POD: If you’re not Warren Ellis.
Posted on November 17th, 2009 in making things
Oh, I spent some time trying to craft the single most condescending post title I could think of, yes. I also considered “for the common man” and “little guy” and — my personal favorite abandoned only because it was a touch too long — “for all those losers who really have no right even trying.”
Turns out, I only had to hit up the internet comments buzzing around the release of Shivering Sands to find the most patronizing qualifier. Because all sorts of people, it turns out, would just love to try out POD, except they just “aren’t Warren Ellis.”
If you haven’t guessed yet, this post is going to be a little bit mean. But, see above: people were asking for it.
So, okay, yes — let’s go ahead and talk about this terrifying and insurmountable hurdle to publishing/creating/selling through an online Print on Demand service: Let’s brainstorm and try to find some solution to our pitiful state of not being Ellis. We can do it together, I think, if we try really hard — we can shut our leaking cry-holes for a second and consider a kinder world, with possibilities even for us.
All right. Here we go.
We have already, I assume, ruled out the possibility of going back in time to before Warren started his writing career and attempting to become Warren Ellis before he can get there. Time travel is, after all, fiddly business. And, frankly, if any of us had already built a time machine, I’d imagine that using it to get a book published wouldn’t be our top priority. Except maybe for you, over there in the back — I see you’d like to make a DINOSAUR PHOTOS coffee-table book, so yeah, you’re going to need to work on a time machine. And best of luck to you, I’m ready to buy your book if you’re not torn apart by raptors on your way back to the console.
But the rest of us are going to have to think outside the temporal displacement box, bah.
Well, there’s the fake it ’til we make it option, I suppose — which I’d certainly usually advocate… except I’ve been modding Warren’s forums for a lot of years now, and I gotta tell you: there’s few things that annoy me more than people putting on a lo-fi Ellis-lite persona to get attention. In fact, it’s one of those things that makes me hit the ignore/ban button faster than almost anything — and I’ve got a pretty high internet-nutter tolerance, so that might just end up losing you those imaginary book sales you haven’t even made yet.
Oh this is just looking hopeless, isn’t it? I mean, clearly the steps to POD success are as follows:
- Be Warren Ellis
- Have a hugenormous audience
- Sell them all your book
- Profit
But what, oh what can we do if we’re not Warren Ellis?
…
… no. That… that couldn’t work.
It’s too crazy. I don’t even want to say it.
What if, what if step one is… be [your name here]?
I mean, that’s just crazy-talk, innit? I mean,, there’s a long list we haven’t exhausted yet. I mean, we could try being Wil Wheaton, or Jamais Cascio, or Lee Barnett, or our next-door neighbors, or that guy at the bus stop. Surely we’re not to the point of desperation that leads to trying to make a go of it ourselves.
Except…
What if the steps were:
- Be [your name here]
- Write a bloody book instead of whining about what you’ll do with it when you’re done
- Get an audience
- Profit
Now, I know that mixing up steps 2 and 3 like that just FLIES in the face of internet logic, but I might be on to something here. Because now we’re talking about a fantastic world where, when you introduce yourself to people, you can actually say you’re a writer — and be telling the truth — instead of your usual “And I’ve got a bunch of clever ideas I’m going to write someday as soon as I get an agent and/or wake up one morning in an alternate reality where I’m Warren Ellis.”
How mad is THAT? I mean, the possibilities get really wild after that! When people ask you what your book’s about, you can actually tell them, instead of hinting about how you don’t really want to get into it because they might steal your idea! And then, OH MY GOD, you could — oh this is incredible — you could direct them to the site where your book is ready to be printed and mailed off! Do you realize what this means? They might buy your book! This could… my god this could actually work!!
Yes, I am the biggest bitch you’re going to read today.
I’m also right. And if one person reading this finally got the shake they need to stop talking and start doing, then the massive traffic drop-off I’m going to get now is completely worth it.
And if one person did finally get it, you should come back tomorrow when I’m going to have some not-so-bitchy advice about the POD system I’ve picked up in the past little while. Because if you’re going to actually use it instead of making excuses, then I’ve got time for you.