|
Thinking of Self-Publishing? By Tim Knight
It's a brilliant, insightful, witty and, no doubt, seminal 250
pages about the shortcomings of TV journalism (like how it's newspaper
and testosterone-driven and nobody remembers any of the information
anyway) which causes the Globe and Mail's TV columnist, John
Haslett Cuff, to confess "I find the premise . . . rather intriguing.
Gee, maybe that's why I stopped watching TV news some years ago." Other critics call it "important," "terrific,"
"amazing," "a textbook for a revolution in television"
and "the best book on TV journalism I have read." The talented and charming Vicki Gabereau interviews me about the
book for 36 minutes on her CBC radio show. So, where's the problem, you might well ask. Most writers would
kill for reviews and exposure like that. You could go further. You
could say writing a book is what people like me do. Among other
objectives devoutly to be desired, it stops us from taking real
jobs from folk who want real jobs. Writing a book might even keep
people like me off the streets and out of strange beds. And anyway, you might say, after writing the book and getting these
great reviews, I'll be invited to swap bon mots with erudite and
charming publishers who ply me with carelessly large cheques and
get on Letterman and Gzowski a week Thursday if a week Thursday's
OK with me. Following which, I'll instantly become rich and famous,
insulted in Frank and much admired by beautiful people at the sort
of party I'm never invited to now. That's what you might say. But that only happens to writers with
publishers who give them money before they write a word and pay
for the printing and publishing and all sorts of other goodies after
it's written. That's the dream scenario. That's a scene from another
movie. I start this damned book in the naive belief that I can actually
help improve the sorry state of TV journalism in Canada. That my
ideas can contribute something to my beloved and battered profession.
To be honest, it also seems like a good way to pay the rent and
buy the occasional beer and sushi. All I have to do is take time off from training broadcast journalists
and people who want to communicate better than they do now to bash
away at my Powerbook until, having nothing more of interest to say,
I stop. And mail the manuscript off to eager publishers. The publishers, of course, will fight viciously until the highest
bidder wins the rights to the book and shovels obscene amounts of
money at me. Copies will appear, all bright and shiny, on bookstore
shelves. Perfect strangers will line up to buy them and beg for
my autograph. That's not the way it happens. The first publisher sends back a
suitably polite rejection letter. Another publisher sends back another
suitably polite rejection letter. And another. And another. And
so it goes. Until there are no publishers left. Suitably polite
or otherwise. How, you may well ask, do I handle such brutal rejection? The answer
is I say to hell with it and do the post-modern thing. I desktop-publish. I become my own publisher. The first thing I do with the powers
vested in me as President and sole employee of Broadcast Press
is borrow $20,000 at six-percent interest (which makes it $21,200)
to pay living, writing and publishing expenses. Just like the big
boys. Around $8,000 of the $20,000 goes straight to the printer. Another
$4,000 pays for design, layout, editing and mailings. Then, there's
$3,000 to flog the book at journalists' conventions in Vancouver
and Spain, where I buy booze for everyone who looks as though they
can read. And, $1,000 or so comes under the "various"
heading. All of which uses up $16,000 from the $20,000 loan. Leaving me
$4,000 for rent, beer and sushi. But, at least I've written and
published the damned book. Fame and wealth come next. Which brings me to the problem of marketing the damned book. I don't mean to boast, but I've been a TV journalist in more than
a dozen countries for some 35 years. I've worked for ABC-TV, NBC-TV,
PBS and CBC. I've won Emmy and Sigma Delta Chi awards for my journalism.
For 10 years, I was head of TV journalism training at CBC. I've
trained thousands of working broadcast journalists in Canada, the
U.S., Europe, Scandinavia, the Caribbean and Africa. In fact, I was the first journalism trainer invited to train South
African Broadcasting Corporation journalists after international
sanctions were lifted and before that country's first-ever democratic
elections. So, in all modesty, I reckon I'm fairly well qualified to write
a book about the problems and future of TV journalism. And, I have
reason to expect that Canada's journalism schools will be interested
in it. Particularly since Canadian journalism teachers are always
whinging that they can't find any Canadian journalism manuals for
their students. In mid-Summer, before I offer the book to bookstores, I write letters
to every journalism professor/instructor/teacher who is a member
of the Canadian Journalism Educators Association. I write to them
by name. Some 90 of them. I describe the book and quote reviews. I figures that since none of the teachers has read the book yet,
they can't claim it's no good. So, I expect all of them to, at least,
show a little interest. However, if only half of the 90 actually
buy it, read it and like it--and make it required reading for their
students--at an average of 20 students per class, that's 900 books
at $30 a copy. Which is $27,000. Which will make me very happy and
help pay for rent, beer and sushi. Of the 90 journalism teachers, however, only seven even bother
to reply to my letters. The seven order one or two copies each.
Presumably their students will share. It's enough to make you lose faith in journalism schools. (Oddly the BCIT journalism school--which isn't a member of the
association so didn't get a letter--orders 40 copes for the Winter
term. May instructor George Orr prosper in unendurable pleasure
infinitely prolonged.) Right now, I own 500 bright, shiny copies out of a 1,000-book print
run. They crouch unsold in cardboard boxes overflowing from my broom
closet and the warehouse of distributor Christie & Christie
in Cookstown, Ont., wherever that is. Not too shabby, you might say. Selling half the print run in eight
months at $30 copy may not be Bertonesque but, at least, it brings
in a few bucks. Problem is, I've only actually sold 200 of the 500
gone. Three hundred were given away free to:
I sit down and try to work it all out. It takes me 15 months of
hard and lonely work to write and flog the book. Each book costs
me roughtly $10 to produce. So the 200 sales at $30 each earn me
$4,000 for 15 months work. Which works out to $266 a month. The minimum wage in Ontario is $1,096 a month--four times more
than I earn. The problems multiply. Visa starts making more than usually nasty
noises about something called my "outstanding account."
Rent has to be paid, beer and sushi have to be bought. Reluctantly, I stop flogging the damned book, put dreams of making
The New York Times bestseller list behind me, and announce
to the world that once again I'm available to train broadcast journalists
and folks who would like to communicate better than they do now. The world is busy with its own problems and doesn't notice. This is when Patti The Bookkeeper calls with the mother-of-all
problems. She announces it's just two days away from the end of
my financial year and Pay-The-Government-What-You-Owe-Or-Go-To-Jail-For-A-Hundred-Years-Day.
"By the way," she adds, "you owe the taxman $10,000." "Impossible," I say proudly. "You've screwed up
again. I haven't earned any money for a year, so I can't owe $10,000.
The tax people owe me. Big time." Patti The Bookkeeper patiently explains the system as she does
every year around this time. (You can skip the next paragraph if
you wish, it's a bit technical). She says I pay taxes on what I earn the year before the year just
ended. So, I'm supposed to pay taxes on money I earn before I start
to write book. Which means that last year (the year I write the
book and earn almost nothing) turns out to be the year I owe $10,000
on income from the year before that. And, I won't get any tax credit
until next year. Which hasn't started yet. Or something like that.
She offers to go into detail. I decline. Patti The Bookkeeper says she can't understand why I don't understand
bookkeeping and taxes. I tell her if I understand all this stuff
I won't need to pay her massive amounts of money so she can play
golf three times a week and drive a new convertible every year.
She says something rude and hangs up. The $10,000 tax I can't pay, plus the $21,200 loan and interest
I can't pay adds up to $31,200 I can't pay. I decide to take control of my life. I go to the corner store and
buy 10 6/49 lottery tickets and something called a "window
peat starter kit" so I can grow my own vegetables and live
off my 24th-floor balcony until I get back to something resembling
solvency. The lottery tickets turn out to be the usual sad investment and
the starter kit dissolves in the rain. I decide to reform. To become a responsible citizen. To handle
this tax thing like an adult and do some creative accounting for
the future. What if I tell the taxman that a Turks and Caicos scuba-diving
trip I take to cure a serious case of writer's block and get beyond
Chapter Three is a professional expense? Which government accountant
can dispute the fact (widely known among writers) that only diving
with sharks and sipping cold beer in the hot sun with oiled and
lissome lovelies can overcome the dreaded writer's block? I find the white plastic Loblaws shopping bags in the closet where
I keep tax stuff. I look for Turks and Caicos receipts. Nothing
there. In an excess of honesty, I've thrown them out. Maybe if I just scribble down what I can remember, the government
will take my word for it. Snowballs and their chances in hell come
to mind. I wonder whether the government will let me work off my
taxes over 10 years of community services or just send me straight
to jail. At night, I dream about large, hairy men covered in tattoos abusing
me in ways you wouldn't want to know. The large, hairy men covered
in tattoos are government tax accountants. I hear it's even worse
in prison. I'm writing this story about the problems this damned book has
caused me for four reasons. The first reason is to warn you against self-publishing. Only publishers
know how to publish. That's why they're called publishers. Unless you've got a private income, you're a super salesperson
and a genius at promotion, self-publishing is even more likely to
bring you poverty and despair than working for the CBC. So, if you ever get the urge to take a year off to self-publish
that book about Serbian war heroes or how you lost your innocence
there on the sand dunes in that languid Summer of '69, resist, gentle
reader. Shoot crack cocaine into your eyeballs instead. It's safer. The second reason is to suggest that if you absolutely must self-publish,
save money to pay your taxes for the time you take off. The government is in a foul mood. It needs $440 billion or so to
pay off humungous debts it runs up without asking us. Also, I have
a sneaking suspicion that it's getting more than somewhat pissed
off with folks like us who hang out doing artsy-fartsy things, like
writing books and not contributing our fair share to the glories
of savage capitalism. Remember: like death, the taxman always cometh. And, like death,
when he cometh, he taketh. The third reason is to warn you not to borrow money so can pay
the rent and buy beer and sushi while writing and self-publishing. But, if you must borrow, you might consider this cunning plan I'm
working on. It's how the big boys do these things and it's got as
good a chance of success as any other self-publishing plan I've
ever heard of. Tomorrow, put on your best suit and announce to your friendly local
banker that you're prepared to accept a billion-dollar loan to publish
your next book. And, of course, you have no equity or collateral.
(Patti The Bookkeeper explained equity and collateral, but I'm a
touch fuzzy on the details). If recent Canadian big business history
is any guide, your banker will go orgasmic, lick your shoes and
grovel until you graciously accept his money. Yes, I know, after a couple of years he'll notice you haven't paid
any interest. But that's all part of the plan. That's when you go
bankrupt. So you don't have to pay the money back. That's when you
write a best-selling book titled How To Get Your Friendly, Local
Bank To Finance Your Book. Just one thing--don't self-publish the book. The fourth reason for writing this story is to earn the miserable
$125 Sources is paying for this article. God knows, it's not much. But $125 from $31,200 (loan + interest
+ tax) brings the debt for the damned book all the way down to $31,075.
Which means only 1,036 more copies to sell before I break even. But I don't have 1,036 copies left. I only have 500. Which means
I'll have to do another print run. And the problem will start all
over again. What the hell, $125 from Sources is a start. Then,
of course, there's the tax on $125 . . . Tim Knight is a freelance communications consultant and broadcast
journalism trainer who lives in Toronto. Everything you always
want to know . . . (enough already--Ed.) was published in March,
1995. Unsigned copes cost $30. Signed copies $25. Phone (416) 968-2947.
Fax: (416) 922-1459.
Sources |