The death of publishing

[SFG75]

I guess it won't occur......at least in the mind of some.

Reports of publishing's death are exaggerated; Susan Zakin (http://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/page5/reports_of_publishings_death_are_exaggerated_20121 207/)

No matter what "model" comes up, I can't help but get the general feel that the writers will get screwed. Globalization and "world is flat" models will turn the next Keats into a starbucks barista with the same amount of pay.

[DocHeart]

The world will go for whatever it perceives to carry more value. It doesn't really matter whether any number of people feel that doing things the old-fashioned way is best -- if e-publishing represents greater value to the industry and the consumers, printed books will eventually become obsolete.

I love the printed book as much as the next fella, don't get me wrong. But in times like these it's more advisable for writers to adapt rather than whine. Incidentally, if the poetry of Keats and the siht that I write were both put on iBook Store at the same price, guess which one would sell more, and guess who would have readers anxious for the next downloadable collection...

Best,
DH

[RicMisc]

I don't think the publishing industry is dead at all. It might have taken a set-back in recent years due to the availability of free ebooks but it will most likely survive. We have seen the same thing happen in the music industry. Five to ten years ago the music industry thought it wasn't going to make it another few years, and yet here we are. However, they have had to adapt their strategies and that's what the publishing industry will have to do too. But even without reforming the industry there are still massive amounts of books sold everyday. A lot of people don't have ereaders, don't want them or don't know how to acquire free ebooks.

The argument that there are a lot of aspiring writers having to work three jobs to keep from going under. That is nothing new, has it not always been like this in creative industries. There are loads of aspiring musicians that have to work three jobs too, that is just the way it is. Making it in these industries is about being in the right place at the right time, together with having some skill of course (though Fifty Shades has shown us that even that is no longer a requirement). Anyway, the industry will be just fine. Times are changing and that's the way it is. It won't be the end of publishing and writers or of record labels and artists.

[Emil Miller]

I guess it won't occur......at least in the mind of some.

Reports of publishing's death are exaggerated; Susan Zakin (http://www.truthdig.com/arts_culture/page5/reports_of_publishings_death_are_exaggerated_20121 207/)

No matter what "model" comes up, I can't help but get the general feel that the writers will get screwed. Globalization and "world is flat" models will turn the next Keats into a starbucks barista with the same amount of pay.

Thanks for the quote, it underlines the problem for writers in today's digital world. Some years ago, I wrote a novel about how a great writer's work is used and abused for the benefit of corporate America regardless of its intrinsic value. The upside is that, whereas publishers' agents were able to ignore great, or even immediately profitable writers, they are now being outstripped by small independent Internet companies who are prepared to publish novels such as my own which I do not consider great writing but is, nevertheless, instructive about the way the mass mentality is manipulated.

[JBI]

It's this weird misconception that there were historically a lot of high paid authors, musicians, and artists. The only few high paid poets I can think of in English are Longfellow, Byron and Pope. Others had day jobs, though there are a few who made ends meet (Eliot, though his money came from publishing).

The Victorian era saw the birth of publishing, and even if it dies, it will do nothing to the real production of work. Joyce got his money from fans, notably a fan, and historically all authors tended to either get paid by their fans (usually rich aristocrats, or commissioners) and rarely by the reading mass public (which is a new phenomenon anyway).

The best of works in our canon circulated in either manuscript or live performance (Shakespeare was banking on money from live performance, Donne was unpublished just handing verses to friends). The idea that we somehow had this long tradition of books and authors making money is ridiculous. Shakespeare is not an author, he is an actor and dramatist - he does not get paid for the play based on how many read it, but how many nights in fills up on stage - it is an oral form of literature.

Now, with the internet, putting a book online is easy - and production of the physical text, meaning the digital copy, is virtually free (you need online storage and upload space for a small file, which in today's market is free on many sites). Selling a text like this, however, is near impossible.

What I see happening is either we follow the Chinese model of pay-per-character (which exists on numerous sites) and relies on the reputation of the author through their own means to get published (usually they put out a few chapters and people catch on and pay for the rest, or don't), or they use alternative mediums to generate revenue (for instance, movie deals, television adaptations, etc.). What we consider publishing is undoubtedly transitioning to digital sharing.

Now, for the serious author, the occupation of novelist is probably going to be destroyed. Harry Potter as a phenomenon of book sales will probably yield to Harry Potter as a franchise of movies and toys, and snacks, and live events. Those who want to make the big buck are going to know the money comes from movies, and not from novels.

But anyway, lets be real, who ever got rich writing? Very few people, and they relied on mass-publicity, either from pre-existing reputation (such as Bill Clinton's biography) or a publisher's magic and ensuing publicity (Dan Brown, for instance). Very few have ever made big money self-published without mass advertisement. Harry Potter was the most advertized book ever as the installments were coming out (though the first book relied a lot on word of mouth). One could still look for promotion with digital texts.

For instance, you pay a commission to a firm to advertise for you, or you pay a publisher to get you on the front page at amazon, or in people's mail boxes, or whatever. That is how publishing works. Then you pay your agent to sell your book to the film company.

Basically what has happened is those without means for publicity will no longer self-finance the binding and distribution of a unsellable text. The scam-style marketing of Eco's Foucault's Pendulum is the loser. Not publishers, not authors.

In fact, with no production value, the biggest losers are presses, who now are obsolete. Somewhere like Canada will only stop the pirating of books when finally they stop making their sales tax on imported cultural works (which will happen, though nafta is still iffy on the subject). Digitalization only gives more rights to readers, who now if they think the book is overpriced can easily procure a bootlegged copy. The percentage of money going to the author will undoubtedly increase (the first book may be commissioned to a publisher for an inflated amount for publicity, but if you are a successful author, your book can pretty much self-publicize and the author would hypothetically be privy to a bigger sum). Translators and editors are now probably going to be brought out of the margin, and be entitled to more money (a good translation sells a lot more copies, especially if it is into English, and a good editor can bring an already established author from Ok to Great).

That being said, I am a poetry reader. Poets pretty much have always had day jobs. The poet who writes poems for money is a fool. There is no money in poetry, and not a single high-paid poet around, though prizes help. Poetry does not change. Poets will still need to rely on foundational grants or day jobs to get on with their lives, their art, now 1000x more accessible and available. I will no longer need to pay 15$ for a volume when 3$ will be enough. The poet will get the same lousy 2$ and still make no money. If anything it will encourage more reading.

Libraries will become super-accessible, as their files are put on the internet. I suspect books rather than be sold page by page will be sold to a major library, who will put them out for rent - lets say a paid subscription as was seen in early Victorian publishing. If you want to read the new Dan Brown, you have to have a library access for the digital file. The digital file then is sold to the distributing library who then makes money on renewed subscriptions and interest in the product. That's what happened with films anyway.

Nobody will spend 500$ a month on books when they could just pay 25$ a month to a library who will distribute to them an infinite amount. Already serious readers like me have become involved in such enterprise. If I paid for every book I read in entirety (meaning, from start to finish) I would be out probably 5000$ a year if I was buying new copies at market rate in Canada, maybe more. If I bought every book I started or read part of, maybe 15 000$. Now, that is not including special collections. All my reading and borrowing was done at an exclusive library (Robarts, in the University of Toronto, particularly the Cheng Yu T'ong East Asian Library) - I paid for access, and I got what I needed. All serious research is done in such fashion - serious readers very rarely own their own libraries and own every book they read.

The exception would perhaps be Umberto Eco, whose great sales from his works have allowed him the purchase of a private library of physical texts. Soon, it will all be online, and we will merely pay per month. The competition will be then over who represents which authors, and who gets the business from the reader. If Dan Brown was only available on the Kindle, and not the Kobo or the Sony, then all his fans would be forced to buy the Kindle, and subscribe to that company.

Now if Dan brown was only available from Amazon and not Barnes and Noble, then everyone would subscribe to Amazon. The problem is of competition. There needs to be enough "sources" of books and subscriptions to allow freedom from price fixing. The market can only handle so much before somebody prints the thing out themselves, or copies it, so prices will be kept in check by cross-dealing and lawyers and agents. The right to distribute digital text will become the traded commodity in publishing.

[mortalterror]

A few writers became rich from writing. Sir. Walter Scott was probably one of the first, starting in the early nineteenth century. Balzac got rich but he wrote about a hundred novels, so maybe if he'd only written 20 books he might have just done alright. Dickens wrote episodically for newspapers and then got paid again when they bound his works into novel form. Tolstoy did this too, but he was fabulously wealthy to begin with. Mark Twain made a couple of small fortunes writing. Whenever a business venture left him bankrupt and badly in debt he would write his way out of it, although he augmented his income with a number of public speaking engagements. I may be wrong but Yeats and Tennyson might have done well by their writing, though Yeats dabbled in the theater and Tennyson might have had a stipend as a poet laureate. Samuel Johnson doesn't seem to have been well off or even totally secure until after the king gave him a post as a chronicler or something. Pope made a mint translating Homer as you said. Stephen King is obviously worth somewhere in the range of 400 million. And while Hemingway died with about a million dollars to his estate, that wasn't exceptionally rich for 1961, even if it does come out to almost a hundred grand a book. Victor Hugo was a millionaire from his novels, plays, and poetry. Goethe probably made good money off his royalties too, but luckily he was heavily connected with the aristocracy and got good jobs with numerous patrons. Alexander Dumas grew wealthy, but I believe he lost it all in the end.

[JBI]

A few writers became rich from writing. Sir. Walter Scott was probably one of the first, starting in the early nineteenth century. Balzac got rich but he wrote about a hundred novels, so maybe if he'd only written 20 books he might have just done alright. Dickens wrote episodically for newspapers and then got paid again when they bound his works into novel form. Tolstoy did this too, but he was fabulously wealthy to begin with. Mark Twain made a couple of small fortunes writing. Whenever a business venture left him bankrupt and badly in debt he would write his way out of it, although he augmented his income with a number of public speaking engagements. I may be wrong but Yeats and Tennyson might have done well by their writing, though Yeats dabbled in the theater and Tennyson might have had a stipend as a poet laureate. Samuel Johnson doesn't seem to have been well off or even totally secure until after the king gave him a post as a chronicler or something. Pope made a mint translating Homer as you said. Stephen King is obviously worth somewhere in the range of 400 million. And while Hemingway died with about a million dollars to his estate, that wasn't exceptionally rich for 1961, even if it does come out to almost a hundred grand a book. Victor Hugo was a millionaire from his novels, plays, and poetry. Goethe probably made good money off his royalties too, but luckily he was heavily connected with the aristocracy and got good jobs with numerous patrons. Alexander Dumas grew wealthy, but I believe he lost it all in the end.

But I mean, from just literature, the first is probably Walter Scott (who cheated by printing his books in numerous volumes so lending libraries could cash in more) - but even so, until the 19th century writing was not seen as a particular career. Poetry has never really been a "career" as few got super-rich, and most, if not all had day jobs - Yeats was a school inspector, for instance.

Now, though some got rich in the modern era,they did so mostly in novels, and it was rarely the particularly good authors who cashed in the most. Proust was virtually unsold. Faulkner was a financial mess. Novelists had some leeway, but many turned to film and grants for sustenance.

Professional writing today for money is usually commissioned, from what I can gather, like publishing romance novels under someone else's name or writing technical manuals. Very few books make people rich, very few, and yet every housewife with a computer dreams of being the next J. K. Rowling.

[dark desire]

@JBI

And what about piracy? The way it is in movies right now, it will be very convenient that way for the books as well. But then that will hurt creative artists. I don't know what is being done to stop piracy. I don't see piracy very negatively. Simple reason being that the work becomes available to a much wider audience.

[stlukesguild]

It's this weird misconception that there were historically a lot of high paid authors, musicians, and artists.

Visual art is another game altogether for the simple reason that the traditional visual arts have always retained the element of being a luxury craft and depended far more upon wealthy collectors than a market based upon the whims of the masses. Most "old masters" made a decent living... akin to that they might have made as a skilled carpenter or goldsmith. Standards were incredibly high and rigorous and controlled by the guilds. The patrons, in most instances, were wealthy and educated aristocrats, clergy... the church and various regional governmental entities. With the rise of the Dutch burgher class we see the development of the "middle-man" and art begins the move away from artists working directly for the wealthy patron toward art as a commodity sold on the open market by dealers. As a result of this the guilds lost their power and we get a situation where art education is no longer under rigorous control and individual artists begin to follow their own "vision" more. As a consequence, we also get artists such as William Blake, among others, who fail to really succeed within the market system. Still, a good many artists did very well for themselves whether we are talking of Delacroix, Ingres, Turner, etc... There is the image of the Impressionists as a bunch of artists starving in a Parisian garret... unaccepted by the salons. While this might have been true of these painters at age 20 or even 30... by middle age they were very much in demand and quite financially successful. Van Gogh, quite likely, would have died quite well off... his paintings selling very well just a few short years after his death following a short 10-year span as a painter. Picasso was a millionaire by his 40s and a great majority of the artists whose names are familiar from Modernism did well in financial terms. Beyond these, there are always those artists with a definite mastery of realism or a decorative style who are able to do reasonably well in the market. Of course if an artist insists on making conceptual installations about the Holocaust or working in some esoteric manner that most would find "ugly" there is no chance of success in the marketplace unless one makes it into the top tier galleries.

[JCamilo]

It also depends on what means "getting rich", 1000 years ago, being protected by a king, queen or other powerful noble was "getting rich" and we have some writers that were "rich" (and most writers needed a "humanistic" formation, so they wrote not just poetry...)...

But the bigger misconception is that publishing - in the end, making the text public - is ending or was selective. Even Keats... People seems to forgot he died poor, quite unread, completely lost. It would not be much different now (or maybe, he would post in the forum and we would snob him here, killing him again).

[tonywalt]

It also depends on what means "getting rich", 1000 years ago, being protected by a king, queen or other powerful noble was "getting rich" and we have some writers that were "rich" (and most writers needed a "humanistic" formation, so they wrote not just poetry...)...

But the bigger misconception is that publishing - in the end, making the text public - is ending or was selective. Even Keats... People seems to forgot he died poor, quite unread, completely lost. It would not be much different now (or maybe, he would post in the forum and we would snob him here, killing him again).

Keats would be have been guaranteed lots of constructive criticism here-no doubt. ("Temper down the whole romantic thing for f#$ks sake, otherwise not bad"-stuff like that.

[Jassy Melson]

I think for the average writer, the best way to go is self-publishing. Things being what they are financially, at least the writer who self-publishes has a tangible object in his or her hand--their own work which they created and put together. I think most writers had better stop thinking of making a living from writing. The odds are against it.

[AuntShecky]

The poet who writes poems for money is a fool. There is no money in poetry, and not a single high-paid poet around, though prizes help.

"There is no money in poetry, but then there is no poetry in money."
--Robert Graves

[tonywalt]

It also depends on what means "getting rich", 1000 years ago, being protected by a king, queen or other powerful noble was "getting rich"

That's still the definition, just a change of titles, characters and setting.

[JBI]

It's this weird misconception that there were historically a lot of high paid authors, musicians, and artists.

Visual art is another game altogether for the simple reason that the traditional visual arts have always retained the element of being a luxury craft and depended far more upon wealthy collectors than a market based upon the whims of the masses. Most "old masters" made a decent living... akin to that they might have made as a skilled carpenter or goldsmith. Standards were incredibly high and rigorous and controlled by the guilds. The patrons, in most instances, were wealthy and educated aristocrats, clergy... the church and various regional governmental entities. With the rise of the Dutch burgher class we see the development of the "middle-man" and art begins the move away from artists working directly for the wealthy patron toward art as a commodity sold on the open market by dealers. As a result of this the guilds lost their power and we get a situation where art education is no longer under rigorous control and individual artists begin to follow their own "vision" more. As a consequence, we also get artists such as William Blake, among others, who fail to really succeed within the market system. Still, a good many artists did very well for themselves whether we are talking of Delacroix, Ingres, Turner, etc... There is the image of the Impressionists as a bunch of artists starving in a Parisian garret... unaccepted by the salons. While this might have been true of these painters at age 20 or even 30... by middle age they were very much in demand and quite financially successful. Van Gogh, quite likely, would have died quite well off... his paintings selling very well just a few short years after his death following a short 10-year span as a painter. Picasso was a millionaire by his 40s and a great majority of the artists whose names are familiar from Modernism did well in financial terms. Beyond these, there are always those artists with a definite mastery of realism or a decorative style who are able to do reasonably well in the market. Of course if an artist insists on making conceptual installations about the Holocaust or working in some esoteric manner that most would find "ugly" there is no chance of success in the marketplace unless one makes it into the top tier galleries.

For every old master there are 100 unknowns. And even so, they hardly relied on a mass public, but an inflated collecting class.

China reached that stage earlier by the mid-Ming where collectors and fakes were flourishing. The Canadian Ming historian Timothy Brook is about to publish a large book on the subject - basically because the art of spotting the fake, and spotting the true "gem" amongst the circulating art was restricted to a class of wealthy, educated, connected people, the standards we use to judge art are solidified into a grid based on the whims of this class. Anybody can waste money on an expensive fake, but it takes the true master to spot the masterpiece. As such masterpiece becomes defined on the whims of the master-collector class. We have now a standard that emerges.

The same to an extent can be said about Western painting. The wealthy patron decides what is purchased and what isn't. Then, the style which is purchased becomes the standard to be matched, and the trend followers work within those grounds. Radical artists, like Blake, rarely would sell.

Still, painting and writing are not the same, in that most writers were not commercial but social authors until the 19th century. Pope got rich, but Dryden was rich from the beginning, and made his money in theatre anyway.

Now, if we take a performance art as the desired product, for instance, a movie in cinema, not on home video, piracy and all the problems we mentioned are no longer important - the big cash in in cinema is ticket sales, not DVD copies. The big cash in in music used to be Concert sales, not tracks on Itunes.