La Bene Vita

The Death of the American Author: Commentary

As both a writer and a business person, I may have a unique take on this New York Times article called "The Slow Death of the American Author"   in which the writer, bestselling author and Authors' Guild President Scott Turow, laments the newest stream of challenges facing authors today:

* The US Supreme Court ruled in favor of importing foreign editions of domestic books (with no royalties)
* Public libraries offer free e-books over an easy Internet connection, discouraging the purchase of e-books
* Offshore pirates offer free e-books to consumers, and search engines are permitted to point to them
* While e-books take over the literary market, Amazon drives book prices (and therefore, royalties) down
* E-books typically pay lower royalty rates than print, which means the shifting market equals lower pay for authors
* Most recently, Amazon has proposed the re-sale of "secondhand' e-books at deeper discounts

I'm sure most of you have heard that the US Department of Justice sued Apple and five of the "big six" publishers over anti-trust allegations last spring. In case you're not aware, here's the watered-down version: Apple and the publishers supposedly met in private to discuss how to raise book prices from Amazon's stubborn $9.99 pricing to their desired price points, in the range of $12.99-$14.99. The case never went to court, because the defendants all settled, offering concessions that basically allow Amazon to continue to sell at discounted rates for the next two years. Turow's article considers this a failure for the author and for humankind in general, fearing that the concessions will allow Amazon to return to its monopoly position in the e-book market, driving the price of books down.

Turow points out that as copyright is continually devalued, the American author loses more and more income, and I completely agree and understand his position. However, I can't help but think his complaints scream of "Who moved my cheese?!  "

Here's the thing: Yes, I'm a writer and a business person, but I'm also a consumer, and I buy books. I'm all in favor of driving prices down. Though Apple and the publishers claimed no wrongdoing, stating that they settled to avoid a lawsuit rather than as an admission of guilt, I believe, from a 30,000-foot perspective, that they are, in fact, guilty of antitrust. Did they, or did they not, drive the price of books up from $9.99 to $12.99-$14.99? I've purchased books from Amazon over the last few years and saw it with my own eyes. Turow claims that the lawsuit has diminished competition rather than strengthening it, but I disagree. It's Amazon who came along and competed with the decades-old big boys, throwing new business models around (how dare they!?), and Amazon has given the publishers a run for their money. The publishers need to find new ways to be profitable or start digging their graves.

The more time I spend in business, the more I realize that consumers are a fickle crowd. Yes, literature is art, science, progress, forward thinking. Yes, literature is important to our culture - to every culture - and to the advancement of humankind. But Turow is not talking about progress or importance. He's talking about money.

I am an author. By that I mean that I write, not that I earn a living as an author. I've earned a meager income as a freelance nonfiction ghost writer, and I may have strengthened my business position at MTMS   through semi-regular blogging, which drives traffic to my website. It would be nice to earn a living at writing "someday," but the possibility or lack thereof has no impact on my decision to write today. In fact, I don't expect to earn a dime from documenting this very commentary, yet I choose to express my opinion and have my voice be heard without compensation.

I am not saying that authors should write for free. I'm saying that authors, like the big publishers, should take their feet off the brakes. Sorry, people, but you can't stop a shifting economic culture. You can either stand in front of the train and let it barrel you over, or you can hop on and take it for a ride. In real terms, that means authors need to let go of old paradigms and find new ways to make money. Perhaps the old royalties-through-traditional-publisher methods are no longer going to work. When the printing press came along and put bards out of business, I'm guessing they bitched about that. But the smart ones learned to write... and access to literature skyrocketed. Today, we have more literature at our fingertips than one person could read in a million lifetimes. How can Turow argue that this is bad for society? He stated that lack of viable income for authors in Russia (the birthplace of Chekov and Tolstoy) has resulted in not a single contemporary author whose name is known within The Motherland herself, let alone around the world. But is it about the author, or is it about the literature?

Don't misunderstand: I think we have problems. We've grown bigger than our britches - too big, too fast. We went from books to computers to Internet to e-readers to phones that can read books aloud to you while you drive, all in about twenty years. Today, I read more junk on the Internet on a daily basis than quality writing. But that's just growing pains. My point is that consumers drive demand - not publishers, not Amazon or Apple, not the justice department, and not authors. And as a consumer, I demand better quality writing. As a consumer, I will find what I'm looking for. When I get tired of bad service and connectivity from AT&T, I switch to Verizon. If Amazon doesn't provide me with the quality writing I seek, at a price I'm willing to pay, then Apple will. If not Apple, then some new company, who may be in its infancy today, but whose foresight and understanding of consumer needs will drive some new business model that makes writing again be profitable. I guarantee that company isn't concerned with the location of his cheese. As authors, neither should you be.