Print On Demand Models Like Theirs Is Killing Literature
Companies like Amazon are literally the fucking devil in the details in modern publishing. Authors across the board should be avoiding them like the plague, but the idea that they are “the only game in town” has clouded their judgement and their business sense. From the censorship to playing with the price of the books to withhold royalty payments, they are ten miles of bad road that need to be removed from the publishing spectrum forever. But most of the writers following the groupthink go with them with a coke and smile thinking it’s the best thing since sliced bread, fucking themselves in the process.
Amazon’s monopolistic stronghold via print on demand has created a vacuum of shit lit that has now drowned out real, non-AI authors producing good books for a pantheon of reasons, and since this a multifaceted problem, I’m only covering the important tenants.
Amazon is the same ungodly bastard that made unholy alliances with PenguinRandomSchuster subsidiary imprints and TOOK THEIR ENTIRE DISTRIBUTION (hence how you get Prime Delivery with your POD), and created that now ill fated Amazon Subscription that they failed to tell 99% of indie writers and publishers about, which eventually blew up in the chosen few’s faces when they decided to KILL MAGAZINES August 2024. The other PODs like Lulu and Draft2Digital are at their mercy, with countless stories of how Amazon will reject novels put out through the competition because they want exclusivity.
Sure, the entry into self publishing is low, and in theory that should be a good thing for true blue writers that wouldn’t be getting attention otherwise. The reality though, is that anybody and their mama can get a free KDP account and “be a publisher”. Nobody is LLCing their imprint; nobody has office space with editors, artists, etc. to lay out the book. Because anybody can get into publishing without a lick of knowledge of talent, turn out slop, and make a buck, the industry is worse off for it because the good mixed into the bad is a turn off for all.
Long gone are the days when an imprint would get 100K books printed, send them to the bookstores, and then pay you in quarterly installments what you were owed. This is an era where imprints by and large published everything, and even small imprints would do a lot with a little and actually promote the books they released. Today marketing/advertising is done on social media, which is on life support or by email lists. Bookstores took a major death hit during COVID, and just aren’t coming back. That leaves limited markets and even worse, Amazon dominating and destroying both commercial print and indie print simultaneously.
Amazon, who once upon a time bought CreateSpace around the same era they bought GoodReads (which they have done fuck all with) turned it into the craptastic shitfest that is now KDP. Same thing happened when Barnes and Noble bought IngramSpark. KDP & IngramSpark alike HATE INDIES.
Not only do they take 40% of your earnings (even if they are ebooks which cost 0$ to upload or download), their quality and assurance is literally like an outsourced AI team from the depths of the third level of hell. Books come out printed badly, damaged, even, and in worse cases, unraveling once the thin layer of cheap glue at the binder gives with regular reading wear and tear. All of this is a turn off to the readers, especially when the mountain of complaints and bitchfests reach epic heights on a few social media sites.
They also are primarily responsible for turning the term self-publish & DIY into a bad word.
Adding insult to injury, the level of censorship that these imprints rule over the authors is insane. With their AI protocols in place they pretty much can censor and ban anyone from their site at any time for any reason that they do not have to disclose to you, especially if they owe you money. If they don’t ban you they can shadowban you, i.e. take you out of their search engine and make it damn impossible for anybody to even find your stuff. Amazon’s the Spotify of publishing, raping authors while raking in the ill-gotten gains. A quick google search can tell you how bad down the hole this is, but start here: https://citizenlab.ca/2024/11/analysis-of-censorship-on-amazon-com/.
Hell, if that isn’t bad, they are censoring the hell out of reviewers, which indie writers/imprints using their POD services need badly. You can check out articles like this https://www.selfpublishingreview.com/2023/10/is-amazon-censoring-customer-reviews-seems-like-it/ that literally discuss how this has been the case for years. They also now will ban family, friend, and anyone that follows you on social media from leaving reviews as well – regardless of if they legit bought the book of their own accord and are trying to support. https://sellercentral.amazon.com/seller-forums/discussions/t/3263fbf07587b0f0c6b77a2b4bd10ab1
I don’t care that over a million new books are published on Amazon a year, which is too damn many to begin with even before you factor in AI books, it’s bullshit. There are literally so much to trudge through going through Amazon’s portal of hell, from the genre to getting eyes seen on it that you barely can get the consumer to go through it. Now add in Amazon starting their own indie imprints to dominate that space and you have a perfect shit storm disaster that turns into less profits for the writers and more control and money on Amazon’s part. A quick search into the lawsuits about them not paying out royalties because they say holy are rampant: https://writersweekly.com/angela-desk/authors-class-action-lawsuits-against-amazon
PenguinRandomSchuster, who sold everybody out, is in no better shape. Amazon has cut into their tier of profits as well, since not even the three headed dog of publishing can set their own prices and keep them at the margins they want. Oh yes, Amazon can choose to raise or drop the price set on the books at THEIR DISCRETION and fuck you for thinking you’re telling them otherwise. This can result in your book literally being halved – so imagine all the poor saps out there listing the book at .99 cents just for Amazon to make it 50% off while they take 40 percent of your .49 cents, and out of that percentage you still may have to break bread with your imprint before you even get that ten cents left.
Authors going forward are going to have to stop being lazy and learn the business so they can have some skin in the game and become invested into changing how this new business model is being formed and shaped to their detriment. If they can’t then AI will win and 99% of writers today will be giving their books away for free through Wattpad.
You’ve been warned.