Making Is A Solved Problem
Kevin Kelly, on self-publishing:
The short version: it is not hard to produce a book. It is much harder to find the audience for it and deliver the book to them. At least 50% of your energy will be devoted to selling the book. This is true whether you publish or self-publish.
If you're gonna write a book, write a fucking book. If this cannot be your top priority for the next year, don't do a book.There is a glut of mediocrity in the world. Please don't contribute to it.
If you put out a book that's a C-minus, you're gonna have to live with that C-minus for the rest of your life.
Making is a solved problem. So the fight moves to what counts as quality.
High production values, big budgets, and well-known professional talent used to be the key markers of quality. Today, for many consumers - at least some of the time, in some use cases - their definition of quality now includes new attributes, like authenticity, relatability, snackability, and social currency.
The glut is real. And it is not a glut of bad work. It’s a glut of work nobody cares enough to commit to.