I just finished reading an article by Joanna Penn on the rise of Indie authors (from her keynote speech at the Publishing Innovation conference), and how this helps the publishing industry. Since I am, and plan to continue to be, an Indie author, the title alone caught my eye! How cool if some little thing that I can do will help an industry that I would like to see stay healthy!
You can see Joanna’s article here - http://www.thecreativepenn.com/2012/03/22/rise-of-indie/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+TheCreativePenn+(The+Creative+Penn)&utm_content=Google+Reader.
I loved her comment that on sites like Amazon.com that customers are now the gatekeepers via their ability to review.
(Side note: There evidently is a small scale war going on in the Amazon.com forums over whether “friends and family” should be doing reviews, and whether they are too biased. There also seems to be an issue with noting whether material was actually purchased, or was promotional copy. I review on both – I actually prefer to purchase, so there is no question hat my reviews are based on my thoughts, and not some hidden (or not so hidden) agenda. Amazon now has a little button that reviews can click if they are reviewing something purchased from Amazon.com. I imagine that this is meant to give some kind of credibility to the review – I am not sure that I agree with this.)
Joanna lists several positive things about independent publishing, including a higher percentage of royalties going to the author, ability to follow sales figures daily on the back end (a HUGE bonus, IMHO), and the ability to achieve global sales.
Included in this article were Joanna’s notes on the talk given by Anthony Forbes Watson, MD, of Pan Mac Millan, on self-publishing. Food for thought here.
Take a look at Joanna’s article, and see what you think.
© April 2012 Bonnie Cehovet
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