Writer Sanctum
Writer's Haven => Quill and Feather Pub [Public] => Topic started by: Lysmata Debelius on March 04, 2019, 01:47:22 PM
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I keep seeing people refer to the "Indie Community".
Is there such a thing?
As far as I can see, all we have in common is that we publish books ourselves. There seems to be very little common ground, even in what we consider "our" interests.
Most of the time, I only see people referring to the self publishing community or indie community when they want to shore up some point they are trying to to make e.g.
"people shouldn't (design their own covers/use ghost writers /write steamy books/self edit) because it makes the Indie community look bad"
There's power in people with similar interests banding together, but is it useful to draw the lines based on publishing method?
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The "Indie community" is like herds of cats.
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I mean - especially if you take into consideration that from most readers' point of view, a book is a book, and there's no way most of them can see whether it's self published.
Herd of cats. Definitely.
:dog1: :dog1: :dog1: :dog1: :dog1: :dog1: :dog1::catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun :catrun
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Is WS a community of indie writers? Sure it is, and it has a broad focus.
I do think it would be useful to separate the mills from the true indies (true as in a single author publishing his/her own books), which would diminish a fair amount of the controversies erupting here and there.
Beyond that, I think most people drift into private FB groups for the bulk of their support and idea sharing. The public forums are more for generalized marketing and technical support. There's a fair amount of writerly stuff too in dedicated threads that seem fairly active.
Yes, a book is a book, and I agree most readers have no clue when they pick up an indie book. It's why indie publishing has taken off. If our books were segregated from the main store and not blended in with traditionally published books, it would be a very different game.
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To answer the question, I think at the highest level, most abstract form, there is a community, but it's a very loosely gathered one.
One definition of "community" that I found was this: "a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived or perceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the larger society within which it exists (usually preceded by the )".
So, if we say that the "indie community" comprises all those who are indie authors / self-publishers, then yes, we're a community. In the same way that "writers" are a community - we're all engaged in writing, whether that's trad, indie, non-fiction, fiction, academic, and so on.
The trickier question, for me, is whether the "indie community" shares common goals and common values. To take an obvious example, not everyone wants to make a living with their work, but for some that's the main goal. Neither of these goals are wrong, they're just different.
Interesting question to debate, though!
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I think true self-publishers do form a loose community--like a herd of cats. All writers form an even looser community.
Do we have common interests? Some. To take an extreme case, if Congress were considering legislation banning self-published works from distribution, I suspect we would mostly agree that was a bad thing.
As far as the issues Lysmata is bringing up are concerned, I do think we err when we criticize practices that aren't clearly unethical. To me, only two things are of concern: unethical behavior, and the deliberate production of inferior work. (I know the second one is somewhat a matter of perspective, and I wouldn't jump all over someone who really loved to write but wasn't any good at it. I'm more concerned with garbage being produced to support some kind of scam, like unreadable stuff up for click farm consumption.) I don't really care how work is produced, as long as it's ethical and as long as the product is a good attempt on the part of the writer.
Do readers always know which books are self-published? In my experience, a lot don't even though what self-publishing is. However, if they get stung by a bad book or two, they certainly figure out what's happening, and the tendency then is to overgeneralize and assume all self-published books are bad. So yes, it does make a difference to the indie community if people are flinging garbage around.
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Yes, we are a community. Within the community, there are many groups...but we all face the joys and challenges of self-publishing.
And I do herd cats. Every day. LOL :catrun
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Hum...
I don't know about you guys, but I've never got personal advice from a solely trad author (excluding professors). On the other hand, many indie writers have helped me with blurbs, covers, or answering basic and complex questions.
I've never swapped newsletter mentions with trad authors. I've swapped with indie authors, some of them with mighty lists who were kind enough to support me.
I've never participated in group promos with trad authors.
So I'd say there is a community.
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Often it's a label given by outsiders, originally an epithet, now embraced.
Look how the recent Nebula froofah got a bunch of know-nothings denigrating "indies" for the well-intentioned mistake of one person.
In that sense, we're a community. We may think we can choose to be in it or not, but we may find that choice taken away from us, much as anyone else is involuntarily labeled into a group. Might as well embrace it and be proud of it.
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What Denise and David said.
We can be a little dysfunctional at times, but any extended family will be like that. It doesn't make them not a family.
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I do think there's a community. People cluster around separate nodes, each of which has its own personality and set of values/emphases. Those clusters overlap through people who are members of more than one, and through more indirect relationships. There used to be far fewer clusters, so the community was more centralized. It's expanded centrifugally, but information still spreads pretty effectively, hopping from cluster to cluster and then percolating out through smaller Fb groups, Twitter feeds, blogs, etc.
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Hum...
I don't know about you guys, but I've never got personal advice from a solely trad author (excluding professors). On the other hand, many indie writers have helped me with blurbs, covers, or answering basic and complex questions.
I've never swapped newsletter mentions with trad authors. I've swapped with indie authors, some of them with mighty lists who were kind enough to support me.
I've never participated in group promos with trad authors.
So I'd say there is a community.
That's a good point.
I can't say for sure that I've never been helped by traditionally published writers, but I've been so impressed by the generosity of self published writers in general.
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Lysmata, Yes! Here on WS I've found my indie community. You are right that the only common ground is that we are publishing ourselves, but I see how generously the members help one another. I'm learning so much here from all of you. I cannot contribute much because I'm very new to all this but give me a few years... It doesn't matter to me if other people try to denigrate a group they're not a part of. Usually it's from ignorance. Same thing with in-person communities.
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The "Indie community" is like herds of cats.
Clowder, Clutter, Pounce, Dout, Nuisance, Glorying, and Glare are the common terms for a group of cats(collective noun). Not herd I'm afraid. :police: LOL :catrun
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The "Indie community" is like herds of cats.
Clowder, Clutter, Pounce, Dout, Nuisance, Glorying, and Glare are the common terms for a group of cats(collective noun). Not herd I'm afraid. :police: LOL :catrun
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The "Indie community" is like herds of cats.
Clowder, Clutter, Pounce, Dout, Nuisance, Glorying, and Glare are the common terms for a group of cats(collective noun). Not herd I'm afraid. :police: LOL :catrun
When faced with such overwhelming factual evidence such as you present(if its on film it has to be the truth?), I can only say...WTF? I guess I stand corrected...maybe? I am just going to ride into the sunset on my thingy now. :banana-riding-llama-smiley-em
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Cats are no joke. They'll nibble you to death. :icon_eek: