The Publishing Gold Rush Is Digging Up Lead

Writers refuse to learn basic business principles. Publishing companies refuse to learn basic business principles. And we wonder why the publishing industry is in such bad shape.

I've complained about Simon & Schuster teaming up with vanity press Author Solutions (which, by the way, is owned by Penguin).

This week, Kris Rusch vented her own frustration at writers refusing to take responsibility for their careers.

Now, yet another small publisher may be in the process of going the way of Triskelion (I don't even want to go there), Dorchester Publishing (extensive chronicling by Brian Keene) and Aspen Mountain Press (Samantha Combs's report of the efforts to save the company).

Now, it appears Silver Publishing sinking rapidly. A publisher paying late is never a good sign. When the publisher starts throwing around legal threats and writers are holding a fundraiser for the publisher, things are bad. There's been several flame wars over the matter already, and it'll probably get worse before Silver finally succumbs. The Erotic Romance Blog catalogs some of what's going on.

Unfortunately, where there's smoke, something burning hot usually lies underneath. The fingerpointing and spinning is too much like the other defunct publishers I mention above to not take this seriously.

If you're a writer wanting to contract with a publisher, for the love of Murphy, CHECK THEM OUT before signing the contract!

Uncle Sam Says 'No!' to Agency Pricing

According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Justice Department is planning to file suit against Apple, Inc., and five of the biggest publishing companies in the U.S. for price collusion. In the meantime, the European Union is still conducting its own investigation into the matter.

Go read the article. I'll wait . . .

As a consumer, I like getting as much for my money as I can. But when I go shopping for a birthday present for  DH and I'm paying less for a hardcover from his favorite author than I would for an e-book, something's definitely wrong with the system and I'm pissed..

As an indie publisher, I LOVE the agency model for two reasons:

1) I can undercut the big publishers because I have much lower overhead.

2) I want to be able to set my own prices.

The problem here is that Apple and the five accused publishers pretty much admitted in the Wall Street Journal prior to Steve Jobs's death that they agreed to their agency model arrangement to stop the Godzilla known as Amazon. (Please note: The article I originally linked to last March has been removed. This link is to a cached page of the article, and I cannot guarantee this link will be active after today.)

Right now, everyone's bemoaning Bob Mayer's prediction that e-book royalty/splits will go up. This isn't my biggest worry.

My biggest worry is that this lawsuit (or settlement if the execs at the accused companies have a clue) will eliminate agency pricing, and all of the e-book retailers will start a price war that puts us indies out of business.