I am blogging. Yes, yet another random person hurling their random thoughts onto the net in the hopes that someone will care enough to read them. I had the same reaction to joining Facebook a year or so ago, but folded under the constant nagging of a friend of mine.

But do not expect me on Twitter. EVER. There’s a line, dammit.

So, who am I? What do I have to write about, and why should anyone bother reading what I have to say? In short, my name is Elric, and if anyone out there is familiar with the works of Michael Moorcock, yes, that Elric. My father was a fan, otherwise if my mother had her way I would have been Sumner. Thanks, dad, I mean it. I’m a writer (as if that should be any surprise, given the nature of this site), focused mainly on the Sci-Fi/Fantasy genres, a historian specializing in military history, and a literary scholar with a Master’s degree in English. This means three things: One – I have spent most of my twenties hiding in the halls of academia, learning to analyze literary works that most people don’t give a shit about, and they don’t want to hear anything about it because they’re busy watching American Idol and Dancing with the Stars. Two – I am in debt up to my ears and still can’t find decent work because I have an MA in English, which at this moment is about as useful as a screen door on a submarine. Three – that I am skilled at performing in-depth analyses of media in order to discover what techniques they use to communicate with the public.

That sounds like awesome fun, doesn’t it? No? Don’t worry, I can still enjoy Adam Sandler movies and read old Robert Asprin novels, which allows me to both enjoy the less dramatic things in life while still being able to look inside and see how all the metaphorical bits work. Even “dumb-comedy” has its key techniques, just like dramatic literature, and when it works it works (Airplane, Happy Gilmore, Hot Shots for example)

Bob gets physical with Happy

but when it doesn’t, it doesn’t (Epic Movie, most anything by Will Ferrell).

LOL? No? Me neither.

When I do write a review or analysis for a book, movie, video game, or what have you, know that I do not judge all works based on one set of criteria. I seek to understand what it tries to do within its particular area, and then I break it down to see how it does it and whether or not it failed to meet expectations. My expectations, anyway. Everything with a grain of salt and all that.

Which brings me to what I write about. As you have probably guessed by now you can expect reviews and analyses of books, movies, and whatnot from me. I tend to focus on genre fiction, but I may also pop-up with a piece of non-fiction literature when something catches my attention. I am also an anime/manga geek – but not an otaku. There’s a line there, too. And that line is Man-Faye (look it up – at your own risk). Anyway, look for anime reviews and recommendations from me from time to time, if you care for that sort of thing. Also, I will be tossing up some of my thoughts and techniques when it comes to writing. I do not speak as an expert here, as I haven’t published diddly of any importance, but I do have some ideas that might be useful to others who struggle with certain aspects of the writing process, especially when it comes to characterization and dialogue, my two strongest areas, and I know many writers have trouble with those aspects of the writing process. So, consider this more friendly advice and brainstorming than expert commentary.

My attention tends to drift a lot though, so expect a healthy dose of random crap to come from me, including socio-political commentary, scientific developments, and gluten-free recipes (I was recently diagnosed with celiac disease, and it’s a bloody pain in the ass). I’ll also be shamelessly pimping my own work, too, so look for that, check it out, and give me money. Please. Pretty please?

Oh, I didn’t answer why you should be reading any of this crap from me. Well, I’ll leave that up to you all. Maybe I’ll bring some insights. Maybe I’ll make you laugh. Maybe I’ll point you towards something interesting and off-the-wall. Or maybe you’ll like my recipe for Chicken Curry. Anyway, that’s all for now, look for my first substantive piece of writing, “Constructing Character,” in the next couple of days. Until then.

In order to make this article itself a little more legitimate, I also emailed several people in various part of the publishing industry. A few emailed me back, and I’ll be interspersing their comments throughout the various parts. This part includes quotes from Cory Doctorow the author and blogger who’s had great success publishing his traditionally printed works with free e-books. The quotes are taken from his emails to me, and used with his permission.

Publishing Websites

Similar to the current publishing model, a website could be created with editors that read submissions and only “published” books on the website that met certain standards. On the surface this looks very similar to traditional publishing, however, there is one key difference: resources are only limited by labor hours, not limited printing budget.

Currently a small publishing house only has enough resources to publish a limited number of books per year, even if they would like to publish more. This is limited by editor hours and printing costs. If the cost of “publishing” an e-book on a website costs nothing, there are less limits to how many books can be published a year. No longer will good books be denied because the publishing house has already published their maximum quota for the year.

This method filters out craptent and allows the legitimacy of real publishing. However, there is still a significant overhead (the website must be hosted and editors must be paid), so content would still have to be monetized somehow, via a subscription or some other method. In order to charge for content a website like this would have to offer a great variety of content, as well as great accessibility: each book would have to support multiple types of e-reader formats, at least until the e-publishing format is standardized, which will probably be awhile.

An indie company willing to live on peanuts could probably still do something like the paid content site, apply standards and all that, but still give content away for free. As long as the site has a reputation for only publishing quality work, eventually their word will add legitimacy to their selections.

Obviously, the biggest downsides to this method are cost, monetization, and the risk that the editors will become the same type of gatekeepers as traditional publishing, which is something that must be avoided. Because of these risks, this probably isn’t a feasible option.

Popularity Numbers

“The answer is another indeterminate, I’m afraid. Depends on the publisher, and on the online reception… Say you put it online and no one cared, and the publisher loved it but was freaked about CC. Show him that you’ve have all of 7 downloads, it’ll put his mind at ease.

OTOH, say it was a raging success — 50,000,000 downloads, talk of the town. You could probably parlay *that* into a publishing deal, on the strength of the demonstrated market for the work.

So: depends on the work, the publisher, and the reception.” -Cory Doctorow

When a record sells a million copies, it “goes platinum.” A million is pretty high, but along the same idea, perhaps a target number could be set for a self-published e-book that, when reached, established “legitimacy.” This isn’t a bad method, since it shows that the work is popular.

However, a system like this would be extremely difficult to track unless there was a standard site these downloads had to occur. For instance, my free books are offered on my blog, on scribd.com, and mentioned on a few other random free e-book websites around the web. Do I just add up the total of downloads and claim that number? What stops me from spoofing downloads myself? The difficulty of regulating (or “proving”) something like this makes it an unattractive option.

Financial Records

“A book that made a lot of money would absolutely get a lot of respect in the professional world.” – Cory Doctorow

Although authors probably don’t write for the money (most are barking up the wrong tree if they are), it’s nice to get paid for creative work. If a self-published e-book was popular enough to drum up some sales, financial records could be a way of legitimizing work. However, with a solid financial record, traditional print publishing is much easier to obtain, so I don’t know why an author with demonstrated e-book sales wouldn’t just jump into a traditional publishing contract. Still, for an author interesting in proving herself legitimate, actually selling books is a solid way to go.

The main difficulties, of course, stem from trying to sell an e-book that has no corresponding print version. You’d have to ask Scribd.com (or some other publishing site), but I’d imagine the majority of the monetized self-published stuff on that site doesn’t get touched.

Reviews

A self-published e-book could be legitimized through reviews in journals and on blogs. If a book gets enough voices talking about it and praising it, surely it becomes legitimate publishing. However, finding reviews for a self-published e-book has to be a very difficult task, almost as difficult as the traditional publishing model, which might make the whole thing moot. However, there are sympathetic bloggers out there who are willing to take chances and review self-published e-books, so although this method could be as awful as finding a traditional publisher, pounding the virtual pavement is still an option.

Critical Mass and Internet Notoriety

“Put another way: it’s hard to monetize fame, but it’s even harder to monetize obscurity.” – Cory Doctorow

This is probably the most attractive option, the most likely, and it combines aspects of most of the above options. Building a good standing on the internet is the same as building a good standing anywhere else. It takes work, a lasting presence, a reputation for quality content, and time. Sound familiar? It should. It’s almost the same damn thing as trying to get published through traditional publishing methods.

However, there is one (very critical) difference between traditional publishing and self-publishing on the internet, and that is the barrier to entry.

However, because the barrier to entry is lower, the barrier to “success” is higher. It might be easier to put something up on the internet, but once it’s up, getting people to pay attention is pretty tough. It means the same type of shopping around as traditional publishing. However, the feedback is faster, and that, if nothing else, is the best part about the net over those six-month snail-mail wait times.

On the negative side, a traditional “substantial publishing record” takes more time to get started, but is probably still worth more once it’s done.

Either way, I’d just like to see critical mass and internet notoriety as an acceptable option, as far as the ivory tower is concerned. Most of the time, it means enough for the rest of the world.

That’s all for this post. Join me tomorrow for the opinion of Levi Montgomery, an author who self-publishes his own work, both on the internet and through print-on-demand publishing. Same mispeled time, same mispeled channel.