The democratisation of writing
We're all 'published writers' now...
Not so long ago there was — by and large — only one route to becoming published: you wrote, found and agent and a publisher, and the publisher took your words and turned them into a physical book (or included them in a magazine or anthology) to sell in shops. A very few might find a rich patron prepared to privately fund the writer’s publication journey, while others — those wealthy enough — may have chosen to fund the printing themselves.
Publishing: the business or profession of the commercial production and issuance of literature, information, musical scores or sometimes recordings, or art. - Merriam-Webster dictionary
Scan the internet and you can easily find definitions like the one above where the emphasis is on the commercial, the professional. (Interestingly, the same focus is true in some definitions of ‘writer’ too.)
But things have moved on, haven’t they?
Today we live in a world in which ‘a writer’ doesn’t need an agent or a commercial / professional publisher in order to be ‘published’ — and yet there may be a degree of irony in play here in that more people than ever may be seeking an agent. Literary agents have probably never been busier.
And why is that? Perhaps because more people are writing — or because so many other writers are seen as ‘published’ (including ‘celebrities’) and so aspiring individuals are clamouring for similar validation: to be read, recognised as distinctive, wanting to be ‘first among equals’. There are so many voices crying out in the wilderness. These days it’s a packed field.
Technology — in terms of computers, software, and affordability — has been the game-changer. If one of the primary goals of a writer is to be read (perhaps assuming that, by default, self-expression comes first) then the options available to them in order to achieve that ambition have never been greater. And all thanks to technology.
Indeed, you only have to consider contemporary definitions of ‘publishing’ to see that recognised:
Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software, and other content available to the public for sale or free of charge. - Wikipedia
Publishing means making information available to the public. In the past this was done mainly through issuing printed copies of documents. Now there are many more options such as websites, print, DVD, e-publications and apps. - The National Archives
‘Self-publishing’ has become ‘a thing’ only in the last couple of decades, driven by a wave of technology-enabled services: Amazon launched Kindle Direct Publishing in 2007; IngramSpark was launched in 2013; in 2009 Lulu Press started its on-line publishing offering — and by 2014 the Lulu platform had issued around two million titles. And there are a number of similar offerings.
As of 2024, around 1.5 million people have published using KPD — which means there are many more self-published books than that! — and although official numbers are not made known, estimates suggest the number of new Kindle ebooks are upwards of 3,000 per day! I came across one author who says they have published over 400 books on Amazon since 2010.
‘Self-publishing’ has journeyed along an accelerated curve in terms of its maturity and how it is viewed: shock & denial; anger; bargaining; depression; acceptance (Kübler-Ross). Where anyone sits on that curve will be a personal matter of course — though I’m pretty sure I know at which end Amazon’s 1.5 million KDP users will be!
Even so, maybe the notion of ‘self-publishing’ remains tainted; perhaps it smells just a little bit unsavoury. Indeed, the term itself doesn’t help: the ‘publishing’ of ‘self’, with all the negative connotations of unbridled self-promotion attached. The lack of an independent gatekeeper also suggests that ‘self-publishing’ risks going hand-in-hand with an overall lack of quality — the purchase of a third class rail ticket because someone doesn’t have the money (sic talent) to travel first.
Which is not necessarily true of course… just as having an agent / publisher doesn’t mean the writing will always be ‘good’ (however one might choose to make that judgement). Perhaps you can name names…
Yet self-publishing is now about more than the production of paperbacks or ebooks via KDP et al. In 2010 Instagram was launched; Facebook even earlier in 2004. Substack (2017) is a relative newbie. What are these technologies if not platforms which allow people to say what they think, espouse their thoughts and feelings, and send their writing out into the void? There are ‘Instagram Poets’; ‘BookTok’ is ‘a thing’; and across the internet there are millions of websites produced by — and featuring the work of — individual writers and writing groups. Billions of words being written and pumped out into cyber space.
In the broadest possible sense, as soon as someone posts on any website or social media platform you might argue they are ‘self-publishing’. And if you expose your poems on Instagram et al, well…
Perhaps one conclusion to which all this leads us is that ‘self-publishing’ is now an entirely redundant term. Every day, millions of people ‘self-publish’ their creative work one way or another — and make that billions if you broaden the definition to include anything written on-line.
And the corollary to this is surfaced in the contemporary debate as to what ‘a writer’ is. Not an issue fifty years ago perhaps, but now? If you broaden out that definition too — and eschew any notion of quality, subject matter, or intent — then maybe we’re all writers now. Indeed, there are plenty of people who subscribe to the mantra “if you write, you’re a writer”.
The stance you take on ‘self-publishing’ and being ‘a writer’ will, inevitably, depend on where you’re starting from — or where you sit on the relevant Kübler-Ross curve, or how important you think quality / talent is, or what ‘form’ you consider qualifies as ‘writing’ or ‘publishing’. In my own case I simply cannot divorce writing from ‘quality’ and ‘intent’. If you sing but do so very badly and always out of tune and rhythm, would you really call yourself ‘a singer’? Or if you paint very badly are you ‘a painter’? Or if you sculpt clumsily?
Of course what can’t be denied is the impact technology has had in the democratisation of ‘publishing’ — and perhaps that experience is one of the reasons there is so much fear around AI. For example, Amazon KDP now has a limit of 3 new books per day per author, a response to the fear that it risks being swamped by AI-generated work; technology disrupting the disruptive technology… ChatGBT could ‘write’ an 80,000 word novel in the time it takes a person to make a cup of coffee.
So what are we looking at: 1.5 million ‘real’ authors plus a potentially infinite number of fake ones? Even more ‘voices’ in the wilderness. If the bedrock of ‘publishing’ and being ‘a writer’ has been shaken, perhaps AI will soon blast it to smithereens… Who knows?
In consequence, maybe we need another seismic shift in what it means to be ‘a writer’ and to be ‘published’ — because if everyone qualifies, then in a way everyone is simultaneously disqualified…
I self-published my first book in 1972, using the then-new technology of photocopying. It was a rather beautiful little book of seven poems. The original was handwritten. The copies sold for 30p!
I've been thinking about this for years now. Especially when I'm asked for advice from an aspiring writer about where to publish, how to publish. What I've negotiated in my own mind are two things . . . 1. Publishing is only the act of getting your words out there. How it's done is a matter of gatekeeping or not, platform, and goals. What is it that you want to do with your writing? And 2. I think there is a difference between an author and a writer. A writer writes because he must. It's in the DNA and "publishing" is a byproduct. How it's "published" sometimes doesn't matter. An author is someone who has a specific goal -- to get their memoir, for example, out in the world and seeing it in print. Holding it in your hand. There's a tangible goal that MUST include publishing in some fashion. I'm OK with the modern world of publishing. More voices is always good. But "democratization" also means that with those many voices comes various levels of skill and craft, and that can be a kind of collateral damage with now have no choice but to accept.