I wrote this as a reply to Rob's post, but it's too long. Surprising, right?
I get your point. I do.
But people are leaving out what e-publishing offers.
Suddenly...I will get 100% control. That means no more title changes, covers of my choosing, leaving things the way that I want them.
It means writing what *I* want to write - not trying to think of the next high concept that will get me in the door, not trying to be aware of what I have to write for what market, not worrying over whether or not my new agent/editor will force me to write questionable content because that's how it's done; it suddenly means that everything is in my hands. It doesn't matter if another author has a book like mine. It doesn't matter if the publisher has taken on another book with similar content. It means I don't have to worry about the, "Oh, you're so close. But no thanks." None of that matters anymore.
Not for a second do I think it's easy. Not for a second do I imagine that I'll be making $100,000 next month. But...at least there are possibilities that didn't exist before. What if someone had told Amanda Hocking "This e-publishing thing is crap. It's too hard. Don't do it." Or Victorine Lieske? Or HP Mallory? Or Michael J. Sullivan? (All indie authors off the top of my head with recently acquired agents shopping deals for them, which means they *must* be outliers or anecdotal, right? ;) )
For the first time in a long time, I am *excited* again. Books I've been wanting to write, books of my heart, have been put aside because they won't work for certain markets. My Muse had gone silent. And suddenly the floodgates have opened. I have ideas, dialogues, scenes coming so quickly I can hardly write them down.
This isn't because New York doesn't want me. I don't know whether or not they do. I haven't tried. I don't have a drawer full of rejections. Not because I assume they will reject me, but because I haven't had anything to give them that I think will work. The midlist author is disappearing. It'd better be big or go home (see also: Ally Condie, Rob Wells, Stephenie Meyer).
Here's the reality: publishing is changing. Publishers will fight it tooth and nail for as long as they possibly can. But for generations that consume all their other media digitally, they will expect to consume their books digitally and they will be livid that the book they want costs $12.99 and is more expensive than the paperback. My mom got excited today by the possibility that she could get a certain author's books as e-books, until she saw all the prices. While a consumer may understand paying $25 for a hardback (they can look at the book and see the costs involved), there's nothing like that involved with e-books. Consumers will clamor for lower prices, and if traditional publishers refuse to give it to them, someone will come in and fill in the gap (see also: John Locke. Go to Amazon's Kindle Store. He's the guy that's got most of the Top 100 slots).
And the simple fact that I see ignored - there are people that no matter how hard they try, no matter how many times they submit to New York, are never, ever, ever going to get published. And before that meant languishing in obscurity with only your mom to read your books. Now it could mean that you might be like Tina Folsom and sell 100,000 books in less than one year by e-publishing all those New York-rejected books. And there are so many authors that are thrilled beyond belief to have just five people buy their book in a month. That means five strangers went out of their way and actually read something, paid for something, that previously just sat on someone's hard drive.
Publishing is hard. It's hard to go through New York and succeed, it's hard to do it yourself and succeed. But so what? Marketing? Up to me whether I'm with NY or just me. Accounting? For sure 100% accurate, because it's just me (NY tends to have a slight problem in this area). Cover? Plenty of excellent designers who can do it for me on the less expensive side (and there's even websites where you can bid the work out - a writer I know did that and got 150 covers to choose from). Editing? I'd be using a professional for that either way - one way means I get to keep the money I earn, the other I give up 90% (give or take) of the money in perpetuity.
It's not the same beast. E-readers have turned everything on its head. You asked how many authors are making a decent living on e-publishing - I would garner a guess that it's probably a tad more than make a living wage via traditional publishing.
I'm actually feeling a deep urgency to get started with this stuff because I want to get my foot in the door before other excellent authors figure out what's going on, before we get more midlisters and more bestsellers turning to this medium and suddenly there will be so much more competition.
So, never mind. Ignore everything I just said. As you were. ;)
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