From about 2001-2010 I used to get startups emailing me excitedly about their plan to “disrupt publishing” and asking me to hype their new platform.
Then I had to explain that publishing is really all about supply chain contract management for paper products …
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Then I had to explain that publishing is really all about supply chain contract management for paper products …
/1
The ascent of the ebook distro channel has mixed things up a bit, but essentially you’re dealing with a supply chain, b2b contracts all the way from author to bookstore, and if you ignore paper produce you’re ignoring 50% of the revenue stream.
Worse …
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Worse …
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The startups inevitably focussed exclusively on SF/F (about 3-9% of the fiction market) and via ebooks (10-50% of sales). Paper books were irritatingly physical, and they had no idea that Romance accounted for 35-50% of all fiction sales (and was the first to go >50% ebook).
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IIRC the only one of those startups that’s still around is WattPad, who did a lot of pivoting in their early days … and Tor.com who don’t count because they’re part of Macmillan, run by Real Publishing People who know what they’re doing.
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Moral of story:
If you plan to “disrupt” an industry you need to know how the industry is currently structured, what it’s doing inefficiently, and target *that*. Also, remember the 80/20 rule and go after the 80% of the revenue base, not the 20%!
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If you plan to “disrupt” an industry you need to know how the industry is currently structured, what it’s doing inefficiently, and target *that*. Also, remember the 80/20 rule and go after the 80% of the revenue base, not the 20%!
/(end)
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