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castironA random thought caused by too much reading of commentary on Harlequin Horizons:
Traditional publishing is like working for a company. You work; the company profits from your work; you're paid. (And if you lose the company money, you're likely to be not working there in the future.) You don't get all the profits that result from your work, but you're also not responsible for handling most of the company's expenses.
Self-publishing is like being self-employed. You work; you do everything yourself or pay a subcontractor to do it for you. You have to deal with every aspect of the business, not just the part of the job that originally interested you. You can lose a lot of money on the business -- but if you succeed, all the profits are yours.
Vanity publishing....that's like being in graduate school in the humanities. You work and often pay for the privilege; the department benefits from your work. The department sells you a dream -- a tenure-track job, a life of scholarship -- but you're likely to find that the dream isn't attainable, or if you do attain it, that it cost more than you'd expected. The people who do best with this option are the people who go in with their eyes open, who've looked at the options and know what they're really likely to get out of the program.
Traditional publishing is like working for a company. You work; the company profits from your work; you're paid. (And if you lose the company money, you're likely to be not working there in the future.) You don't get all the profits that result from your work, but you're also not responsible for handling most of the company's expenses.
Self-publishing is like being self-employed. You work; you do everything yourself or pay a subcontractor to do it for you. You have to deal with every aspect of the business, not just the part of the job that originally interested you. You can lose a lot of money on the business -- but if you succeed, all the profits are yours.
Vanity publishing....that's like being in graduate school in the humanities. You work and often pay for the privilege; the department benefits from your work. The department sells you a dream -- a tenure-track job, a life of scholarship -- but you're likely to find that the dream isn't attainable, or if you do attain it, that it cost more than you'd expected. The people who do best with this option are the people who go in with their eyes open, who've looked at the options and know what they're really likely to get out of the program.