Self-publishing, vanity publishing, POD, independent publishing - many people think they all mean the same thing but they don't.
And as an author, it's important that you know the difference. The cost of not knowing is high, both in actual dollars and in the outcome of your book.
Vanity publishing is probably the reason why self-publishing got its tarnished reputation. If an author is willing to plunk down a few [sometimes many] dollars, anyone can have a book published. With the advent of POD [print on demand] printing model, it is now possible for a company to format and upload your book to a printer distributor and have your book in your hands in just about a month. The problem with companies like that is that they do not edit or in any way vet your book.
That may be all right if you are diligent about doing that yourself. But many authors aren't. And many people who have no business writing a book are out there with published books. Readers tend to paint all self-published books with the same brush. So if they read one self-published book that was awful and then hear that yours is also self-published, they may be likely to turn up their nose at yours, fearing the worst.
Does it mean you shouldn't self-publish? No, it means you just have a harder row to hoe.
More to come this week.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
3 comments:
>>The problem with companies like that is that they do not edit or in any way vet your book. That may be all right if you are diligent about doing that yourself.<<
No author should be her only editor. It's as foolish as self-surgery.
Michael N. Marcus
-- president of the Independent Self-Publishers Alliance, http://www.independentselfpublishers.org
-- author of "Become a Real Self-Publisher: Don’t be a Victim of a Vanity Press," http://www.amazon.com/dp/0981661742
-- author of "Stories I'd Tell My Children (but maybe not until they're adults)," coming 4/1/10. http://www.silversandsbooks.com/storiesbookino.html
-- http://BookMakingBlog.blogspot.com
-- http://www.SilverSandsBooks.com
Some authors can do their own editing or they can hire out if they can afford the fees or they have a team of other writers they trust who proof for them. But what I meant was that these companies do not do anything other than formatting. What the author sends, they publish.
Just to jump in, self-publishing doesn't mean a writer does everything themselves, they act like the general contractor and cause the editing, printing, gluing, or whatever to be done. Most often the jobs are done by subcontracting and usually for a fee. So when you said a writer does it themselves, I didn't take it that they actually were the only editor. There are many things a self-published writer does do hands-on.
Post a Comment