Is KDP worth it?

I have said that one day Amazon will one day take over the world and it will be a better place for it. Not kidding at all. On and on I went on to give example after example about purchases made better for buying through Amazon. I have attempted to convert family and friends. When Amazon started with the self-publishing oh.my.god. all my prayers had been answered, it was doable totally doable. All those ‘short’ stories (unfinished) could be finished polished and put out and just maybe I wouldn’t go from call center to call center in city after city (I have commitment issues) and I could do what I really wanted to do which was write for a living.

This was great this changed the rules, it didn’t just flip the script it made black white, it made it so a fish could live outside of water and I chuckled as I watched publishing house reps and authors decrying it while sweating buckets from the balconies. (I’m a sick fuck I don’t know why, I laughed when the market crashed and people were crying-I’ve been to a therapist I swear.)

But then it happened I put a book up and there were all these little things that kind of nibbled at the heels of what I wanted to do versus what Amazon would allow to happen. This was years ago and it was all so new, the rules were still being written. Barnes and Noble was teetering but they still wore their lipstick and the public pretended like all was good as they roamed but rarely bought from B&N. Then the Nook popped up propping them up and Amazon fought back with their Kindle and hello, here’s self published book cheaper than the others. So Nook went self published too and man was there no support or guidance there either. It was a fumble all the way down the line, some of the books were shit, some were diamonds in the rough, people were becoming millionaires, others could at least quit their day job.

Now B&N has lost the lipstick and is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, so I have someone telling me that means Nook and self publishing on the Nook is going away so not to even bother with publishing on the Nook. To which I say BULLSHIT. How many record stores are there in your town, but you still get your music, records are still being sold, electronically. There is absolutely no reason why B&N cannot continue as a bookseller through the Nook only, I actually know more people who have a Nook than a Kindle-I swear, it’s usually the first or second one, the smaller ones that fit easily in a purse. The people I know who read mainly on Kindle do it through the downloaded apps on their phones and tablets and sure there are paperwhites out there-made to look like the Nook, by the way. I believe, when it comes to ebooks B&N could totally compete and if not win than tie with Amazon as an ebook seller, because that’s their sole focus they can change the rules no overhead at all to supply diapers or watches, B&N already has the space and publishing power of publishing paper and hardback so why can't they push back on Createspace and ship from their warehouses. There's the added plus that they know what works better than Amazon on book selling. Why not create virtual shelves and tables, doing this and updating, they could still be around twenty years from now as an ebook seller. It just makes me sad that they don’t see it that way, clinging to paper and ignoring that the rules have changed and so should they. So what is this long almost insufferable blog post about anyway?

The post is about how pushy Amazon is for their self pubbed authors to go KDP. They aren’t just saying look at how great this is. No, they’re the drunk jock at the party pushing themselves all over you, their way is the only way to go, look at how hung we are babe, everyone wants this, if you don’t then you just don’t get it.

Umm…not quite yes, not quite no and get your hands off me. I think it’s actually genre specific, to a large degree and I’m talking smut, romance and erotica and I’m talking Smashwords. I have to admit I’ve heard of it but I hadn’t gone on it until about a month or two ago and not gonna lie I wanted to wash my hands after scrolling through it. BUT after talking to some people, the real down and dirty smut that people want (some more pretty disturbing) that’s all selling on Smashwords, not through Amazon. Smashwords is letting their authors let it all hang out, you want a cover with the person’s ass hanging out go for it, you want borderline incest, sure. Amazon doesn’t want your smut and it’s going to hide you away in the dark corners. They have finally gotten it and at least they are willing to change (hint B&N) and they have added a new search for erotica but still..it doesn’t feel like it’s as open as Smashwords. I’m thinking this way because one of my beta readers is telling me of my six finished, one is really just steamy romance, not erotic romance and two are what she has coined romantic smut. Mmm….okay, considering she loves smut and she’s the one who told me about Smashwords is where she gets it, I’m not inclined to argue. Is writing down and dirty smut in my future, not planning on it, but I didn’t plan on coming back to Austin and I had thought I would leave again and head toward Raleigh and the ocean, but nope I’m still here. So who knows, I’ve read some pretty good smut, and apparently I’m not bad at writing it and I wouldn’t have to worry about paying for conversion, yeah I’ve thought about it. But for now no words yet, we shall see.

But then again, I watched on Facebook someone do a very informal poll of where people get their books from and all said Amazon, of the 34 responses that I counted. There's also the whole we'll let you do it for free, but if you go through Smashwords you can set it for Free without a time limit and then I hear .99 cents is the new free, so there's a way around that. Then there's the countdown and admittedly if you play their game and you do well on your own, they'll push you out to others, putting you on the front page. So maybe Amazon but no KDP? Or maybe it’s just the asshole in me that doesn’t want to do what others want me to do, yet another reason why I’m not into the whole D/s thing. To quote the great pontifcate Cartman: I do what I want.