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| Debate on Relevance of Traditional Publishing |
In this writer's humble opinion the TP's have been surrounded by the e-book nation and are fighting with their last round of ammunition: marketing (and that is definitely debatable) :)
Marketing is the big advantage to go with a TP according to Michael Pietsch, soon-to-be CEO of the traditional publisher Hachette Book Group.
BUT, Mark Coker, founder of the self-publish book distributor Smashwords, says "over the next few years, traditional publishers are going to become more and more irrelevant."
Hmmm --- can't really argue with that; especially from the point of view of newbie authors who never received any appreciable marketing from TP's any damn way --- They had to do there own marketing --- Talk about being left out on a half sawed-off limb! A really hit-n-miss career building model.
Anyway, tonight's post is an NPR interview/debate (and you can also listen to it) between Pietsch and Coker (with some great follow-on comments by readers/listeners) on:
Why Traditional Publishing Is Really In A 'Golden Age' (or not - added by John)
How healthy is the traditional publishing industry? Not very, says Mark Coker, founder of the self-published book distributor Smashwords. On Monday, Coker told NPR's Audie Cornish that "over the next few years, traditional publishers are going to become more and more irrelevant."
But Michael Pietsch, soon-to-be CEO of the traditional publisher Hachette Book Group, disagrees. "I think we're in a golden age for books — reading, writing and publishing," he tells Cornish. "And the ways that publishers can work to connect readers with writers now are the kinds of things that publishers have dreamt of doing since Gutenberg first put down a line of type."
Pietsch joins Cornish to discuss how marketing sets a publishing deal apart from the self-publishing model.
Interview Highlights
On why writers pick publishers over self-publishing
Read and/or listen and learn more
6 comments:
I am glad to see this discussion and agree with John that TP has forfeited their moral imperative to lead. As a small-run author with some academic-type, nonfiction titles I know TPs not only have nothing to offer me, and would never consider one of my projects they are so addicted to blockbusters and such, but actually are on the other side opposing a lot of what I advocate: competition, variety, open marketplace of ideas. Case in point: After publishing When Scotland Was Jewish and Jews & Muslims in British Colonial America with McFarland I prepared "chunk" versions of the indexes for separate publication on Amazon Create Space and Kindle. McFarland asked me to withdraw them as undercutting sales of the traditionally published books. There's got to be a parable in here, don't you think?
Donald - Apparently there is something to the old adage that bad things eventually catch up and happen to bad people :)
If TP is to survive AT ALL, they are going to have to blow up their old business model and rebuild their thinking from the ground up.
Hi everyone, I'm new to the group but I've been writing professionally since I was 16...which makes me even more confused about what's going on in "Traditional Publishing" today...In my opinion, the tragedy here is that publishing like other kinds of communications (i.e. newspapers, broadcasting) went "corporate"--anjd so the bottom line because the standard by which everything was to be judged....you know the story; how they fired all the old editors, stopped promoting their writers, and dropped anyone who didn't steal a lot of books. Pretty soon, all they had was established "name" authors..who finally figured out that since the publishers were no longer doing anything for them (i.e. promotions, book signings) they could be the ones profiting just from their names...now the traditional publishers are on the ropes. And they have nobody to blame but themselves...The problem is, since now ANYONE can self-publish, how can the reading public know who to read? Who';s good? And who's bad? If everyone can be published today, who is there to set the standards?
Mary Manilla
Mary,
"In my opinion, the tragedy here is that publishing like other kinds of communications (i.e. newspapers, broadcasting) went "corporate"--anjd so the bottom line because the standard by which everything was to be judged....you know the story; how they fired all the old editors, stopped promoting their writers, and dropped anyone who didn't steal a lot of books." --- Big publishing has always been 'corporate' to a degree; but, you are right , in my opinion, RE TP abandoning their committment to authors, especially developing new authors and supporting them with marketing resources, etc.
"...since now ANYONE can self-publish, how can the reading public know who to read? Who';s good? And who's bad? If everyone can be published today, who is there to set the standards?"
The reading public is far from stupid and they will discover what and who to read by simply doing what they like to do: READING. They are now their own gatekeepers and it's about time. There are free samples galore to read before they buy AND the prices are much cheaper without all the wasted overhead --- Plus the authors get to keep higher royalties (70%) of book prices. Even though the book prices are cheaper, authors can make more money as indies if they play their cards right :)
I don't think there is any battle between TPs and ebooks. If TPs are in a battle, it is with the inevitability of change. Dalton is gone. Barnes & Noble is going. Soon, we will be left with boutiques selling coffee table books and antiquarian books only. As bookstores go out of business, TPs are going to be forced more and more into bed with their principal competitor, Amazon. Interesting, isn't it.
Jack - Thanks for your comment :) I see you like sailing --- I do too, being from Key West.
Hopefully B&N will survive by getting more into digital and academic (print) offerings --- I still like print; and since digital has pushed print into new and more efficient technological advances, perhaps it will survive :)
TP's don't need to get into bed with Amazon, they need to put up their own digital bookstores and improvise their own online prowess to compete with Amazon --- better for the industry and the consumer!
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