Every writer, no matter what they say, keeps the seed of publication somewhere in the freezer compartment of his brain, ready to take out and plant on a computer, feed with warm words, water with emotion, hold it out to rays of praise, with the hope of seeing it sprout and grow into something harvestable–and reap a profit of penny or pride.
I have been following Book Publishing at 2 Blowhards and also following the lovely laid out links through a writer’s hell–read them all for a clear picture. And I have started delving deeper into How to Write a Blogbuster at Guardian Unlimited which I discovered at Jerz’s Literacy Log this morning.
From the Guardian:
“The weblog has justifiably been celebrated as a new publishing platform. But writers are beginning to see that it also has the potential to be a new fictional form.”
The publishing picture is grim–if you’re looking to be the next Stephen King or write a Harry Potter series. Hitting the big time is as likely as winning the lottery, but then, we all know someone who knows someone who did, so we have had a brush with fame and fortune or at least have bristled with someone’s stroke of luck. But weblogging, weblogging may be an answer for many. After all, it is published, and the world can read your words just a click away from Plato’s. How bad can that be? Whatever fee you pay for your service is much, much less than initial outlay for publishing, and so many make so little at it anyway. The newest idea, it seems, is to publish an entire novel online via weblog series, daily or weekly updates, or whatever (you really ARE supposed to be writing daily anyway) at the average reader’s rate, perhaps.
Not bad all around for the wannabe, and in writing, everyone but a select few by proportion are in this category. But the distance between published and never read has been shortened by miles and miles of words. And while there is obvious need for professional editors here and there, a good portion of what is out there is well written and interesting, certainly some of it is even better than some that DOES get published.
Let me stick my neck out here and make what may be a completely foolish prediction, based on the amount of reading I and many others do from the internet versus physical books lately: While the weblogs will not replace hard copy text, they are going to put a serious dent in the publishing business and its direction both in style and finance.
And if you can still read the monitor through the tears of laughter, let me remind you of one more thing. The U.S. post office thought they had a monopoly on mail once, too.
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