Mad Swede
Auror
Well, you should care. Because it has a direct impact on how visible your own self-published books are. Approximately 350 000 books are self-published every year. A sign of liberty? Maybe. But do you know how many books agents and publishers get sent every year? I asked my editor about this, because she also acts as a "lektör" for several publishing companies and so it has an impact on how quickly she can edit my latest book. (A "lektör" is someone who, amongst other things, reads and evaluates books and other text documents.) At this time of year, just as the Swedish summer holidays wrap up, she has a pile of 80 submitted novels to evaluate. That's the 80 that made it through the first reader cut - and the publishers concerned had nearly 650 submissions at the end of July. That's just Swedish language novels. So how many do you think the English language publishers and agents get? How long do you think it takes to go through all them? And when they've done all that, and picked the ones they want, what do you think they do? Easy. They push those books, because they need to earn some money. And that push is often enough to push authors like you out of sight, simply because there are so many self-published authors.I don't really care why agents and publishers are so hard nosed. I do, however, care that they are so slow. I can spend *years* just getting to "no" when working through traditional channels. I don't have as many years to squander as they do. It's a simple calculation that has nothing to do with income.
You mean you'd rather not work it out. That's fine, especially if you're not in it for the money. But if, like some people, you'd like to make writing a full time career then you need to be honest about what it really costs to self-publish. And as can be seen from some other linked articles here on the forums, that can mean having to push out a new book every 6-8 weeks. And that is a lot of pressure and involves a lot of stress. It all comes back to the question - why are you writing?As for what my time is worth, my time is worth so much to me, it cannot be calculated in dollars, so all the trad pub arguments fall to the side, while self-pub offers an opportunity.
Oh please. Publishing is nowhere close to a monopoly. Not in Sweden, not in the US and not in the rest of the world. There are quite a few independent publishers out there, more than 20 here in Sweden alone. No, they don't all give authors a big advance. Yes, many specialise. But pick the right ones and they'll consider your book. But it still has to be a good book.But that's not on topic. I agree with the others that gatekeeping is not about how many keepers there are, still less about the pragmatism of their operations. It's simply a recognition that they exist. As in other areas, the closer these approach monopoly, the worse are the implications for the ordinary person. Right now, the publishing industry approaches monopoly. It's not quite there yet (and the term gatekeeper serves as a useful noun for the current state of affairs), but the direction is plain to see. Not only is that the trend over recent decades, there's absolutely nothing in the capitalist legal and political structure to prevent the trend from continuing.
Eventually, the situation is so close to monopoly that legal action is taken, and the proto-monopoly is broken up or dispersed, however temporarily. Corporations find ways around the legal rulings and the trend starts again. Capitalism *always* tends toward monopoly, as some one once observed. Several someones, in truth.
People have been warning about this trend in publishing for some time now. At least since the 90s, when I first became aware of it.
I know quite a bit about the music industry. And services like Spotify do give independent artists a chance. But it's all about visibility - and there's a lot of new music gets published every year. Not many musicians and groups make money on their music sales alone. Even the biggest groups make most of their money on tours (tickets sales, merchandise etc), not on music sales.It's interesting to compare this art form with others. Consider, for example, how music is produced and distributed, how musicians work and are paid. Then look how the process works with painting. Or dance. Every art has its own dynamic, of course. Some are more group efforts while others are intensely individual. But it can be instructive, if only for context.