Disqus - Latest Comments for persiawalker

Re: New Rafflecopter Updates

Persia Walker — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 18:48:06 -0000

I feel like a pest, asking for an invitation, but I can't help it. :-) This sounds like such a great app and I'd love to be one of the "beta" users. Please consider sending me an invitation. Thanks! (http://facebook.com/author....

Re: Literary agents and the changing world of trade publishing

Persia Walker — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 10:21:19 -0000

It's so great to know that people are thinking out of the box. (Your other entry on eBooks first just blew me away, BTW.)

The DBW conference lineup looks absolutely fantabulous. I wish I could be there, but the entry fee is well beyond my budget. If there's to be any kind of feed or video coming out of the conference, then I would love to see. In the meantime, hooray for the forward thinkers!

Re: Literary agents and the changing world of trade publishing

Persia Walker — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 07:39:58 -0000

Hi Mike! Thanks for the reply. I see that I mistyped my comment. I actually DON'T see self-publishing as "necessarily" a losing proposition. I have been published by one of the Big Six as well as self-published. I see pros and cons with both.

But the discussion is about the roles of agents. I can envision them as brokers in a deal between a writer who "independently" publishes (i.e., sets up his or her own imprint, rather than go through iUniverse, et. al., to do it) and a traditional publishing house. My suggestion is that, in such a deal, the writer retains much of his or her creative control and collects a smaller advance, but gets a much bigger cut of the royalties. Meanwhile, the publisher makes a larger investment in the book through the money spent on advertising, marketing and placement in bookstores, etc. The pros? The writer who has self-published gets the backing of a Big Six when it comes to getting the word out, etc. He or she retains control and gets to collect only on what actually sells. The Big Six'er doesn't have to shell out money for a book that doesn't sell; on the other hand, it can no longer do what many of the m do now -- shell out the money and then let the book sink, doing little or nothing to promote it, leaving the writer to shoulder that burden increasingly along.

As for the agent, he or she would get either a percentage-based fee and/or a flat fee with a cut of the royalties.

I've met quite a few agents and they really serve a necessary purpose. They're here to stay. I know they're worried, but there is a role -- a huge role for them in publishing. It's just changing.

Re: Literary agents and the changing world of trade publishing

Persia Walker — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:40:29 -0000

I see that self-publishing is necessarily a losing proposition for an author. As most people realize by now, self-publishing is simply a matter of how to get the book into print. That has nothing to do with distribution and actual sales. That's where the Big Six come in. They have the strength to market and distribute. I envision a day when authors will self-publish and their agents will make deals with publishers to handle the marketing and distribution, something along the way actors now find their own vehicles and then get the studios to put up the money for distribution and marketing of the final film. That's an oversimplification, of course. But essentially that's what's happening with a lot of actors, and musicians, too.

Re: Beyond TweetBacks: Introducing TweetSuite

Persia Walker — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 10:16:26 -0000

Thanks for being so generous. I can't wait to use these.

Re: Article Rewriter for Mac OS

Persia Walker — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:25:02 -0000

Whoever comes up with an article spinner for the Mac is going to make bucks. You always read about Internet Marketers looking for "niches." Well, guess what? Here's a niche of desperate buyers that absolutely no one seems to be paying attention to. Seems sort of dumb to me.