#+TITLE: 033/#100daystooffload Small Publishing Plan
#+author: screwtape
Note the pronounciation of tape as lisp. Name courtesy Mousebot (#mastodonEl)
* Venue
Tonight I joined the spectators of an event at the local university,
the Frank Sargeson Annual Memorial Lectures.
* Exploratory publishing
This speaker was a publisher, nowadays the only name in town in NZ for
publishing NZ fiction; Fergus of Victoria University Press.

Fergus is an exploratory publisher: His approach is to read read read
read everything and anything, and from reading get books entered into
a very interactive editing battle to increase their edibility without
destroying the pungency that had his mouth watering but was perhaps
Too Original. My thought had been to contrast Fergus' unprescriptive
approach to reading and publishing what NZ authors were producing to
exploratory programming, especially since some elements of our artful
coding are explorations of recurring themes and ideas, and planting
them into the banks of a beautiful lisp image; a little like editing,
and finally releasing the fiction prose of NZ as a country. Yet on
reflection I think for us, you and I, hear, now more pressing is
* The Numbers
Fergus was very clear and sufficiently frank as to how publishing
works in NZ, what the challenges are and what numbers that meant by
way of characterising his open-minded and slightly desperate
life-consuming approach to being NZ's premier and really only local
fiction publishing house.
** NZ
NZ has about 5 million people. We are not a Market Of Scale.
** How many copies of an original novel are targeted?
300 sales to break even, 400 copies sold (only the first year
considered) is a job well done. I guess books are about $40 NZD,
probably $25 or $30USD (price my own guestimate).

Key here was that 400 sales for a first time author is also considered
a decent success in much bigger countries: Considering book
consumption normalised by population, NZ's bar is much, much higher
than what Fergus called economies of scale (where a lower success ratio
still results in 400 books)
** What Is Writing A Novel?
Four novels drafted per year was quoted to be One Quarter Full Time
Work. My theory is that if you get a publishing house to consider 12
hacks per year, a small number of those get successfully followed up
on and I imagine most of that number never publish. A book a month for
a Full Time Author seems too high to me.
** Why Do We Celebrate Frank Sargeson?     :as_remembered_by_screwtape:aside:
Frank's contribution to NZ was that he died with all of $25 to his
name (in the 70s). Frank was extremely frugal, and any excess he had
he put towards fostering new generations of NZ authors. For example he
was fortunate enough to have a small house in Auckland: And in his
garden shed he fed and sheltered many later generation NZ authors for
their first novels which otherwise they would have had no way to both
stay alive and work on. He wasn't gregarious: He was regularly bitchy,
and put up barriers so he wouldn't have to stand the sight of Janet
Frame while she was living with him (though by their letters when she
was overseas, they continued to be very close).
** Harming The Software Industry Since 1999
NZ fiction and poetry is kept afloat by authors publishing their works
online and otherwise free, with (rightly) no expectation of ever
seeing a dime from a publisher / for publishing. Fergus lumped
self-published works in here: Without backing from a major publisher
(regarding Victoria University Press a major publisher) there's no
expectation of reaching the 400 sale target of success.

Fergus rejects the name Vanity Publishing: Rather he sees these
authors as self-sacrificing themselves to create the fabric of NZ
fiction writing from which a small number of authors are picked up in
NZ (uniquely and by Fergus personally).
** Online logs and other such
These are in the self-sacrificing author mileau though shortly later
Fergus notes
** One-time authors that become loggers
(He said Bloggers, but still)
In contrast to honouring the sacrifice of unpaid and never paid free
fabric of NZ writing, Fergus notes that an active logging and internet
community presence

by authors who made the 300-400 book sales in one year first time
fiction author target with a publisher

When it happened, this caused and apparently garaunteed successful
second, third, fourth books.

* Relevance to hackers
I guess libre software really vibrates to the fundamental fabric from
which NZ literature is hewn: Those self-sacrificing writers who share
but never see a dime. The beatified nature of Frank Sargeson: A
somewhat successful author who sacrificed to create an NZ literature
resilient after his death (the 70s-present).

** Is it possible to avoid debt prison and author?
Frank Sargeson's garden shed and university residencies aren't good
enough to meaningfully sponsor all the good authored. Fergus
considered universities to be picking up what he as a university
publishing house could not- Basically it was common to misuse masters
or phd funding to sneak through prospective authors' first books (long
before they would qualify for a residency as a Published Author).

** An optimistic if putative solution
I think we can put Fergus' notes on author success into a theory for the sm0lnet.
1. Need To Have Published Once
   1. It's my observation that we (well, I) kinda fell out of society in a way that my academic smattering and unfortunate contributions to proprietary software should not be considered My Authorship. I think lots of people I read could be cast like this (even if they haven't finished falling out of corporate culture).
   2. So we need a way to Publish Once.
2. Identify Successfully Publishing with Having A Software Project Packaged By Someone Else
3. Participate in our sm0lnets.
4. For second, third, fourth authorings there needs to be a funding mechanism. I think librepay is probably appropriate, though I loosely support Basically Not Patreon Probably.

* the_plan                                                            :tldr:
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Everyone needs and in general 'round here already has one software project.    |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| That project needs to be packaged by *someone else* for *their favourite OS*   |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| This means you (me) should strive to package a sm0l peer's software for our os |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Write / play / draw (This is basically what we do together naturally)          |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Associate project 2, 3, 4.. With one librepay for that project/those projects  |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

* Other ideas
** For First Authorship
*** Contribute substantively to
inarguably successful people (ask them, this list is me
spitballing). I really like jmbr and jmbr's THANKS file on some of
their lisp softwares, amszmidt's MIT-CADR, I'm optimistic about
collaborations with cool cats like pizzapal, praetor, ksaj if they're
into it.
*** Maybe literally publish
Given that it's an almost unachievable goal, writing a book that sells
300-400 copies in a single year seems like a possible target, albeit
with some mostly intransigent hurdles. Maybe with a sufficiently sm0l
publishing house (what is nostarch press? Genuine question).
* Proof case
Someone who has basically realised this plan is Tomas,
@prahou@merveilles.town on the mastodon, #unix_surrealism,
https://lemmy.sdf.org/c/unix_surrealism . To the extent we want to See
How This Works Out, I think Tomas has achieved authorhood as and for
sm0lness, BSD, links2 and Coin Operated Laundromats, and has both
as-available support mechanisms to be supported for their resplendent
and continuous artistic authorship, and clothing and such joys. So
with all the humility and gratitude I can muster to ask, please support
https://analognowhere.com/support
Official clothing line
https://redbubble.com/people/analognowhere/shop
and follow [[the_plan]]