WITH THE STEADY RISE of DIY culture, and the increased hype over electronic books, printing-on-demand, and other newfangled verbal-delivery systems, has come a mild (so far) outcry from defenders of publishing’s old guard.

This is somewhat different from the Napster uproar and related rants against the music industry. In regard to music, there’a a general consensus among the ranters that the big corporations running the show are slick, corrupt money-grubbers and always have been.

But book publishing, the conventional wisdom goes, is, or was, or is supposed to be, a fraternity of tweed-clad, nice old men who live for the passion of nuturing capital-L Literature. Instead of rebelling against the book biz’s middlemen, these critics claim we should defend their importance.

Publishing’s current obsession with hype and market-share, under the control of some of the same media conglomerates that run the music business, is seen by these critics as a mere unfortunate anomaly, a digression from some Platonic ideal of the book trade.

That, as you might expect me to say by now, is a crock of bull.

Publishing’s always been about profit. it’s just that the tweed-suited guys worked for little companies before they got big, before they were fully integrated into media-conglomerate “synergies.”

As noted in a recent Times essay by my ol’ pal Fred Moody, who’s put out two books thru major NY publishers and seen scant return for the trouble, “authors have stored up so much enraged aggrievance that that alone could propel electronic publishing and distribution into being, with enough energy left over to fill California’s electricity needs forever.”

And a small-press or even self-published book doesn’t have to be an unreadable mess. It can be, of course, but so are many (if not most) corporately-published works.

There are thousands of self-released CDs out there, and I’d say they aren’t, on the average, as bad as some self-published books. My idea why: Most musical performers still have to learn their trade in front of live audiences. A band-made CD might not have slick 24-track production (although with digital recording, it often does), but it does carry, if it’s any good, a sense of the performer’s live act.

Too many self-published books contain material nobody’s read, heard, or critiqued before. Some author with a credit card just puts it out, hopes it’ll be loved, and gets disappointed when it isn’t.

There are ways to avoid that dreary fate, and they’re well-known ways. Authors should do what they can to make their works known and their schticks honed. Conferences, workshops, zines, live readings, broadsides, etc. etc.

And concerning the argument that some authors still need good editors to shape their work into readable form, an author who does need that help (like most of ’em) shouldn’t be ashamed of asking for it. If a writer’s gonna spend money to get a book or e-book out, s/he oughta spend just a little more on a good editor, designer, and/or packager.

Such as my humble self.

NEXT: Remember rain?

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