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Media, NF and communities of interest
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From: Charles Bayless <charles.bayless_at_gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 13 Jun 2014 14:34:56 -0400
I am looking at some figures to try and get some insight on the economics behind nonfiction and I'll share that shortly.
In the meantime, I came across this article by Megan McArdle, a very savvy writer on the economics underpinning many issues. Her post is Online Journalism is Suffering Print's Fate
(http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-06-12/online-journalism-is-suffe ring-print-s-fate) The point of the article is that print journalism
(newspapers and magazines) have been in an economic death spin for the past fifteen years as print advertising, the economic lifeblood of the industry, fled to much cheaper and targeted online advertising. Publishers beefed up their online presence but now online advertising is showing the same vulnerability. Even worse for everyone involved, new research that she cites indicates that online advertising is simply not cost effective for advertisers. McArdle's summary is
"But I think the biggest issue is the one that I hear the least about: Companies [advertisers] just don't need intermediaries as much as they used to. They can build their own Web pages, run their own videos on YouTube. Sure, they'd like to have our readers, but because our readers ignore or block their ads, maybe they should just put the money into building their own Web presence."
This strikes a chord for me with the conversations we have been having this year. To paraphrase, "Readers just don't need intermediaries as much as they used to" or alternatively, "Readers just don't want to pay for intermediaries as much as they used to." While the inclination is to fall in to preferred narratives about the narrow mindedness of publishers, blinkered attitudes of agents, ineffectiveness of booksellers, reluctance of readers, etc. to explain why particular books don't get published, the reality is that there is such fundamental change going on that these issues, while important to keep on the radar screen, get lost in the froth of change. Reader's choices are driving outcomes that are inimical to the interests of all the original stakeholders.
My summary of McArdle's article is that 1) Quality reporting is expensive, 2) Quality reporting is a small percentage of total reporting (hard to stand out), 3) Advertisers are building alternate and more direct channels to their targeted customers which do not depend on the traditional media/traditional advertising platforms, and 4) Disintermediation is a real and growing danger.
This strikes me as very similar to what is happening with books. 1) Writing quality books is time consuming and expensive, 2A) Well edited, fact-checked, quality printed books are a small percentage of all books published (explosion of self-publishing and niche publishers), 2B) The infrastructure of book reviews (i.e., a version of quality control) in anything but specialty magazines is disappearing, 3) Authors, publishers, and readers are all struggling with the implications of industry consolidation (mergers of large publishers, dominance of B&N in bricks and mortar, dominance of Amazon online), the shift to digital (b&m retail to online retail, book scanning, ebooks, etc.), and industry dispersion
(explosion of number of small/specialty publishers, self-publishing, etc.), and 4) Disintermediation.
Readers want what they want and they don't want to pay a lot for it. My take away as a possible analog is that the book market has some similarities to what is happening in print journalism and that perhaps what is happenning there might have some portents for books. I have mentioned before that I think that part of the evolution in books is likely to yield communities of interest which is a version of what McArdle is describing advertisers as doing. I think this is likely especially true for nonfiction where the communities of inteterst tend to be smaller, more tightly defined, and perhaps more motivated. The overlap between people who are intensely interested in maritime history, for example, doesn't overlap a lot with the community of people interested in trains. Both communities are small in market percentage terms but large in absolute terms. If you can connect with the community of those interested in maritime history, you can sell a lot of quality books even though maritime history is probably less that 0.01% of the book market. Both communities have reasonably tight boundaries. Both communities have demonstrated motivations (museums, restorations, events, participants, etc.)
I think Marc's earlier example is a telling one. STEM subjects are big and getting more emphasis. Quantification and statistics are an integral component of virtually all branches of STEM. You would think that there could (ought to) be a very large opportunity for quanitification/statistics oriented NF books for high school readers but they tend to be few and far between. There are some really good adult NF books on mathematics and statistics and their permutations which are quite accessible to YA but very little YA specific that I am aware of. I wonder if a communities of interest approach might not bring that hidden market into plainer visibility, allowing readers to more easily find that in which they are interested and authors/publishers a greater chance to more cheaply connect with their readers.
Charles
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Received on Fri 13 Jun 2014 01:35:55 PM CDT
Date: Fri, 13 Jun 2014 14:34:56 -0400
I am looking at some figures to try and get some insight on the economics behind nonfiction and I'll share that shortly.
In the meantime, I came across this article by Megan McArdle, a very savvy writer on the economics underpinning many issues. Her post is Online Journalism is Suffering Print's Fate
(http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-06-12/online-journalism-is-suffe ring-print-s-fate) The point of the article is that print journalism
(newspapers and magazines) have been in an economic death spin for the past fifteen years as print advertising, the economic lifeblood of the industry, fled to much cheaper and targeted online advertising. Publishers beefed up their online presence but now online advertising is showing the same vulnerability. Even worse for everyone involved, new research that she cites indicates that online advertising is simply not cost effective for advertisers. McArdle's summary is
"But I think the biggest issue is the one that I hear the least about: Companies [advertisers] just don't need intermediaries as much as they used to. They can build their own Web pages, run their own videos on YouTube. Sure, they'd like to have our readers, but because our readers ignore or block their ads, maybe they should just put the money into building their own Web presence."
This strikes a chord for me with the conversations we have been having this year. To paraphrase, "Readers just don't need intermediaries as much as they used to" or alternatively, "Readers just don't want to pay for intermediaries as much as they used to." While the inclination is to fall in to preferred narratives about the narrow mindedness of publishers, blinkered attitudes of agents, ineffectiveness of booksellers, reluctance of readers, etc. to explain why particular books don't get published, the reality is that there is such fundamental change going on that these issues, while important to keep on the radar screen, get lost in the froth of change. Reader's choices are driving outcomes that are inimical to the interests of all the original stakeholders.
My summary of McArdle's article is that 1) Quality reporting is expensive, 2) Quality reporting is a small percentage of total reporting (hard to stand out), 3) Advertisers are building alternate and more direct channels to their targeted customers which do not depend on the traditional media/traditional advertising platforms, and 4) Disintermediation is a real and growing danger.
This strikes me as very similar to what is happening with books. 1) Writing quality books is time consuming and expensive, 2A) Well edited, fact-checked, quality printed books are a small percentage of all books published (explosion of self-publishing and niche publishers), 2B) The infrastructure of book reviews (i.e., a version of quality control) in anything but specialty magazines is disappearing, 3) Authors, publishers, and readers are all struggling with the implications of industry consolidation (mergers of large publishers, dominance of B&N in bricks and mortar, dominance of Amazon online), the shift to digital (b&m retail to online retail, book scanning, ebooks, etc.), and industry dispersion
(explosion of number of small/specialty publishers, self-publishing, etc.), and 4) Disintermediation.
Readers want what they want and they don't want to pay a lot for it. My take away as a possible analog is that the book market has some similarities to what is happening in print journalism and that perhaps what is happenning there might have some portents for books. I have mentioned before that I think that part of the evolution in books is likely to yield communities of interest which is a version of what McArdle is describing advertisers as doing. I think this is likely especially true for nonfiction where the communities of inteterst tend to be smaller, more tightly defined, and perhaps more motivated. The overlap between people who are intensely interested in maritime history, for example, doesn't overlap a lot with the community of people interested in trains. Both communities are small in market percentage terms but large in absolute terms. If you can connect with the community of those interested in maritime history, you can sell a lot of quality books even though maritime history is probably less that 0.01% of the book market. Both communities have reasonably tight boundaries. Both communities have demonstrated motivations (museums, restorations, events, participants, etc.)
I think Marc's earlier example is a telling one. STEM subjects are big and getting more emphasis. Quantification and statistics are an integral component of virtually all branches of STEM. You would think that there could (ought to) be a very large opportunity for quanitification/statistics oriented NF books for high school readers but they tend to be few and far between. There are some really good adult NF books on mathematics and statistics and their permutations which are quite accessible to YA but very little YA specific that I am aware of. I wonder if a communities of interest approach might not bring that hidden market into plainer visibility, allowing readers to more easily find that in which they are interested and authors/publishers a greater chance to more cheaply connect with their readers.
Charles
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Received on Fri 13 Jun 2014 01:35:55 PM CDT
