We had a chance to meet and talk with Alessio Jacona at the Ebok Lab Italia conference, which took place at the beginning of March in Rimini. The article appeared on the 10th of March in Il Sole 25 Ore, a top Italian national daily business newspaper.
Every author has a story. There are inspiring ones, like that from Amanda Hocking, but in most cases there are stories like mine: about trying and failing and trying again.
Please find below a good Google’s translation to English:
If the bestseller is a do-it-yourself
Piotr Kowalczyk writes short stories. Two years ago it had produced enough to fill four books, but could not get published because – says fun – according to publishers today, “nobody wants to read short stories. The audience loves the novels. ”
A response ruthless in front of which Piotr has not lost his nerve: he has become self-publishers – or to put Italian, publisher of himself – and started experimenting. “My short stories have become free for iPhone stories – he explains – and the music is now changed, with the English version that has reached 50 thousand downloads. Once the attention he sought, Kowalczyk has reissued these same stories and put them on sale at various online stores including that of the U.S. giant Amazon, where he still “going pretty well.”
The self-publishing, which is the total disintermediation of the traditional publishing industry, is made possible by the Internet and the multiplicity of services available to all. The history of Piotr it is a good example, and is not an isolated case: Amanda Hocking, 26 year old American writer, has just become the symbol of self-publishing because it sells more than 100 thousand per month ebook on Amazon. Last January was less than 18 self-published books in the top 50 of the Kindle store, but “natural selection” is relentless: only 0.01% of the self-publisher comes to success.
Who can not be entrusted to one talent: “To get ahead you have to constantly innovate – says Kowalczyk – developing new forms of narrative and new formats.” In this way the author takes on an experiment which, as noted by Antonio Tombolini Simplicissimus Book Farm, it is worth the whole sector, but that no traditional publisher would now be able to support financially. In addition, the self-publishing has the merit of disintermediation that for publishers is the most difficult and demanding task, namely to identify talent. That said, the question arises what should be the role of publishers in the new context. According to Mark Carrara, expert blogger digital publishing, “the publisher will be responsible two main tasks: to select and secure their brand with quality, aggregate and provide services for authors, who are in need of editors, and especially the cover of good translators ‘. With their help, and thanks to the internet, it will be easier to open up the global market.
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