Upon seeing the article screencapped below, I went on a bit of a rant on X this week….
“Independent/self publishing has been the best choice for most authors for at least a decade. But now?
When the editing and marketing staffs and budgets of the traditional publishers have been gutted?
When, unless you're a million-dollar unicorn, you're lucky to get a contact at the publisher you can email?
When your best roulette spin at brick-and-mortar fame is two weeks with your book's spine jammed between all the rest before it's chucked into a black hole, and the contract to finish the series you pitched never arrives?
When the publishers have handed the very work their reputation for "expertise" is built on over to AI, and it's inventing hallucinated quotes from your own book (and your 2nd-grader can prompt better)?
To aspiring authors, I say this as gently as possible: let go of a romantic dream that hasn't existed in the real world for a long time, if it ever did. If you truly want to share your stories with the world, embrace independent publishing.” https://x.com/GSJennsen/status/2115602183098122556
To wax philosophical a bit more here: I’m a techie. While many legitimate concerns exist that need to be wrangled, I think AI has tremendous potential to transform our lives for the better. But one of the things AI does is put the power in an individual’s hands. It weakens the case for turning over your book and publishing journey to a huge, faceless corporation in Manhattan and strengthens the case for taking control of your career for yourself.
Screencaps courtesy of Zito.
