Self-publication - a short guide, with an assessment
of the pros and cons for academic writers and others.
Do-it-yourself - the future of publishing
The information on these pages concerns specifically the publication of
academic books in print
form, notably as paperbacks; some of the information also
relates to other forms of publishing, such as
e-books, hard-cover
books and document-sharing websites. However strictly speaking, the
term
self-publishing
refers to the creation of books and monographs for distribution either
privately or through traditional or online
bookstores,
or on
e-book
readers such as Kindles. It does not cover document
sharing on the Internet, which is an altogether different and lighter
process.
In the past
Not so very long ago, academics who wanted to publish their work -
something that had become vital in the
publish or perish
atmosphere of higher education - could do so with relative ease and
obscurity. In the
fragmented world of pre-Internet academia, it was difficult to know
which publishers had high academic standards, and which publishers,
particularly smaller university presses and less-well-known commercial
publishers, had little or no quality control in place. Bibliographical
references had to be taken at face value, as it was very difficult to
check out titles from the majority of the world's publishing houses.
There were of course the "majors", the large publishing
houses, national or international, who had a global
reputation.
An academic book or journal published by
OUP or
Cambridge or
Yale, or
Wiley or
McGraw Hill or
Hachette or
Springer or a
similarly
high-profile publisher with trusted editorial boards, would by
definition look good on any academic's resumé or CV. Until the Internet
came along, recruitment and promotion committes in universities
worldwide had no means of actually checking up on the publications
listed on an academic's profile, unless they happened to have the book
or the journal to hand in their university library or department, or
could rapidly buy it or obtain it on an inter-library loan. CV's
listing books
published by major publishing companies, and articles published in
top-ranking journals, thus tended to find their way to the top of the
pile, since actually checking out academics' less visible publications
was a complex
process unless candidates actually provided copies of their works,
which was generally not the case.
For titles published by small publishers, or by publishers
in other countries, checking was even harder.
The new order
Fast forward to the 2020s and the situation is very different. The
Internet, and with it academic document sharing sites, have put
academic publications from the whole world just a click or
two
away. Academics on one continent can consult or buy books and
journals
published on any other continent with an ease that was impossible at
the start of the century; information on the quality and practices of
academic journals – are they peer reviewed? do they publish interesting
articles? – is instantly accessible. As a result, serious academic job
applicants no longer have an absolute need to present CVs or resumés
with a list of publications including big name and reputed publishers
and internationally known journals; any publication from any publisher
can be checked for quality in a world where aspiring applicants can
even include digital copies of their books, or extracts from them, with
any application.
Of course, having work
published by a
major
international publishing house remains a
strong plus on any academic's CV or list of publications, and is likely
to remain the gold standard. There is no change at this level. What
has
changed is that the playing field has been levelled up for those many
academics and aspiring academics – probably the majority of us – who
have never had any work published by a major internationally known
academic
publisher, but on the other hand have had interesting and
original
work published by local university presses, small lesser-known
publishers, or even through vanity publishing or self publishing. These
"
minor"
publishing channels, that once offered little or no visibility
beyond their own printed catalogues, can now offer the same visibility
as that provided by the
majors,
with their
powerful marketing departments,
or at least can be made to provide this visibility when it is needed.
Yet although books published by minor or local publishers can
now be much more easily found and acquired than in the past,
it can still remain very difficult for academics to actually find a
publisher willing to take on their book. In many cases, books
will not get published at all as academics give up the seemingly
fruitless and stressful task of trying to find a publisher. In
this scenario, self publishing offers an obvious solution to the
fundamental binary question: to publish or not to publish?
Many traditional publishers are swamped
with publication requests, and unless a book publishing project comes
with a grant to help with publication costs, or from an
already-published author, the chances of acceptance may be low.
University presses have limited resources, and commercial publishers
are looking for titles that will sell. Major commercial
publishers in the Springer / Wiley / McGraw-Hill league have
it easy; they can just slap a 300-dollar price tag on an
academic title, in the knowledge that enough university libraries will
automatically buy it to make it profitable for them; but smaller
publishers do not have this option unless the author is particularly
renowned. Most academic authors are not particularly renowned; many are
quite unknown outside their own university or college. Besides, when a
book has a $ 300 cover price, very few sales will be to individuals,
almost all will be to institutions, so getting a book published with a
high cover price by a major academic publisher may be a boost to an
academic career, but it will not lead to the book being made available
to as many readers as might like to buy it.
This is where the new option of academic self
publishing comes in, removing the stressful task of searching for a
publisher, allowing a book to be published at a reasonable
price and... a big plus for many academics... rewarding the writer with
some royalties at the same time.
Self publishing
Self publishing, particularly of the
print-on-demand 1
variety,
is
the fastest growing area in the world of book publishing, and alert
academics
are jumping at the opportunity. With self publication, any academic can
publish research (books, monographs, dissertations) or
teaching
material, and do so at no cost and in a form that can be purchased on
demand by students, other academics, libraries and the general public.
Being the publisher, the author generally retains all the rights to his
or her publication, including the right to send electronic copies to
friends, colleagues, and recruitment boards.
While the self-service nature of self publishing
means that the main
self-publishing platforms like Kindle KDP or IngramSpark have
in place
absolutely
no quality control regarding content, let alone regarding academic
value, authors have no interest in publishing rubbish, even if it is
free to publish, since there can be little or no use in publishing, let
alone publicising, rubbish. Attaching a copy of a poorly researched
book to an academic job application is unlikely to produce the desired
result.
Apart from the fact that it can be done for
free, the greatest advantage of self-publishing (and there are many,
see below) is that anyone can publish anything, just as
long as it
meets certain ethical standards and is produced in an appropriate
format; besides, doing so is fairly simple (
► see
how to self publish).
The
preferred file format for preparing books for self publishing is .pdf,
though KDP accept (with warnings) documents saved in .rtf
or
even .docx formats. Self publishing can also be more or less instant,
and it allows authors to completely bypass what was often in the past,
and is still to this day with many traditional publishers, the stress,
delay, and trauma of finding a publisher.
It
remains true, however, that many professors, particularly in
universities and departments that imagine themselves to be a cut above
the others, still look condescendingly at job-applicants whose
research has been published solely or mostly by minor publishers,
unfamiliar university presses, vanity publishers, Internet document
sharing websites like Academia (which is a commercial website, not an
academic institution) and self
publishing. This state of affairs is not going to change
overnight, but self publishing is still in its infancy and is a
fast-growing option. It is inevitable that the more good quality and
interesting academic books get self-published, the more
self-publishing as a genre will gain in credibility. It is a
fairly safe bet to suggest that well before the middle of the century,
self publishing of academic titles will be considered as part of the
norm – if not the new norm.
Advantages of self publising
- Full control.
Depending on the self-publishing channel
used, the author can maintain full, or almost full control over all
aspects of publication. Content, layout, format (paperback,
hardback and/or e-book) distribution channels, and even pricing. Both
KDP and IngramSpark now offer a full range of publishing choices -
hardback, paperback or e-book.
- Costs .
There need
be no cost at all, though the real
cost will depend on how much the author does himself. While many
platforms charge a fee, Kindle KDP, which is the world's largest
self-publishing platform, has no upfront fees, and they even provide a
free ISBN. IngramSpark publish for free, but authors living in any
country other than the USA must first buy their own ISBN from their
national ISBN agency.. To be completely free, an author will need to
write his book, format it in a word-processing program, convert it from
a standard word-processing page size (A4 or US letter) to one of the
page formats accepted by the self-publishing platform, which can be
done with any word processing package including the open-source
LibreOffice suite, and save it as a .pdf file (not always
required, but highly recommended). It will also be necessary to
provide a cover - but most self-publishing platforms provide free
templates. For
more details ►
see How to self publish.
If the author is unable to master these fairly
simple skills, then formatting a book for self publication can be
outsourced to someone who can, which will then of course involve a
cost.,... which will hopefully be offset later on by royalty payments.
- Royalties.
With self publishing, authors are generally free to fix their
own cover prices, and the publishing platform will pay royalties. This
can be a novel experience for some acedemics who are more in the habit
of paying to have their books published, than of being paid royalties.
In many cases, authors will be able to fix considerably higher royalty
rates than those obtained from commercial publishers.
- Reeditions.
Some print-on-demand self-publishing platforms,
including Kindle, allow authors to reedit their books as often as they
want. This can be a great advantage for academic writers, as it allows
text to be updated, footnotes to be added, typos to be removed, and
other changes to be made when and where they are needed, something that
is quite impossible with traditional publishing.
- Speed and
ease. For a writer who masters the preparation of
book for self-publishing, the time lapse from completing the
manuscript to having the book up and running and available for purchase
can be as little as 72 hours, or even less if systems are not
overloaded and there are no issues to be corrected. The author also
avoids the hassle and long waits that are involved in getting a book or
paper accepted for publication by a regular publisher.
Disadvantages of self publishing
- Do it all
yourself. There is a learning curve, and there are
techniques that must be mastered (► see How to self publish)... but
on the whole academics are
pretty intelligent people and should be able to master the ropes
relatively easily. And indeed, it can be argued that in a day and age
where traditional publishers also
require authors to present their
manuscripts ready-formated to their required specifications, formating
a document for self publishing is no different from preparing it for
any other kind of publishing. Obviously however, if you are
an
already-published academic and a name sought after by traditional
publishers, then going through well established publishers may offer a
much easier solution, since the publisher will do a lot of the work.
- No editors.
Self
publishing is just that: doing it yourself. Traditional publishers have
in place whole teams of editors, proof-readers and designers, who (in
theory at least) will thoroughly vet any manuscript before it is
printed, to make sure that it is properly presented, paginated,
coherent, and free of typos (spelling and other typographical
mistakes). With self publishing, it is the author who is
responsible for all this.
Relying on the spell-checking and grammar-checking tools that come with
word-processing platforms is not sufficient, as these have a nasty
habit of introducing new mistakes as well as correcting those they
actually find. Self-publishing authors need to be aware of questions of
grammar and style
and must attempt to remove all typos
through careful proof reading, and if they manage to remove most of
them, they will be doing as well as – and in some cases, better than –
certain major academic publishers whose reputation for producing
typo-free books is not what it used to be.
- Little or no marketing.
This is the big drawback of self-publishing, specially self
publishing with free platforms like Kindle. The publisher will not
market your book.... or will only do so for a fee, and with no
guarantee of result. Self-publishing platforms to not send reps round
to schools, libraries and book fairs, they do not edit glossy
catalogues, and they do not buy advertising space for your title in
targeted magazines. Marketing is up to you. This may not be much of a
drawback if you publish a work in a disciplinary niche where you
yourself have access to ways of publicising your work; but for anything
more general, marketing can be difficult. On the other hand, many
(most?) academics do not publish in order to become rich, so maximising
sales of a work is not necessarily among the objects of self publishing
when academic titles are concerned.
- Pricing
problems. As stated above, authors are
generally free to fix their own prices, but the publishing platform
will set limits. Some platforms, such as Ingram Spark, will
automatically ensure that titles are available to bookstores and
library purchasers, though for this privilege, they charge fees.
Kindle's KDP platform offers this option in some markets. The option is
called extended
distribution,
and is available in the USA and the UK; but
using extended distribution requires the author to set cover prices
higher, and in some cases much higher, before any royalties are earned
through extended distribution, and doing so may negatively impact sales
through KDP's main distribution channel, which is Amazon. Books
published with IngramSpark automatically get bookstore distribution,
and become visible on the online catalogues of leading bookstores
around the world, including Barnes & Noble, Waterstones, and many
others.
A word of warning though. Any author publishing with IngramSpark
is strongly advised to make the books "non returnable". - Library
purchases.
Many public libraries do not, or do not want to, buy books from Amazon,
so for writers who expect their book to be available to libraries and
bookstores, IngramSpark offers a better publishing channel than KDP.
Unless a book is available through the traditional
channels used by
university and academic libraries worldwide, it may be de-facto
excluded from many or most public libraries. KDP offers a way round
this, which is to sign up to "extended distribution" in the USA and the
UK. The big problem with extended distribution is that Amazon still
wants their full share of commission on any item sold, so the author
needs to increase the price of any title sold through extended
distribution, or else receive no commission on sales. Using Amazon's
extended distribution may require a rise in the book price anyway, as
the minimum price that can be set for a book published by KDP is higher
if the book is going to be made available through extended
distribution, than it would otherwise be.
The way round this
is to publish not with Kindle, but with IngramSpark... or to use
both.The publishing process is pretty similar. A book published with
IngramSpark will - they claim - be available to 40,000 retailers,
online stores, libraries, and universities worldwide.
=================
Notes
1. Print-on-demand. With print-on-demand (POD), a book is
stored electronically, and copies are printed to order, often one at a
time. In terms of production costs, POD has been a game changer, doing
away with economies of scale, and with the costly jobs of
print-runs (printing maybe 500 copies by offset), holding
stock (books that have been printed but not sold), selling to retailers
on a sale-or-return basis, and in the event of poor sales the final and
valueless operation of "pulping". POD publishers, which means all
self-publishing platforms, have thus done away with the biggest
overheads and fixed costs that traditional publishing needs
to pay for, allowing any title to be sold directly at little over cost
price, and still be profitable for the writer and the publishing
platform.
List your self-published academic title
In order to illustrate the range of academic titles now being self
published by their authors or academic institutions,
Academic-self-publishing.com is happy to list a
selection of
representative titles in the discipliary fields of arts and
humanities,
economic and social sciences, and the sciences. To
submit a title for listing, please use the contact information
indicated below.
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