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| Gloomy days for indies |
Facebook is abuzz about posts from Nora Roberts and others who have revealed the plagiarised,
ghosted, pirated scams going on in the world of publishing. The scams have now moved
into audio where Audible pays on hours listened just as Amazon pays on pages read; scammers run "loop systems" where the book just plays for hours and hours and... consequently the pay-pool
for genuine audio is reducing.
In retaliation, readers are saying that therefore any book offered for free
or 99 cents is ghost-written and isn't worth tuppence. Yet many indie writers have,
in the past, been advised to offer a 0.99p series leader as an enticement to bring
readers into the entire series. The pundits said it was a solid marketing technique; they
also advised offering the book for free for a while to encourage reviews and possibly
ensure an Amazon ranking.
Now readers are saying they will never look at
99 cents and free books again. This is a sad blow for the genuine indie writer
and publisher, who works very hard to write every word of their offerings.
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