Traditional vs Indie Disambiguation (made clear)

Here's a thought to ponder about the changes to the publishing industry.

The fact is that editors at major imprints used to act as gatekeepers and now almost anyone can Indie publish a book. The impacts of this change are many.

The traditional publishers point very loudly at the drop on quality and there's evidence to support their claims. BUT...They are dead wrong and I can prove it.

Indie books don't have to have less quality, it's not automatic. In fact many mainstream books started as indies. Furthermore, mainstream pubs had started pumping out crap books themselves. So the traditional route didn't guarantee the customer a good book.

Why would trad pubs compromise what they vocally touted as their advantage? Because they were dying and they believed it was because indies are more flexible, efficient, and quicker to market.

All those qualities are true of indies but that isn't why trad pubs were dying. The real reason is because of the gatekeepers. Seriously! If you can have quality with or without a gatekeeper then what else do they do?

A few big things. Trad pubs use economy of scale which means they need to sell a lot of each book to keep price down (they have a large overhead). That means they have to go after a market segment big enough to support big sales numbers. So they pub books with mass appeal. Books that don't match anyone exactly but don't offend anyone either.

Who's dying among brick and mortar stores right now? Macy's or Toys R Us? The generalist that's who. Indies niche market and bring product to reader as fast as they can buy it.

So next time you hear woe is me from a trad pub remember they are getting beat by basic business principles. But it gets worse.

The other thing that gatekeepers do is throttle the number of authors. If they allowed too many authors then they couldn't sell enough books. So they turned away good writers to protect sales from existing producers who already had a following.

That's called making artificial demand. Their bubble burst for the same reason the housing market did. It was a giant ponzi scheme. It's happening in every industry.

All our "government regulation" has worked to prevent new startups and protect mega corps who in turn throttle consumer options to keep prices high.

Boom! Put that cat back in the bag big brother.

Book Marketing for Indies: Is Free Back?

Here's a slideshow from Smashwords for your indie information.

2015 Smashwords Survey - How to Sell More Ebooks from Smashwords, Inc.

Being Busy & T3: Evil or Good? (Mixed Blessings Part 1)

What is T3? It's my name for one of the greatest evils we face these days, and at the same time it can be quite helpful. It's something we engage in daily and most of us don't give it a second thought. What is T3?

It's my shorthand for T to the power of three and it stands for Tips, Tricks and Techniques. What do I mean T3 is evil, and what does it have to do with being busy?

Being overwhelmed with things to do is very much the spirit of this age. It's a subtle attack against us coming alive because it robs us of time with the author of life and the designer of our being. How can you become who you authentically are if you don't spend time with your designer? How can you be redeemed without connecting with the redeemer? 

Being busy also buries your talents. Jesus even told a parable about that issue. We weren't given the ability to do amazing things for any reason short of doing those things as extravagantly as we can.

So being busy is a subtle satanic attack, what's that got to do with T3? Well, the enemy of life counterfeits everything including the solution to the problem. What we call "the world," is really a system of false solutions treating the symptoms of sin (i.e. worldly fairness is everyone gets the same help, kingdom fairness is everyone gets what they need). T3 can be turned into the point and in that way it becomes a false solution and therefore insidious. 

When you're drowning you don't need anyone handing you a cup of water. It's an answer to the problem that makes the problem worse, and in that same vain, T3 is giving a busy person more "stuff." I love this post from Sam on this topic. 

So now that we're convinced T3 is totally evil, how can I defend it? 

Well the issue isn't T3, it's T3 as a solution. See I'm getting ready to launch a series of books on the topic of organization. My intent is help people reframe how they handle their "stuff" so they can free up time to use their God-given talents.  But I keep running into the same concern, over and again. How do I spend that kind of time giving people, what is essentially more T3? Is my T3 somehow not as stinky as other experts stuff?

No. While I hope my stuff is more effective than other peoples stuff, its all stuff and it's as likely to make the problem worse as it is to make it better. 

You see, in this world nothing is really pure and nothing is purely evil. That's a dangerous statement for a Christian to make. The uncomfortable truth is that only one really good thing entered this Earth after the fall of man and He died for your sin. 

Intellectually, we all know that our church pastor is a sinner and somewhere out there some pot smoking hippie is saving a soul no one else can reach. People are fallen and saved by grace, but what about things? What about stuff?

I saw a list of things that were "evil." It gets passed around social media by people who mock Christians because these things make us look like idiots. It included such things as Dungeons and Dragons, and Heavy Metal. (Obviously those stuck in my mind for a reason.) But can stuff like this be evil? Sure. For some people. They can lack "redeeming" qualities, sure. But here's the problem.

When we make faith about what you do and don't do we miss the point. If you think you're more holy because you only play bible charades and listen to Christian choir music then you've fallen for T3! 

Yeah I said it. That's right. Your Christian stuff is just stuff too! It's all stuff here on Earth. The world taints everything. Everything has something good that was tainted. Everything has potential to be a blessing or a curse. This is radical and dangerous I know. So lets jump to the end and get one things straight. God redeems. The bible says even evil serves God (Proverbs 16:4 & Genesis 50:20) See stuff isn't the problem unless you count on it. 

So moving forward, know that any time I point out T3 to help you organize I mean it for good, but I'm powerless to control whether or not you use it for good. Furthermore, you might initially use it for evil and then later on God does something and turns it all to good. He can do stuff like that. He's the redeemer. 

So God bless. Relax and enjoy your day. I'm going to walk in the full weight of who I am and share with you plenty of T3 and I hope you all use it under the guidance of God to free up time for God. 

PS Picture is of sunrise on a day I slept in. 

Fall Home and Garden Show

Come see me and 20+ other local authors at the Portland Fall Home & Garden show this Thu-Sun (Oct 1-4)! Booth 567! http://t.co/9lr3YbIzdr

I'll be there again this year. Can't wait to hang with friends and sell books. Starts today folks. You can get a copy of my latest book, Saber and Science.

Updates Galore!

Hello Friends, Family and Fans,

Lots of great changes and as usual the hardest part is trying to find time to update everyone. Kristin and I have successfully bought a house which you might call a fixer-upper. In the process of fixing up I tore my hamstring and spent a week laid up. 

I did still manage to get to the Sept 25th release party for the Paradisi project, which makes me really proud. However, It's time to shift back to non-fiction projects for a while. I'll give you some hints about that below. (Saber and Science)

On the Health/fitness front. I'm excited to announce that I've kept off more than 50lbs of the weight I lost despite utter chaos this summer. I'll be retooling my fitness plan between now and Christmas as part of my non-fiction/organizing efforts. I'll be certain to post updates here as they come out. If you're an early adapter you can go here:  SirBunch.Le-Vel.com and start now. I've also had success with HIIT and something I call ponder walking. More info to come in the next few months.

So am I done with fiction? Right when I have two series awaiting sequels? No! I've simply entered a new stage in life which is very rich in relationship (wife and daughter, new home) and so full that I'm struggling to make progress on anything that isn't urgent. 

I know that's a very common place to be in these days and I believe I've got some ideas to triple my productivity (or anyone's). I just need to focus what little writing time I get on creating that system for the short run. 

Abraham Lincoln once said if he had three hours to chop down a tree he'd spend two hours sharpening his ax. This is me going to sharpen my ax. I'm really excited about this. 

That's most of the news I can share at this time. 

One last thing: I'm looking for one rabid fan. I'm rebuilding a marketing platform (refocused on my non-fiction) and I'll need to build a new street team. I start by finding one rabid fan to spear head marketing efforts. The position is volunteer, but you do get early access to beta versions of potentially life changing material. You'll also get to see how I implement marketing for projects, (which I shelled out money to learn.)

Thanks for being a loyal follower of this blog. (PS I'll be radically improving this blog too.)

Loads of Loot #paradisichronicles

Alright, it's the big day and all my writer friends are going to be promoting like crazy the next wave of books coming out. I'll try to post all the info to free swag here so you can enter to win stuff. (Who doesn't love free stuff?)

Let's start with my own.
a Rafflecopter giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Author Andy Bunch - On how he got involved in the Paradisi Chronicles Pr...