Robert J. Sawyer on Digital Technology and Writers

[Steerpike]

A short, interesting interview. I can't agree with everything he says here, but it gives one something to think about. Are the days of the full-time novelist numbered?

Robert J. Sawyer: Authors, Paying the Price | TVO

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

I think there has always been, and will always be, a very small percentage of writers who can make a decent living writing full time.

Also, there has always been, and will always be, consumers willing to pay for content, and those continually searching for free. Personally, I don't see this as an issue.

You have to be a good writer, but even then this may not be enough. There are many factors that combine to make an author a commercial success, two of those being timing & another just plain ol' luck.

 

[GeekDavid]

Dean Wesley Smith, who himself makes a very nice living from writing, disagrees.

This myth “You can’t make a living writing fiction” is so clearly hogwash, I shouldn’t have to include it as a chapter in this book. All anyone has to do is look at a certain fantasy writer in England being richer than the Queen. And the number of fiction writers on the Forbes List every year. And that’s not counting all the writers publishing their sales numbers each month just from Kindle alone.

But, alas, new writers hear this myth all the time, constantly, from every direction, and sometimes from longer-term professional writers.

[snip]

So, how many writers in the United States do make a living writing only fiction? Well, that depends on how you define “living.” That’s another shocker for me. For the longest time I figured over six figures gross per year was a living. At that level there are thousands and thousands of fiction writers making that much and a lot more.

But lately, I’ve been forced by discussions with students to look at reality a little bit more when it comes to “making a living.”

A $2,000 mortgage, $1,000 for various insurance, $1,000 for various utilities, and $2,000 more for food and other details, like clothing, trips and such. $6,000 per month after taxes needed to survive. $72,000 per year, but if you are married and your spouse works, cut that number in half. Your half, to say you are making a living writing fiction only needs to be $38,000 per year. Slightly over $3,000 per month.

And many, many people I know make nice livings on less than that. A bunch less. So my number was way high when it came to “making a living” so I have no idea how many thousands and thousands and thousands of writers make a living.

[snip]

Think of us (every writer) as a huge bakery and all we make is pies. Magic pies, that seem to just reform after we sell off pieces of the pie to customers. And each pie can be divided into thousands of pieces if we want.

The Magic Pie secret ingredient is called “Copyright.”

Every story we write, every novel we write, is a magic pie full of copyright.

We can sell parts of it to one publisher, other parts to another publisher, some parts to overseas markets, other parts to audio, or eBooks, or game companies, or Hollywood, or web publishers, and on and on and on. One professional writer I knew sold over 100 different gaming rights to different places on one novel. He had a very sharp knife cutting that magic pie.

With indie publishing, most writers are only focused on one tiny aspect of their pies, the electronic rights. But interestingly enough, when a story or novel gets published electronically, it gets spread out to many, many stores, and sometimes other publishers see it and want to buy it for their project, or a movie producer sees it and options it, or a game designer sees it and makes an offer. So in this new world, getting stories up electronically can help out other sales given time.

So each professional writer has this Magic Bakery, making magic pies that can be cut into as many pieces as we want and many of the pieces can return as if never taken, even after being sold off. (You must learn copyright to really understand this.)

That section makes me think of our own Feline Overlord. :Wink:

One afternoon while at a writer’s retreat I wrote a short story called “In the Shade of the Slowboat Man.” The story took me about five hours.

— Five hours to create that pie. It was rejected at the market I wrote it for, so I sold it to F&SF Magazine. Decent money.

— Then I sold another slice to the Nebula Awards Anthology, another small slice (nonexclusive anthology right) sold and then returned to the pie.

— Then I sold it to another reprint anthology (same right again), another small slice sold and returned to the pie magically for another person to buy.

— Then I sold the rights to an audio play made from the story, making more off of that slice than the other three before, and then I was hired with Kris to write the script from my story, so more money yet again.

— Now I have that story on Kindle, B&N, Sony, iBooks, Smashwords and other sites selling and making nice money each sale. And I have put it in a collection so it is making more that way each month as well.

I have made well over $10,000 income from one short story, and I still have the pie on my shelf in my Magic Bakery, still there for sale, even though it is selling electronically.

Say I decide to make a novel pie out of the story. Short story pie will remain and continue to make money, novel pie will be created and both will have thousands of slices to be sold.

I had Hollywood once give me $1,000 every six months for three years simply to give them the chance to buy a slice of one pie (story) on my shelf. That’s right, I never SOLD anything from the pie. I simply said “Give me a thousand bucks every six months and I won’t let anyone else buy that one small slice of that one pie.”

They never touched the pie and I made six thousand bucks off of that option.

I love this business.

There's much more, but that's enough excerpts.

 

[Jabrosky]

Smith's counter-argument would be a refreshing and heartening contrast to the conventional wisdom, except he seems to emphasize quantity of work produced as his ticket to commercial success. Maybe churning out so many stories at such a rapid rate might provide valuable practice for a beginner, but wouldn't it take some additional time and effort to ensure the stories are well-written?

For that matter, what are Smith's views on working on multiple projects at once? I would expect that would make a writer even more prolific in the way he means.

 

[Steerpike]

Smith's counter-argument would be a refreshing and heartening contrast to the conventional wisdom, except he seems to emphasize quantity of work produced as his ticket to commercial success. Maybe churning out so many stories at such a rapid rate might provide valuable practice for a beginner, but wouldn't it take some additional time and effort to ensure the stories are well-written?

For that matter, what are Smith's views on working on multiple projects at once? I would expect that would make a writer even more prolific in the way he means.

I think it is a combination of both. If you're going the self-pub/indie route, you need good stories, of course. But volume appears to be critical. I've read numerous times that the best use of your time after publishing a story is to get to work on the next one, even more than spending a lot of time marketing. Even with traditionally-published authors, quicker output seems to be more and more in demand by the publishing houses.

 

[GeekDavid]

I think it is a combination of both. If you're going the self-pub/indie route, you need good stories, of course. But volume appears to be critical. I've read numerous times that the best use of your time after publishing a story is to get to work on the next one, even more than spending a lot of time marketing. Even with traditionally-published authors, quicker output seems to be more and more in demand by the publishing houses.

That's exactly what DWS says. His work pattern is something like this:

1. Finish Story 1.
2. Send Story 1 to trusted reader (editor).
3. Immediately start on Story 2.
4. When Story 1 comes back, fix any problems.
5. Get cover for Story 1.
6. Immediately sell Story 1.
7. Get back to work on Story 2.
8. Lather, rinse, repeat.

"Writers write" is one of his favorite sayings. He also says an author is focused on marketing the last book, a writer is focused on writing the next book.

Oh, and he says there is no better marketing for the last book than the next book. :Biggrin: