What matters, and it isn’t Twitter

I adore making money off my books. There is nothing more satisfying than the figurative ka ching you hear when your book sells and you know money is going to land in your account. This does not happen with NY publishing, who for some reason, don’t even want to tell authors how many books they sold, much less when and where they sold.
That’s the primary reason Amazon and like retail online booksellers with lots of traffic are going to bleed off selling authors from New York like a head wound. That’s the reason stuff like stuffy New York Times book reviews are going to matter much less. All that will matter is the number of people buying your books. This already is all that matters to the publishers, of course, but the equation that will change is how much it’s going to matter to the authors. Other folks saying you’re smart and brilliant will dim in comparison to the ka ching. New York published with hoity-toity agent ain’t going to mean crap if you can see others rolling in money and you can’t even find out how many of your books are selling, much less pay your credit card bill.

There is a literary brouhaha going on involving Twitter, some readers site with the hashtag #fridaydeals and Jennifer Weiner. It is all very convoluted, but the gist is that Weiner called out the chick who has a site and runs #fridaydeals for profiting from publishers paying her to promo their books. Fridaydeals chick does admit to as much on her website, so I personally think that’s good enough.

I feel it’s much ado over very little. Everybody who can get paid for something, basically does. I think much more interesting is those folk who turn down money for the sake of some muddy principle. Obsessive, much? Sheesh, everybody ad whores. Give me your money and I will show folks your drawers. I’ll be happy to do it.

Here is the official announcement. Anybody who feels moved to pay me for anything that’s legal and more or less ethical, well, I will deign to take your money. If you want me to advertise something, I will say you paid me to do so on my site and feel all is well and dandy. I’m not great at social media, but I can’t think of anything better than money to motivate me to try. I don’t feel the need to be particularly politically correct, but I do have my high horses and might cuss you out if I feel you peed on them. But, I will probably still take your money if you still want to give me some. I guess my horses aren’t that overly high, after all. Christmas is coming, so feel free to shake some money my way. Anybody? I’m waiting.

If somebody wanted to criticize for actually making money? I’d laugh at them so hard, I’d probably fall over, still shaking with mirth.

I’m pretty clear on what matters and what doesn’t. People matter most, along with one’s health. Then money. Everything else is down there so far, you gotta squint to see.

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