tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29620281.post210140311018577989..comments2023-07-06T13:37:06.039+03:00Comments on Cobwebs Of The Mind: An Open Letter To Barnes And NobleUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29620281.post-66647410570468489242012-02-09T19:48:34.437+02:002012-02-09T19:48:34.437+02:00I'm not sure I agree with calling agents and p...I'm not sure I agree with calling agents and publishers bullies just because they don't recognize some people. Sounds more like sore losers trying to demonize people that are only trying to do their jobs to the best of their ability. They're human too and with ease of the internet, the number of manuscripts they receive have increased exponentially. Can you imagine getting not just ten mss a day but twenty, fifty a hundred?<br /><br />The number is unmanageable, not to mention, they have to try to determine what will be marketable, something no author ever thinks about. It's stupid to publish something knowing it will be at a loss. But all an author thinks about is that they have a great book and damn the publishers for not recognizing it and publishing their great masterpieces.<br /><br />I'm glad you mentioned that a lot of self-published stuff out there is crap. It was like that before the digital revolution and that percentage hasn't change. In fact, it has grown because anyone with a computer and a mss thinks they should be published and that's far from the truth. All we get now is a haystack becoming a mountain.<br /><br />I don't care how 'wonderful' a boom it is for self-publishers now. It's the detriment to our industry to have so much crap out there and to bring the price of books down so much that you can get an author's lifeblood at 99 cents.<br /><br />Just because there are exceptions, and there always were, and so much is made about them that we forget they are only exceptions, and exceptions don't make the rule.<br /><br />And Amazon. Don't even get me started on them. A shark eats up the publishing industry, spitting out the bones of publishers, agents, book stores, other online booksellers.<br /><br />How many people don't expect them to turn those sharp teeth on the hapless authors who blindly help them become a monopoly for the 'privilege' of making our books worth...nothing? They already shoved a knife into the backs of the publishers, making nice with them at the beginning until they all agreed to sell their valuable book lists on Amazon's site. Now that Amazon became successful, look at what they're doing to them? Do we seriously think they're not going to do that to the individual authors who have no power at all?<br /><br />I think in a few years from now, it isn't only the publishers and agents who will be thought of as short-sighted, but all of the authors so desperate to be published that we unwittingly get get into bed with a piranha who thinks that because it has so much money to burn, they can burn the rest of us.<br /><br />And I don't agree that it is petty of B&N to refuse to sell books in their bookstores. It is the only power they have left. It is the one thing Amazon doesn't have and they need.<br /><br />What's petty is for Amazon to force authors to cut out all sales avenues except Amazon for the 'privilege' of giving away our books so that even more people will invest in Amazon and make them even more powerful or for them to bully their affiliates like Goodreads, demanding that if they use Amazon links then they cannot link to anywhere else that also sells the same book, and thus taking away the freedom of choice of their readers to buy their books anywhere they wish. That's an outrage. They're already trying to bully readers by doing that.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12554740620548880646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29620281.post-5708185577429387122012-02-01T23:02:25.111+02:002012-02-01T23:02:25.111+02:00It's even worse for those of us not in the US,...It's even worse for those of us not in the US, because Barnes & Noble will neither sell books to us nor let us use PubIt. This sort of provincialism is not acceptable in an increasingly globalized world.<br /><br />Good post BTW.Cora Buhlerthttp://corabuhlert.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29620281.post-77223116115960126672012-02-01T21:41:18.550+02:002012-02-01T21:41:18.550+02:00Does anyone remember K-mart? Maybe it still exist...Does anyone remember K-mart? Maybe it still exists somewhere but we had one here that the Wal-mart 'drove' out of business. Or so they said. But the truth of it, as a consumer, was that K-mart was run-down, dirty, had even poorer quality than Wal-mart, no customer service, and all in all, was trying to play up the poor-pity-me aspect of this rather than competing and changing according to the marketplace.<br /><br />Amazon has gotten into the publishing business--as a publisher--and it's petty for B and N--a bookstore--to refuse to sell books. Why don't they revamp their search engine, recommendations, and also boughts? Why don't they open their arms to indie authors instead of limiting categories, and funneling them to the back room of their online store? It's not a mystery why Amazon is making a killing off indie authors and B and N isn't. There's a REASON so many indie authors ditched B and N in favor of KDP select (and this is from an author who didn't).<br /><br />We need a competitor to compete with Amazon, rather than whine about how unfair things are.Sarah Woodburyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04428869371751939930noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29620281.post-16108316512663671072012-02-01T21:05:02.632+02:002012-02-01T21:05:02.632+02:00There is more to it than just the ease of publicat...There is more to it than just the ease of publication. The Amazon search function is excellent. Their algorithms ensure that a reader will find the kind of book they are looking for <b>whether it is self-published or not</b>. There is a reason why, when I had novels on both B&N and Amazon that my sales on Amazon were 50 times what they were on B&N. It is because Amazon makes them easy to find rather than in effect sticking them in a bin in the back of the store.<br /><br />It isn't a matter of fixing how easy books are to publish nearly as much as climbing out of the pockets of the Big 6 and standing on your feet like a big boy.J. R. Tomlinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01109874615059334200noreply@blogger.com