Stumbled across you post looking for something else. Was rather surprised I hadn’t come across you before since you’ve been blogging about publishing almost as long as I have:-)

I don’t know what kind of market share Amazon has in UK, never tried to compute it, but here in the US, they’ve become the biggest bookseller, passing the Barnes&Noble chain. As a result, self publishers of niche books, which are a particularly good fit for Amazon due to the number of potential titles and the online search function, are having a real impact on larger trades.

I’m not talking about the literary market, whether fiction, biography or history, but the non-literary market, how-to, self help, etc. The top 10,000 sellers on Amazon (equivalent to a small book shop) is full of titles from self publishers, most under their own imprint, but even some using author services companies like Lulu, Booklocker, Author Solutions, etc.

Many self publishers, like myself, are actually trade authors or ex-trade authors who started our own publishing companies in order to have control over our work and the financial outcome. My books sold over 100,000 copies with McGraw-Hill, but I do much better selling in smaller quantities and earning half the cover price instead of 15% of the net!

Despite some of the drawbacks of self publishing in terms of sales and production support, most authors who write potentially commercial titles are much better off investing in themselves than putting all the work into earning money for their publisher (or author services company).

Morris Rosenthal
Self Publishing 2.0 Blog

Of course that’s not always a good thing, is it? But I think increasingly the POD publishers are offering writers more than just a ‘last chance’ at getting into print after the manuscript’s rejected or if (like me) their ‘platform’ isn’t huge: these companies are offering authors a quicker turnaround, more control over details, and less pressure to justify a publisher’s investment with sales figures.

For my novel manuscript, I hope to find a traditional publisher. But for the blook project, POD seems ok–better than ok, even, and I think you’re on to something, about the nonfiction niche future.