Wake Up: Real Writers Are On Their Own

The Outrage of the Week is the revelation that Random House is out to screw people with their new self-publishing scheme.

Just Shut the Fuck Up. No, really.

For years I have screamed — screamed! — about how the Big 6/4 are out to screw writers.

The 1920s Scheme To Create A National Bookstore Chain

Continuing my research into Napoleon Hill, I came across a remarkable thing in an issue of American Stationer and Office Outfitter:

Prospectus of United Bookstores Co.

The following prospects, printed on a page leaflet, has been sent out by the United Bookstores Co. of America:

Organization Syndicate

An opportunity is presented to a limited number of persons interested in wider and more profitable book distribution to participate in a strictly business enterprise for this purpose by becoming members of a syndicate to promote the United Bookstores Company of America.

Quote: Kristine Kathryn Rusch

The Business Rusch: The Death of Publishing

You’re a rotating group of widgets that might make the publisher some money.

That’s the truth.

And she also explains why the print bastards haven’t yet died — and nearly convinces me.

Comment On The gTLD dotBOOK Domain Grab

Who’s After the dotBOOK Top Level Domain

Maybe we can stop this idiocy after all.

ICANN is asking for public comments: “Closed Generic” gTLD Applications

dotBOOK should not belong to any commercial entity.

The WTF TOS Of Bookish

The Savior of the Dying Traditional Book Industry launched today.

It’s called Bookish.

It was in private beta for the longest time.

Probably because they had so many damned insane lawyers vetting the Terms Of Service (or Terms Of Use, as they call it).

Have a gander and join in the WTF merriment with some excerpts that are probably against the TOU itself. (Like I give a fuck. I have accounts at Amazon, Kobo, and Sony.)

eBillions Of eBooks

Amazon.com Announces Fourth Quarter Sales up 22% to $21.27 Billion

Jeff Bezos honks:

We’re now seeing the transition we’ve been expecting. After 5 years, eBooks is a multi-billion dollar category for us and growing fast — up approximately 70% last year. In contrast, our physical book sales experienced the lowest December growth rate in our 17 years as a book seller, up just 5%. We’re excited and very grateful to our customers for their response to Kindle and our ever expanding ecosystem and selection.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

Just five years for that to happen.

And Bezos was expecting it.

While the Big Six/Four clutched their pearls and did nothing.

What were they expecting? Illegal collusion to save them?

Wake up, move fast, or die.

Kickstarter 1770-Style

Once upon a time, an author had to directly solicit pre-sales for his own book. Those who bought in were subscribing to the book.

From the 1770 book, Antiquity [Google Books link], we see how this worked out in the finished product.

We Are This Future

From a 1903 issue of Appleton’s Magazine (reformatted for easier reading):

A Problem of the Future

Carnegie is the great bestower of libraries, and the fact that his money can create many libraries that contain all the books ever written that are worth while, leads one to wonder whether private fortunes of the future will be commensurate to the bestowal of any complete library anywhere, for the mind is appalled by what we may come to in a thousand years in the way of books.

Amazon’s Market Obesity

Amazon May Already Have Reached 50% Market Share of the U.S. Fiction Book Market Across All Formats

The amazing thing would be that, in three waves of about half a dozen years each, Amazon would have completed a total transformation of the U.S. publishing and bookselling business. (Only the third wave, of course, has been strictly about ebooks.) And for better or worse, that transformation is a game-changer in every sector of publishing and bookselling activity including, of course, the activities of authors and readers.

And who is to “blame” for this?

The stupidity of the Big Six (soon to be Four), period.

And Bookish remains in perpetual private beta.

Will Amazon “AutoRip” Print Books Too?

I know the meme is to answer every headline that ends in a question mark with the word, No. So shut up.

Amazon’s “AutoRip” Service Goes Live, Giving Customers Free MP3s For CDs Purchased On Amazon As Far Back As 1998 (Hands On)

Amazon is today introducing a new service called Amazon AutoRip, which automatically gives customers free MP3 versions of any CDs they’ve purchased from Amazon since the launch of its Music Store back in 1998.

If Amazon was able to get the music industry to agree to that — and they are no pushovers — how soon will it happen with DVDs/Blu-Ray Discs? (Hello, Ultraviolet!)

And then printed books?

For all of you print fetishists who have long brayed about bundling an eBook with a printed book, here’s a solution that finally makes some damn sense.

And if that happened, my prior post would seem more plausible as the next step too: How Amazon Could Switch Over ePub Book Buyers