selling books in the internet age

The San Francisco Chronicle ran this article on how some authors are avoiding the traditional publishing model.

“The old model was you had to go through an agent, then the editor and publisher, then the bookstore to get to fans,” notes Harwood. “Now you can bypass all those gatekeepers and go straight to the fans online.”

Naysayers insist that the problem with self-published books is that they are not subject to the same standards of quality that conventional publishing houses maintain when they weed out less qualified contenders and put manuscripts through a rigorous vetting and editing process.

“A weeding-out process has to happen,” Harwood grants, “but you can let the fans do the weeding instead of the agents and publishers.”

book trailers

Book trailers — little movies that promote books — are now a large enough phenomenon to garner their own awards ceremony.

Here’s the Flavorwire article on the competition. This is their pick for ‘Best Big Budget,’ and it’s a engaging piece of paper-cutting animation:

You can see all of the nominees at the Moby site.

the abundant artist on confidence

Cory Huff on selling your work with confidence:

There are a lot of important things you can do to sell your art. Great technique, good connections, the right background, and a beautiful website. If you don’t have confidence, however, you’ll find it difficult to seal the deal. People respond to confidence. They want to feel like they are making the right decision, and if you tell them they are making the right decision, then they’ll trust you.