出版与作家生涯2011news.slashdot.org
犯罪小说作家靠 99 美分电子书大赚一笔
Crime Writer Makes a Killing With 99 Cent E-Books
导读
这篇帖子讲的是犯罪小说作家约翰·洛克（John Locke）靠 99 美分的电子书赚了大钱：他以极低定价和系列化写作，在 Kindle 上直接卖给读者，绕过了传统出版社。对写作者来说，它提供了一个关于定价、类型化写作、读者画像和“廉价通俗读物”传统的具体案例，也让人思考平台经济的钱是怎么被赚到的。
可以直接用的写作要点
- 01
低价不是贱卖：99 美分靠的是系列化、高频产出和长尾销量，而不是单本利润。
- 02
认清你的读者是谁。洛克说他的读者最多八成是女性，她们在阅读时幻想“改造”男主角——人物设定要服务于读者的代入欲望。
- 03
“一便士惊悚小说”的通俗传统一直存在：冒险、暴力、快节奏，读者要的是即时的爽感，不必羞于写得好看。
- 04
类型小说的销量养活了整个出版业；同理，写作者应先在一个有稳定需求的类型里站稳，再谈其他野心。
HN 评论精选
廉价通俗读物有历史传统；即时获取是新的便利；了解读者画像（多数为女性、代入式幻想）直接关系到写作取向。
这是“一便士惊悚小说”的回归。梦想冒险和刀剑厮杀的孩子们（以及心态年轻的人）读的就是这些便宜的纸浆纸平装本，讲骑马劫匪和公海海盗。现在有两个重大变化：一是算上通货膨胀后价格其实差不多，但即时把书传到你设备上的便利弥补了这一点；二是绝大多数读者是女性——洛克在原始访谈的评论里说，他的读者中多达 80% 是女性，她们在阅读他的故事时幻想“把主角改造得更好”。欢迎来到独立经济革命。
muhfuhkuh查看英文原文
It's the return of the penny dreadful. Kids (and the young at heart) dreaming of adventure and hack-n-slash violence read these cheap little pulp paperbacks about horseback robbers and high seas pirate swashbucklers. Two significant changes, now: It's had to adjust for inflation, but I think the convenience of getting it beamed to your device instantaneously makes up for it. The second is that the overwhelming majority of the readership is women (in the comments of the original interview, Locke suggests that his readership is up to 80% women who fantasize, as they read his exploits, about "changing" the protagonist for the better). Welcome to the indie economy revolution. First they came for the apps (the vast majority of the top 100 paid in the App Store and Marketplace are from indie developers), 1-5 team houses that need only split their massive spoils a few ways; and the numbers are massive if memory serves; something like $10000 a day for a top 10 game, and that's _after_ Apple's vig. And, those who choose free with ads or freemium on Android, can see numbers approaching 1-5k per day (unless you're Rovio, who claims about 35k a day from Angry Birds on Android. The closest parallel I see to the App Store model is the arcade. Instead of a quarter a play, you pay a buck, but you don't have to shlep over to the mall to play with your friends since they're all on gamecenter or openfeint or Facebook and you can pester them about your score on your wall), and for a buck you get to keep the game. It's still a gold rush, but with no end to the vein in sight because there are people all over the world with a buck in their pocket ready to buy. But just like anything in life, you can't be horrifically bad at it and expect to make a killing.
类型小说的畅销在为“不赚钱”的写作（诗歌、调查报道）输血；渠道成本降低后，这套交叉补贴可能被打破。
总有意外后果。整个图书出版业的资金其实靠悬疑和言情小说的销量支撑。让这些书更容易生产，你就会失去用来出版诗集的经费，就像大多数报纸已经没有余力供养下一个揭露美莱村或阿布格莱布监狱的 Seymour Hersh 一样。
lsb查看英文原文
There are always unintended consequences. The entire book publishing industry is funded by sales by mystery and romance. Make those easier to produce, and you lose the overhead to publish poetry, in much the same way that most newspapers don't have the overhead to fund the next Seymour Hersh disclosing the next My Lai or the next Abu Ghraib.
低门槛会带来内容过剩，因此“策展/筛选”本身成为新的稀缺价值和商业模式。
好东西。我同意这彻头彻尾是“纸浆小说”，但它也在按规模重新定义创作努力的边际成本。如果作者一本“畅销书”真能净赚 50 万美元，那么一旦成名，他一年卖三四本“故事”就能轻松谋生，此外还有长尾。这会把大量垃圾推向市场吗？绝对会。会催生一个垃圾过滤器的经济机会吗？绝对会。从一万个想被听见的作者，到充当“造王者”的出版方——按某个主题或类型做筛选，就像《Analog》或《Amazing Stories》那样。作者愿不愿意让出 10% 给编辑/策展人？谁知道，这种交易还没有多少历史。但它一定会发生，会出现某个新的 John Campbell，一个月读一千个故事，挑出最值得读的十到十五个。如果一个故事年均回报是 5 万美元，这位编辑拿其中 5 千，那他每月就能给自己的收入流再加 7.5 万。下一本书的书名是：《编辑靠在一美分电子书市场里替人分辨好坏而大赚一笔》。
ChuckMcM查看英文原文
Great stuff. I agree its 'pulp fiction' in every sense of the word but its also defining the marginal cost of the creative effort as defined by scale. So if the author really clears $500K on a 'best seller', they can easily make a living selling 3 - 4 'stories' a year once they are known. Plus there is the long tail. Will this promote a lot of crap into the market? Absolutely. Will this create an economic opportunity for a crap filter? Absolutely. From 10,000 authors wanting to be heard to 'king maker' publishers whose job is to provide a selection along some theme or genre, an analog to Analog or Amazing Stories for example. Would an author be willing to give up 10% to the editor/curator? Who knows. That isn't an economic transaction with a lot of history yet. But it will happen, some new John Campbell of the world will emerge who can read 1,000 of these stories a month and suggest the top 10 or 15 that are 'worth' reading. If the average annual return on one of these stories is $50K and our editor person gets $5K of that, then each month they add another $75K to their income stream. The next story in the series : "Editor makes a killing telling folks the good stuff from the bad in the 99 cent e-book market."
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