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Internet Authors are the new Black Swans

By Mike Scantlebury

Republish: EasyPublish™
Published: 01May2008
Word count: 893
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Every Traditional Publisher should read the book by Nicholas Taleb called 'The Black Swan'. Not least because it's now a runaway best-seller and, in the fine tradition of that category, it was ignored by most publishers who were asked to publish it. If people who work at old-established publishing houses want to find the next best-seller, they could well take some advice from Mr Taleb in his important book.

You see, he stresses the value of the unexpected and the importance of the random. He also says that people aren't logical, even on the smallest things. He gives the example of asking the question: 'Which do you prefer, apples or oranges?' We might assume that there is only one answer, but some people can't even give that. Those that can, move on but get fooled at the next step. They are asked if they prefer pears to apples. If they say they do, they are asked if they therefore prefer pears to oranges. Some do, some don't. That's odd, they shouldn't say that. Who says? The logicians, and the people who invented the art of philosophy, going back to the Ancient Greeks. If you prefer one over the other, and a different one over that one, then you should prefer the first over the last. You really should. It's called logic. Unfortunately people don't operate as the textbooks predict they will.

Worse than that, it affects economics. These days the supermarkets are keen to know what you want, so they can plan ahead and get it on the shelves. So they ask people the apples and oranges question, over and over again, but are baffled when the oranges don't sell. They should, people said they wanted them. Unfortunately, those questioned do silly things, like change their minds. Or their circumstances change. Maybe a child leaves home, or a lodger arrives, and the household shopping starts to vary. Or, going back to the question, people have an annoying habit of saying yes, they really like oranges, then never eating them. Maybe they think they're good for them, and oranges need supporting. Whatever the reason, it drives the shop buyers wild. People are so unpredictable.

Meanwhile, back at the Traditional Publisher, an editor picks up manuscript A and decides he likes it. Then he starts on submission B and decides he likes it better. When he reads the third one on the pile, C, he's even more excited and thinks it's even better than B. Which means that he must think C is better than A, right? Well, maybe. But since they're all different, there might be different qualities at work, which means B is better than A, and C better than B, but only in some ways. If the editor's boss then says they can only afford to publish two books that month, do you think that means he will pick B and C, since he's decided they are 'better'? Not a bit of it. It depends on what every other Editor is doing, and what every other publisher on the block is doing too, come to that. So, A might get published after all. C might get put off, (you remember, the 'best' book), and might not even make it onto the list next month either. That's the way Traditional Publishing works. It's unpredictable. Plus, just to make things more 'human' and even less logical, it also depends what day of the week it is; whether a pay rise is in the offing; and what the Editor had for lunch. That's the way it is in those offices.

Which is why many authors have given up the battle entirely and turned to the internet to find a way to publish their books. They light upon a print-on-demand publisher like Lulu, and find they can get everything they want there, without the accompanying trauma and heartache. It's entirely logical and predictable. You load up your files, choose a cover and can immediately order a copy of your book to look at. It's nothing like the random world of Traditional Publishing, which is why that place is suffering. As writers turn to the internet to get their books to the marketplace, they have created a new option. It's not Vanity Publishing, where the author pays all the costs of printing and publicity, and it's not Self-Publishing in the old sense, where books are printed but never sell. In Internet Publishing, books are only printed when they are needed. There is no initial expenditure and no inventory. Whoah, no one was expecting that. It's a Black Swan, as Nicholas Taleb would call it, a totally new and unexpected response to an unsatisfactory way of doing things. People seem to have been able to tolerate the abuse for the past two hundred years, but, for some reason, have now finally decided that Traditional Publishing is too high risk and have moved to put it behind them. It will take a while for that message to get through, but that's the characteristics of a Black Swan. Nobody thinks they exist, and then, when they appear, nobody recognises them for what they are. A generation ago, the whole concept would have seemed ludicrous. Writers becoming their own publishers? It'll never happen! But it has, and it's called Internet Publishing. It's here to stay.

Mike Scantlebury is an Internet Author, with a half dozen novels and numerous synopses to his credit. He lives in Salford, England, the new home to the BBC in the north, but isn't restricted by geography, preferring to communicate to the world via the internet. Find out about him and his works at one of his many websites. You can download chapters or order a complete novel. http://www.MikeScantlebury.com

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