Head in the Clouds?
Published August 22nd, 2009 | 
There’s a new buzzword floating around the Internets of late: “Cloud Publishing” or “Cloud-based Publishing”. In a nutshell, this is a method of self-publishing that combines social media, database management and print-on-demand distribution. It’s being tauted as the next wave, the future of publishing and the last nail in the coffin of Big Publishing. Advocates include former Soft Skull honcho, Richard Nash and Hugh McGuire co-founder of the start-up Book Oven. It’s innovative and intriguing. But, there is a tendency among cheerleaders of the innovative and intriguing to get overly exciting by a concept before it’s really been tested and I’m wondering if the advocates of cloud-based publishing aren’t, perhaps, blowing their loads a little too soon.
No one with any sense is arguing that mainstream publishing isn’t a dying animal — an antiquated beast relying on a 20th century business model in a 21st century economy which is driven by 21st century technology. No one is arguing the point that this beast is out of touch with book readers, seeing them only as mindless consumers of a manufactured product who can’t tell the difference between a manifesto on skin care and fashion by Paris Hilton and the Great American Novel.
But, what is also undisputed is this:
Print-on-demand has yet to supplant traditional publishing and the method of choice for printing and distributing books. While it’s probably true that many of the 300000 or so books produced each year come from well-meaning self-publishers using services like Booksurge or Author Solutions, most of the books actually bought by readers still come from traditional publishers. Right now, there are thousands of aspiring writers browsing the Internet for self-publishing services the way one might browse for insurance quotes, but what will they get for their money and their sweat? Even as innovation causes problems for a publishing industry in denial, it has done very little to solve problems for writers and readers.
Sure, handheld devices have expanded the market for e-books, but e-books haven’t supplanted real hardcopy books and still make-up a very small niche market.
Sure, blogs and ezines have impacted newspapers and paper magazines but, truth be told, the readership of both was in decline before the Internet came into being and despite their troubles, newspapers are still being read and new magazines are being created even as old ones close their doors.
What that tells me is that people are still heavily invested in the old regime. The Internet has neither saved traditional publishing nor destroyed it. The salvation or destruction of tradional publishing may have more to do with the old institutions’ own denial than anything else.
Over the last decade, blogging has lead to more blogs — not necessarily more good blogs. POD has lead to more books produced — not necessarily more good books. The alternative to traditional publishing currently is that blogs are free and no one wants to pay money for something they can get for free (and you can’t offer something for free indefinitely unless it’s free to produce and you’re not interested in making money), ebooks and POD books cost too much. As such, the alternative isn’t really satisfying the needs of the reading public anymore than traditional publishing outlets are.
If cloud-based publishing leads to more quality books being produced and provides a cost-effective method of putting those books into the hands of readers at a fair price then I say, “Great.” However, that remains to be seen.
The Eunuch in the Library
Published August 21st, 2009 | There’s a rather interesting article posted over at The Huffington Post about the current state of publishing. It’s author, Tom Matlack, has some harsh words for the mainstream American publishing industry and, while Big Publishing is deserving of much of the criticism it’s attracted of late, I do find that Matlack’s whiny, petulant, self-serving rant is uncalled for in this instance.
Matlack’s premise that his anthology project was universally rejected by every notable publisher he submitted the project to simply because “men don’t read” is somewhat disingenuous. While it’s probably true that women do make up the highest percentage of the book-buying public, men do read. Mostly men read non-fiction. History, sports, political memoirs, etc. And the fiction they do read tends to fall somewhere in the thriller category for the most part. As such, the prediction that men wouldn’t want to read Matlock’s anthology is probably dead-on accurate. Anthologies, in general, do not sell well — either to male or female readers. An anthology of first-person accounts by men “with stories to tell about fathers, sons, husbands and providers at this turning point in man-history”? Who the fuck would read that? I’m a guy and a voracious reader who’ll read just about anything and I’d just as soon stick a fork in my eye as read that shit. After all, I know first-hand what it’s like to be a guy so I don’t really need to read about it. See, I have this thing called a penis that is a constant reminder that I am male. I have no interest in sitting around a campfire beating Robert Bly’s drum swapping “guy stories” about how tough it is to be a man in this world or reading stories written by other men who do.
Seriously, instead of bitching about the publishers who won’t publish his pet project, perhaps Matlack should see how many eunuchs are visiting the public library these days.
Besides hasn’t there been similar projects in the past? I’m sure there have been. How many of those books lit-up the bestseller lists? I predict that Matlack will spend far more money producing and promoting this project than he will ever receive from it. And that’s not the fault of Big Publishing or celebrities book deals or women who read chick lit or male readers who’d rather read the latest Vince Flynn novel.
This Made Me Laugh
Published August 19th, 2009 | About a year ago (more like 8 months ago), I wrote about this Internet company that had tried to sell me one of my own dot.coms I’d been cheated out of years ago. Well, that same company just emailed me this afternoon (a few minutes ago) offering to sell my old domain back to me yet again:
We are selling the domain name 13thwr.com. Since you own 13thwr.org if you would also like the more desirable .com we are making it available. The one time cost is $29.95. That includes a year of registration and transfer of ownership to you. To purchase or to learn more go to:
If you pass on this opportunity someone else could purchase this domain and it may not be available again.
If you are not interested there is no need to respond. We will not contact you again regarding 13thwr.com.
(Well . . . at least not until next year, right?)
If you read my previous blog post this subject, you will note that the price keeps coming down. Originally, the price offered was $200, then $99.95 — now, $29.95. That makes me laugh. After nearly five years, they are still trying to sell this domain. The domain has no value to anyone but me since I own the website that is associated with this domain. I can’t imagine a smart person buying this domain ever (and they’ve yet to find a person dumb enough to buy it so . . .). Me, I might consider buying it for $5.00 as that would actually be a bargain, but I don’t really need it and wouldn’t consider it even for that price unless I could transfer it out of the hands of this company.
