2007 The Beginning of the end? (begun in Novels)

Garpy · Jan 7, 2007

I've been doing a lot of reading around the book business recently and my spider-senses are tingling.

A lot has already been happening this last year that I suspect will set things in motion in 2007; the google thing - digitizing book content, the rise and rise of homebrew media (eg: YouTube), the growing credibility of self-published POD books, the shrinking market for traditional brick-n-mortar book shops, the first eReaders coming to market...etc etc

Let me make it clear, I'm published with one of the big name UK publishers, the first book is doing well, the second is coming out soon...and I have every reason to have a nauseous little smug smile on my face, to be happy with the way the business works right now, and to argue that nothing much is going to change.

But I suspect it is all about to change. I suspect in 2007 we're going to witness the start of many changes;

1. Retailers will continue to merge, consolidate and shrink, perhaps ending up looking like internet cafes printing books on demand (I blogged about that recently:link )
2. Digital books will pick up. It may not by Sony's eReader link that everyone rushes out to buy. Apple may well enter the fray and design a reader, that becomes the must-have gadget.
3. Without having to invest in large print runs, and buy shelf space, the book market will open up for small indie publishers and self-publishing authors.

If you look at the music industry in Europe (I suspect it's the same in the states, but I can't say for sure, not living there an' all)...any old band now has a chance of success and fame if they snare people's attention with a funny little promo on YouTube and a catchy little tune that spreads like a snotty cold across MySpace. You can become a household name with a song that cost a £100 in studio time, and a homemade video...if, your ideas are good enough.

Well, that model, I think, is what awaits the book industry. A digital marketplace of PDF files, downloaded from a literary equivalent of iTunes, and customers will either buy the licence to play it on their reader, or nip to the local Book PodStop and get a fresh print.

For established midlist authors, it means we'll have to compete on a more level playing field with thousands of new authors. It will mean (hopefully) much more variety, much more originality, but...I suspect it will also mean an influx of a lot of dross that customers will have to sift through.

I think actually, YouTube is a very good example of what we can expect; hundreds of thousands of bored kids whingeing into their webcams, but dotted amongst that...the work of some incredibly inventive, creative kids who completely shame the professional writers and producers of TV content at the moment.

Scary times ahead, but hopeful times. For quality writers who've yet to be picked up by an agent or publisher, because they're not chasing this year's hip bandwagon, or because they're work is confusingly cross-genre and hard to market, or simply because they haven't mastered writing a decent query...I think there's real hope ahead.

For writers like me, that jumped the hoops and got published, it'll be not so good. I'll have more competition, I'll have to work that much harder to make my books stand out of the crowd.

Anyway...enough of the essay. What do people think about this? Are we on the cusp of a revolution in publishing?

Christine N. · Jan 7, 2007

I hate e-books. Not the content, just reading them on my computer. Or digital media, or whatever. I spend enough time in front of my computer, reading is for entertainment. I still like the feel of paper in my hands, turning actual pages.

Until they make one that will stand up to being inside my purse, going to the beach or reading in the tub, e-readers will not take over print media. But I hear that erotica is seeing a huge jump in readership in the e-book market; pubs like Ellora's Cave are making money hand over fist.

For the rest... I kind of see that. But will people search out books by people they don't know? I have a MySpace, I've gotten myself some friends. I've seen website hits go up, new people checking it out, but that hasn't translated into sales that I know of.

The problem with self-publishing (and I agree we're hearing more and more about it, it's getting 'street credit') is that there is no gatekeeper. The market will be flooded with poorly written, unedited crap. But I must admit I've seen a few books that may in fact be self published (on MySpace) that do look interesting, and that I will be purchasing from Amazon once my to read list shrinks a bit.

I think people who consider themselves readers will not be swayed by the new self-publishing craze. They demand a certain standard. Now, if self and small press (or micro-press) publishers offer the same discount and returnablitiy that big names do, well, I can see it gaining popularity.

I think I just talked myself into a circle.

I hope more indie bookstores pop up. Seeing as how big box brick and mortars seem to be getting fewer and farther between in some areas, I would hope indies would fill in the gap. We have one here, it's much closer to my house than the big box, but my aunt hits the big box because she's got the discount card.

James D. Macdonald · Jan 7, 2007

For established midlist authors, it means we'll have to compete on a more level playing field with thousands of new authors. It will mean (hopefully) much more variety, much more originality, but...I suspect it will also mean an influx of a lot of dross that customers will have to sift through.

Don't worry about the thousands of new authors. Worry about the now out-of-print backlist of everyone ever published since publishing was invented. Those are proven good (for some value of good). A random pulp story from the 'thirties is probably a mile better than a random slush book written today.

Here's one thing to remember: the publishing industry is constantly changing. I've seen massive changes since I started this game twenty years ago -- I expect changes will continue.

Nevertheless, the number of people with the talent to actually tell entertaining stories remains small. Information wants to be free, but entertainment wants to get paid for. I'm not terribly worried.

Jamesaritchie · Jan 7, 2007

2007

Trouble is, merges and consolidations haven't caues shrinking, but expansions.

And there's simply no evidenec at all that digital or POD books are growing in popularity. At least not to any appreciable degree.

Hnestly, all tis sound exactly like teh same predictions I've been hearing for at least fifteen years, yet each year since then has actually expanded the book industry as we know it.

Paper books, large print runs, regualr old bookstores, and all the rest, will stay with us until someone comes along with something people want more. So far, no one has.

Things always change, but preditions on what will change are usually wrong, and prediction on when thinsg will change are pretty much always wrong.

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it," is still a good rule, and right now, at least, publishng not only ain't broke, it's working better than ever before.

RG570 · Jan 7, 2007

There was a CBC series about this called "The End Of Print". You can catch it on the CBC website still, I think. It's pretty interesting.

Anyway, according to that, the part of the industry that's really hurting is the newspaper. Books are fine, at least for now. Somehow I doubt everyone will abandon published books for more expensive, lower quality self published books. And youtube-- blegh. There's nothing worth watching on there. I don't see the big deal. It's a bunch of high school kids acting like idiots. Not a viable replacement for real music by real musicians, and books.

ChunkyC · Jan 7, 2007

I agree that traditional paper/bound books aren't in danger ... yet. But I think I know what the OP is getting at. There are signs that big changes might be on the horizon. How far off that horizon is, is anyone's guess. My feeling is that one piece of the puzzle isn't there yet: a reader that truly mimics the look of paper, if not the feel. If that happens, and there are screen technologies that look promising, we may see a sudden surge like we saw in regards to music with the advent of the iPod.

What I think will happen first is already starting to take hold: the distribution of audio books. Take a look at a site like podiobooks. To me, this is a hint of what is to come. I'd much rather listen to a book while driving to and from work than the typical radio drive-time drivel. Before the iPod, this was expensive and a bit unwieldy in that you had to swap out tapes or CDs. For example, my copy of Lawrence Block's Telling Lies for Fun and Profit is 6 cassettes, but if I can get around to ripping it to my iPod, I'll be able to listen to it from start to finish nonstop if I want. I already subscribe to half a dozen writing related podcasts and listen to them in the car almost exclusively.

There was free music for a while, but that has started to mature with iTunes and other similar services. The same thing could happen with audiobooks. Right now stuff is free, but it could easily follow the iTunes model and earn royalites for authors from that source as well as from print.

Or how about advertizing your print book? Many authors offer PDFs of the opening chapter, why not an audio file as well for the iPod crowd?

As writers, there are lots of opportunities out there to use electronic media to our benefit. We just have to see the possibilites.

engmajor2005 · Jan 7, 2007

Digital music is pratical; slap 30 gig worth of stuff on a player that will fit in your pocket and have at it. E-books are not, simple as that. If somebody comes up with something just as portable and interactive (marginal notes anyone?) as the book, then we'll see a change.

I do think that self-publishing and POD will be playing a big part in the future, but bad writing doesn't sell...at least not enough to be considered "competition." So while we're going to see more self-publication, I don't think it will be the industry-shaker that some think it will. That's not to say that all self-published stuff is bad, but as one poster pointed out already: there is no gatekeeper.

ModoReese · Jan 7, 2007

What I'm finding fascinating about your comparison to the music biz is that a few years ago the music business was analyzing that it would go in the direction of the publishing business. There was a large essay circulating talking about how the music business would be more "home-brewed" so to speak - less controlled by the majors. That indie labels would be more like small publishing houses, the returns overall would be less, record deals would be more reasonable. The biggest point was that music would split into two definite groups: style and substance. Essentially the mass market musicians that appealed to a wider range of people and the more "high brow" musicians and artists would be very different beasts.

It made a lot of sense at the time. This would have been about the mid 90s.

It sort of boggles my mind that this same idea that transformed/is transforming music was based on books, but is now impacting how people see the book industry and its future.

Michelle

Azure Skye · Jan 7, 2007

I wonder how far our digital age will go. This generation is growing up wired so I guess I can see how it could happen. But, as long as there are people like me on this earth -- prefer hard copy to reading on a computer screen -- there will still be books.

badducky · Jan 7, 2007

I don't think things will change quickly at all.

Until it is just as cost-effective to produce one professionally bound book instead of one-hundred thousand, we will see no major changes in the industry.

Remember that POD books often rely heavily on the promotional energy of the author. Thus, that author is not busy writing another book. With mainstream publishing, a marketing apparatus of many talented people with stable industry contacts exists to promote authors while the authors are busy writing another book.

This advantage will not go away anytime soon, even if self-publications explode.

The physical thing in your hand is not the whole equation.

PeeDee · Jan 7, 2007

E-book readers have been around for plenty of time now. Some awkward and unusable, some just fine and dandy. We have PalmPilots, don't we? You can read on that, if you must.

Paper books are doing fine. I see a lack of Barnes & Noble workers on the corner with cardboard signs going "COME to OUR STORE! Must FEED my KIDS!" In fact, mostly I just see the place full of people.

Things change and shift. I think the internet may be about to become a useful and recognizable part of the publishing world, if not this year than soon. I don't think this harbinges any doom, because "doom" is a gradual thing and can rarely be harbinged properly.

Actually, I think the internet will be useful for the short story market, the market of the radio drama (because they're screaming "podcast") and the market for serial stories. Novels, less so.

James is right about which end of the spectrum you need to look at as the competition. I'd be a lot more scared about my short story going up against a Back-In-Print short story by Samual R. Delany than I am about some shitsplat kid who thinks he can write real good and post it on the internet.

Tallymark · Jan 7, 2007

PeeDee said:
Paper books are doing fine. I see a lack of Barnes & Noble workers on the corner with cardboard signs going "COME to OUR STORE! Must FEED my KIDS!"

Actually, we all want to stand on corners and beg, but it's against company policy.

However, it's not because of anything going wrong with the bookstore or with sales, but because a large number of us lowly booksellers are poor starving college students. XD I can't speak for all stores, but my store is doing fine.

E-books may save you a trip to the bookstore and take up less space on the shelf, but y'know, I like having a shelf full of favorite books, and a lot of other people do too. And I like browsing through real books in a real bookstore. And it's weird, because with everything else in my life I am totally down with new technology; god knows I wouldn't survive without my ipod. But with books...there's really nothing like the simple pleasure of an actual book. As for POD...there's already plenty of that going on now, and most people only sell a handful of books. That's not likely to change.

David Wisehart · Jan 8, 2007

Free-market slushpile

I used to see POD publishing as little more than a free-market slushpile, but I've recently revised my opinion.

POD publishing expands the types of books that can be published (including bad books, but that's a given).

It's true that most self-published books never break out of the low triple digits, but some of those are books of quality with a small potential audience. Poetry, for example. How many people read last year's Pulitzer Prize winning poetry book before it won the prize? Or after?

Last week I published Valentino: a play in verse through Lulu.com. This is a book no traditional publisher would touch, unless it had already been a Broadway hit or Pulitzer Prize winner. Even play publishers want you to have had a professional production before publication. (My play has been selected for a New Works Festival, but I'm printing the book in advance of that.)

My goal in publishing the play is not to sell a million copies (that would be nice), but to get more exposure for the script, in hopes of achieving a professional, royalty-paying production.

This kind of publishing-as-marketing would have been much more difficult and expensive five years ago.

I've recently completed an epic fantasy novel, Devil's Lair, and don't know if I'd want to go the POD route with that. But I might. My beta readers love it, but warn that the book's vocabulary may be too challenging for the general reader. A couple of agents have been impressed by the writing but unimpressed by its commercial prospects.

If there are only five hundred people in the world who would like my book, POD publishing gives me a way to find those readers.

Garpy · Jan 8, 2007

An interesting spread of feedback.

Badducky said Until it is just as cost-effective to produce one professionally bound book instead of one-hundred thousand, we will see no major changes in the industry.

I think the sheer fact that not having to warehouse and ship stock will factor into the POD 'vending machine' model and provides a lot of economic incentive for the business template to drift towards that. Add to this the fact that retailers would be able to downsize shop floor space and reduce staff, then, the economic argument holds a little more weight.

With regard to eBooks, I think the tipping point will come when a few simple ergonomic details are dealt with; you can drop it in the bath and it still works, it's slim and light enough to slide into your jeans, the screen is large enough to provide a comfy read....that kind of stuff.

Anyway, IMHO, down the line - not sure how far though - there'd be two ways for a customer to enjoy a book; an eBook for the more tech-savvy, or a POD'd hardcopy for the more traditonal like-it-on-paper crowd. But the important thing in either case, is that books would no longer be printed in their tens of thousands, shipped by truck and train, and stocked in large retail outlets. Because that's all overhead, and if there's one thing I've learned, if a company can see a way to trim an unnecessary overhead, they will.

pepperlandgirl · Jan 8, 2007

As somebody who regularly hauls around several anthologies, the Riverside Shakespeare, and what feels like a million novels, I salivate over the thought of a decent e-reader and being able to purchase all my texts in electronic format. I'll be thinking about that today when I trek on down to the campus bookstore and have to drag several bags of books 1/2 mile back up to my office.

PeeDee · Jan 8, 2007

The only thing I've ever wanted an ebook reader for, thus far, is reading a slush pile. I'd love to dump the slush pile on one, go to the park, sit with some hormonally unstable mother geese by the lake, and read slush-pile entries.

badducky · Jan 8, 2007

Garpy said:
I think the sheer fact that not having to warehouse and ship stock will factor into the POD 'vending machine' model and provides a lot of economic incentive for the business template to drift towards that. Add to this the fact that retailers would be able to downsize shop floor space and reduce staff, then, the economic argument holds a little more weight.

Ah, but even in the "vending machine" model, the paper must come from somewhere, and someone must store it. Backstage in a bookstore is not quite as magical as you'd think because it's just a couple bins of damaged stock, a terrifying fridge and a few large piles of trash no one has taken out, yet. Every bit of floor space possible is dedicated to selling the product. In a vending machine model, the situation is reversed. Large amounts of paper and ink in storage, with a small sales area.

All you're doing is shifting around the warehousing. The cost of such a maneuver would be different - perhaps cheaper, perhaps not - but the cost difference would not be different enough to matter.

e-books, even if successfully created to meet your specs, do not solve any of the problems that plagues music. E-books do not make the product more portable. The product cannot generally be consumed in under ten minutes, thus one book is usually all one must carry. E-books are not more convenient because books are surprisingly durable (unlike even the best CD player) and even if they do break, one can replace a book for a relatively low price.

What problem does an e-book solve? Storage? Most people don't hoard books. I'm at my mom's house right now, and my parents are avid readers. They also tend to dump most of the books they've read at a local used book store. Occasionally something might get donated to the library. What they keep, they keep on bookshelves.

Shelving is the heart and soul of the lazy decorator. Books cover walls just fine, and books give any room a personal touch of your true self.

E-books do not solve any problems with the product like e-music does.

The day is coming. That day is not today, or even soon. Until it is just as cost effective to produce one unit as it is to produce one-hundred thousand, the current distribution model will be just fine. Even if the model changes, the quality control and marketing ability of publishing companies will out-perform the guy on the street. Thus, we midlisters will be just fine.

I'm also not scared of competing with history. We authors might adore dipping our toes in the language of history, but most consumers prefer words and products designed for them. HBO kicks TCM all over the Neilson Ratings, after all.

Efrddyl · Jan 8, 2007

E-Book costs?

Regarding e-books, I haven't seen the issue of cost addressed. If I have the choice between paying $7.99 for a paperback, and $7.50 for an e-book, I'm going to buy the paperback. Then I have something tangible and highly portable for my money. No DRM.

To be fair, I like having the ability to adjust the type size and all on my screen, but right now that's not enough of an advantage for me to buy an e-book. Maybe someone here has some insight on the pricing for e-books. I thought the idea was that they would be cheaper, because of not being printed.

I need to replace some of my classics, and I can't. They aren't in print, or the current edition is not the same. Would I buy backlist authors on e-books? If that was the only way I could get them, probably. But they better not be retooled, abridged, or inferior copies. I've been burned on rereleased CD's enough to be wary.

PeeDee · Jan 8, 2007

Badducky is right. When ebooks reach the useful level of an MP3 player, then we may see something. I still think that ebook readers are approaching a new issue (if it is an issue, which I really don't tink it is) from what's mostly still an old standpoint. It's like listening to MP3s, but your player still looks like a Discman, size and shape.

ChunkyC · Jan 8, 2007

badducky said:
e-books, even if successfully created to meet your specs, do not solve any of the problems that plagues music. E-books do not make the product more portable. The product cannot generally be consumed in under ten minutes, thus one book is usually all one must carry.

I generally have half a dozen books on the go at any one time. A novel or sometimes two, a couple of magazines, computer manuals for work, etc. There's no way I can cart all that around with me all the time. If I had a suitable e-reader, I could carry a whole library with me and read whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, wherever I wanted.

badducky said:
E-books are not more convenient because books are surprisingly durable (unlike even the best CD player) and even if they do break, one can replace a book for a relatively low price.

I agree, with the durability part anyway. Until an e-reader is created that won't snap in half if you sit on it, e-readers won't really catch on. But tech companies are already developing flexible displays that can even be folded like a sheet of paper. Mind you, they'll have to make all the other components like storage flexible too, and that's a ways off yet. Once that's done, it certainly will be far more convenient to carry a flexible reader the size of a single page than a few hundred pounds worth of printed books.

With all that said, I don't believe for a moment that e-books and e-readers will replace the printed book. I too love sitting with a beautifully bound volume, turning the crisp pages as I stay up too late. I don't think that will ever go out of vogue, but I also believe it is inevitable that an e-reader that mimics paper will be invented in the not-too-distant future, and that the electronic book will take its place as a legitimate media for distributing the works of writers. It may take a while, and will probably fill a niche like audiobooks do now, but it will happen. We should be ready to take advantage of it when it does.

badducky · Jan 8, 2007

e-book readers, too, have always proven difficult.

ok, john doe consumer, i want you to pay a hundred bucks for this e-book reader that needs batteries and might break so you can save a couple bucks every time you buy a book. You do not know how long your tech will last until it becomes obsolete.

Or, you can buy a nice trade paperback for fifteen bucks, and then another, and then another.

Guess what? E-book readers have been on the market over and over again and investors have collectively lost their shirts on the technology.

PeeDee · Jan 8, 2007

Okay, here's a supposition.

Supposing the internet does indeed become, as I've theorized before, the place where the short story market explodes into another golden age. Supposing further than in this short story market, on this fluid surface, we begin to see a sudden rise of good quality serial novels appearing.

An ebook reader, thin and comfortable, which I could sit in bed and access the updated stories of my favorite serials would be lovely. There's a use. Or, a la' podcasts, my ebook reader downloads updates of my favorite magazines, which happen to only be online. Delivery systems would change, since if your magazine is online (and still reaching subscribers) you are no longer pinned to a monthly schedule of any sort, since you don't have to make the printer's. You're still on some schedule, but it can be wildly different than it is in print.

THERE'S a use for an ebook reader.

ChunkyC · Jan 8, 2007

E-book readers have been on the market over and over again and investors have collectively lost their shirts on the technology.

That doesn't mean they'll never figure it out. The technology is still pretty young.

Then there'll be convergence ... imagine a flexible display you can fold up and stuff in your pocket, that is actually a full-fledged computer with wireless capability, and doesn't use batteries because the whole surface acts as a solar panel. Then imagine a city that is fully tricked out with wireless Internet access.

I envision sitting in a park reading a newspaper article on my e-sheet, and I take a break to check my messages. In there is one from Amazon, because I agreed to let them send me notifications. Hey, PeeDee's new novel is available! I thumb the image and his novel starts downloading and it's billed to my Amazon account. I close up the article and pop open PeeDee's novel the moment the download is complete and start reading. PeeDee has just sold a copy of his book, seconds after the reader (me) found out it was available. Heck, I could even subscribe to an author and automatically get his or her book the moment it is released, just like I do now with podcasts.

Pretty darn cool.

note: cross-posted with PeeDee

Cath · Jan 8, 2007

Little of which impacts the need for good new stories and writers. The technology may be changing, but our lust to read and learn isn't.

I don't care what format my work gets published in, as long as people read it.

ChunkyC · Jan 8, 2007

Cath said:
Little of which impacts the need for good new stories and writers.

Yes, indeed. All that is changing is, as PeeDee noted, the delivery system. And I truly think it is just becoming a new option for delivering writing to the reader, not replacing anything that currently exists, such as the printed book.

Technology is one thing, but even when the problems with reading electronically are overcome, it will still be the content that will determine whether or not it really catches on.

2007 The Beginning of the end? (begun in Novels)

keyboard monkey

haz a shiny new book cover

Your Genial Uncle

It's hard being green

Bang head here for service

Huh?

No Time For Chitchat, Kemosabe.

Where's my tea, please...?

keyboard monkey

American Aquarium Drinker

Where's my tea, please...?

No Time For Chitchat, Kemosabe.

Efrddyl

Where's my tea, please...?

It's hard being green

No Time For Chitchat, Kemosabe.

Where's my tea, please...?

It's hard being green

The mean one

It's hard being green