more work for same pay, but it's also the evolution of a ridiculously stagnant industry.

2) Shrug. Not really. First time authors get absolutely nothing from publishers. Big time authors get plenty of help (that they could have done themselves or contracted others to do for them at cheaper rates and no points off their royalties). Middling authors sometimes get a break. It is a VERY small portion that gets help from the marketing wing that really needs it.

3) Again, not really. See #2.

4) You covered this.

5) See #2.

All of the "marketing" is overblown. I know this is somewhat your point, but I just wanted to reinforce it. I self-publish now and could not be happier. When I saw how much I'd give up in royalties by going with any of the 3 publishers who sent me contracts, I laughed.

[wozniacki]

  There are plenty of authors that the publisher 
  will deny the opportunity to even put a book 
  on the shelf.

I strongly second this. Precisely this. In as many words.

It's dumbfounding how artists, authors and advocates who claim to support those lowly artists and authors make such self-serving cases against the likes of Amazon, when it does not suit their mores.

What about the democratization of publishing? What about the ability of anyone outside the inner circles of literary royalty, to actually see their work in print? These very same advocates, could not care less.

This is also the reason that newspapers, tabloids and general interest magazines everywhere and the writers who write for them despise what Google has done to their curating (read: gate-keeping) potential.

Their power to singularly table the issues and frame the conversations around those issues has dwindled. And they loathe that with a fervor.

Make no mistake. Artists and authors who demand things to be done on their terms are, first and foremost are unbearable egotists. They want to control the narrative, the medium and the delivery. They want to be power-brokers of their craft. Anyone familiar with the publishing houses will tell you this.

( On a slight tangent, read up on the Frank Gehry - Eli Broad fiasco to learn how difficult even architects are to work with. ) [1]

The outrage in most of these cases is not that some behemoth has unfairly moved the goal posts. Its that the changing landscape is allowing for a larger pool of players to release their works and thereby introducing competition. Hence the playing field is no longer tilted in the favor of these storied publishers and their authors.

That's the gripe here. As in most such cases.

[1] Why and how Eli Broad is giving billions away http://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-and-how-eli-broad-is-giving-...

[wiredfool]

A publisher has a certain amount of bandwidth. They can manage to acquire, edit, copyedit, promote, ship, etc a certain number of books and authors per year, per editor. They acquire books that fit with the marketing direction of their imprint. There's a lot of good stuff coming out. But good stuff takes curation and nurturing to get over the hump of good enough to Really Damn Good. Amazon is not going to do that.

Editing is important. Filters are a damn useful invention. I could be talking about websites, music, or books.

[clarky07]

while i agree with most of your comment, i think you are selling publishers a bit short of what they actually do. They also provide several services such as editing, marketing, designing, making ebooks, etc. They also take some of the risk out of publishing.

obviously all of these things can be done individually by third parties freelance and not using a publisher, but most indie books don't because they likely can't afford it and they suffer from a quality standpoint because of it. publishers can still bring plenty of value, they just need to adapt.

[secabeen]

Even if copy-writing, editing, marketing, cover design, and all of the like can be done by freelancers, most writers don't want to spend their time organizing all of those people, paying them, dealing with the taxes, etc. Some of the best people in those fields are staff at the publishers, and aren't even available for freelancing, nor do they want to freelance.

[clarky07]

I agree. that's mostly the point of my comment. :-)

[facepalm]

Are those services valuable enough for what publishers charge, though? I don't think all those services enter into the cost equation to the same degree. I would guess marketing to be a much, much larger expense than say editing (which presumably is a somewhat constant cost per page, while marketing is open ended).

Maybe it makes sense for authors to bond together to alleviate risks. Again, the question is, what is the right price for that service.

I'd say publishers are just a normal business. They provide some services that have some value. But they are not the gatekeepers they used to be anymore, hence authors should be able to get much better deals now.

As for marketing, a single person with a million followers on Twitter can probably achieve more than a whole traditional PR section of a big publisher? Or a recommendation on the front page of Amazon...

Sure PR still has some value (getting into newspapers and so on). But it's not the only way anymore.

[ekianjo]

> They also provide several services such as editing, marketing, designing, making ebooks, etc

And you know what? They are incredibly bad at most of this. I have a friend who's recently been accepted by a publisher, and he gets virtually no support from them for promotion of his books. Their sole job seems to be putting the books on the shelves in a few places.

At the same time, if you were a marketing guy, you wouldn't want to waste your time working in such companies anchored in centuries of immobility.

[vacri]

Some publishers are just plain bad, but to be frank, there are plenty of authors who are also just plain bad[1], and their work is often saved in editing. I've been exposed to the publishing world through my mother's bookshop and small publishing business - and some publishers are worth the weight in gold, others aren't worth crossing the street to spit on. The problem is that until you're established in the industry (or know someone who is), you don't really know how to tell between them; what services are not being offered or being done poorly.

[1]My housemate's mother used to be an editor for a publisher as well, and in her words "You know the saying that everyone has a book in them? It just isn't true..."

[clarky07]

I'll second what vacri said. of course there are bad publishers. just like there are bad software developers. that doesn't make them all bad.

[icelancer]

>while i agree with most of your comment, i think you are selling publishers a bit short of what they actually do. They also provide several services such as editing, marketing, designing, making ebooks, etc. They also take some of the risk out of publishing.

They do not do any of this for new authors, yet they take huge cuts anyway.

[clarky07]

is that so. i'd love to know which publishers you are referring to that do absolutely nothing for the publishing of their books. No editing, no marketing, no design, probably not even paying for the cost to print the books are they? How about getting the books into barnes and noble and walmart?

[icelancer]

They MIGHT get your book into B&N and other large bookstores (Walmart is a different story). But so what? It just sits on the shelf. Is that really worth giving up 2-3x more royalties to be able to say your book that might sell 1-2 copies in physical stores is available down the street? (Which it often won't be.)

If you self-publish and are wildly successful, you can always sign with a publisher to get an in-store deal later when you have more leverage.

I've been through both paths. James Altucher also wrote about it on his blog and I totally agree with him.

[clarky07]

If you have a platform like James you should absolutely self-publish IMO. If you are an unknown trying to break into it, I think you should go with a publisher if you can get one to take you. It very much depends on where you are. Publishers have value, it just depends on where you are in your writing career as to how much value.

And if you are going to go the self-publish route, you really need to have someone help you with the roles a publisher traditionally fills, such as editing. I say this as someone who has self-published a book. I didn't even consider traditional publishing, but I did use a professional editor.

[comex]

What I don't understand is why supporting self-publishing (and even what Amazon has been doing in that regard), and perhaps disliking the publishers, equates to supporting Amazon's bargaining against the publishers.

After all, one of the things this feud demonstrates is how enormous a share of the book market Amazon has and how strong a bargaining position it therefore has. That's against a big publisher who, whether or not it's acting fully in the interests of its authors, is basically collectively bargaining on their behalf - in the self-published future, most authors would have nobody to bargain for them. Regardless of how nice Amazon is to them at the moment, surely this is asking for trouble in the long run.

[Semaphor]

Why In Fact Publishing Will Not Go Away Anytime Soon: A Deeply Slanted Play in Three Acts - John Scalzi (2010) http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/02/03/why-in-fact-publishing...

Disclaimer: I know very little about the publishing industry but my impression is that both ways make sense. I wanted to link his post here as it seems to me it would make sense regarding this discussion.

[will_work4tears]

I feel Amazon really supports authors more than any publisher. I'm actually working on a project that will help authors on Amazon find an audience. Hopefully I can launch something before somebody else does(it's a pretty obvious idea, and either way, I wish the best for Indie authors).

[greyman]

As I see it, Amazon supports authors, but not the best ones.

Amazon basically wants to condition people that the price of an e-book should be no more than $9.99 max. That is good for basically all except the most quality authors (and publishers), who don't necessarily need Amazon's marketing, but want to price their book higher.

[rdam]

>I feel Amazon really supports authors more than any publisher. I'm actually working on a project that will help authors on Amazon find an audience.

That's what a publisher does.

[will_work4tears]

That's true, but they also are very selective and pay very little of the actual profits to the author. My project will help any author, even those with the standard publisher, but it's really aimed at finding the good writers from the flood of newly "published" authors on Amazon. There's so much noise due to the sheer number of self published authors it's really hard to find anything. It's like the Netflix problem, you spend all your spare time going through looking for something by the time you find it, you don't have free time anymore.

[abhimir]

I would love to know more if you are planning to do something similar for mobile games. As a mobile games developer I know that something like this will resonate with a lot of mobile game developers

[will_work4tears]

I hadn't really considered games (or even games and apps), but now that you bring it up, it seems like the perfect fit. I think it's certainly feasible to merge the two ideas into the same solution.