The old model buys books from authors and publishes them. It’s dying, just like all traditional print models.
The new model is more like a literary agent: edit, package, and market the text, in exchange for a portion of the profits (NOT royalties). The “publisher” doesn’t actually publish the book—Google and Amazon do, as a print-on-demand service.
Discuss.
It’s not elegant and it’s not sexy – it looks like a large photocopier – but the Espresso Book Machine is being billed as the biggest change for the literary world since Gutenberg invented the printing press more than 500 years ago and made the mass production of books possible. Launching today at Blackwell’s Charing Cross Road branch in London, the machine prints and binds books on demand in five minutes, while customers wait.
(via azspot)
Another side of the self-publishing argument: Steve Almond decided to self-publish a short, 15,000 word mixture of stories and essays after his editors balked at the idea. He got a designer friend to make a cover and prints copies using a POD Espresso Book Machine.
Almond writes:
Several years ago, musicians figured out that they didn’t need a big label to put their work into the world. They just needed great songs and the required chutzpah.
That’s now true of literature. Just as bands sell copies of their live performances, I foresee a day when authors will sell copies of the original work they just read.
On the flip side, though, musicians have more than one source of revenue: besides albums, many sell merchandise and concert tickets as well. That, and not many people have a designer friend ready to crank out six awesome covers for them.
The publishing industry is certainly changing, but the need for critical judgment, solid graphic design, and thorough editing will remain. Self-publishing shifts the risks of publishing onto the writer without any obvious rewards.
(via The Rumpus)
