Tim Keiningham sent me an interesting article, “Vanity Press Goes Digital.” We’re excitedly and aggressively (but I hope intelligently) pursuing the digitalization of our business, but I do think that the implications for self-publishing are vastly overstated, by the WSJ here, and in general. Self publishing has been going on and successful (for top .001%) for a long time now (i.e. Mark Twain). Digital changes little, because digital only books access only 10% of the market (at most) but have 75% of the costs (if done right – professionally edited, marketed etc.).
With a few exceptions (driven primarily by time to market), if a book is worth publishing, it’s worth publishing in both paper and digitally. At least for now, and I think for a number of years to come.
