The New Landscape – Access, Discovery, and Media De-centralization

Several things popped up in rapid succession that got me thinking. The first was this announcement regarding YouTube Red, the new ad-free paid tier of YouTube. The second was the news of a new Star Trek series, to be aired (almost?) exclusively on CBS All Access, a streaming service. And then, just as I was writing this post, Amazon announced Amazon Books – a Bricks & Mortar test store.

So now, I’m going to put on my digital media scholar hat once more and talk about some high-level stuff going on right now. Some pitfalls and pain points I see, as well as opportunities.

YouTube Red has been some time in the making. January of this year, musician Zoë Keating got a lot of shares and chatter with her post “What should I do about YouTube?” on this very topic. I see this move as part of an overall shift in the landscape toward more and more de-centralization of content, where 1st-party streaming systems and subscriptions replace once-agnostic content aggregation-esque systems like YouTube, Hulu, etc.

Here’s YouTube creator Hank Green discussing some of the ins and outs of this move.

I appreciate him spending the time to talk about the positives and negatives, avoiding a hard knee-jerk reaction. I’m worried about the independent creators who had found an equilibrium between Patreon, YouTube, and other venues who now have to pivot and adjust in a big way. It’s the way of life, but any logistical interruption costs creators money, because have to spend spend more of their time on admin and strategy rather than the actual creation.

And then, just hours later, I saw the news about the new Star Trek show, and that it was going to be almost exclusively available on CBS All Access, a paid streaming subscription which currently costs $5.99 a month.

It looks to me (and others, from what I’ve seen), that this is CBS positioning the new show as a Killer App for their streaming service, which I’d not heard of before today (I’m mostly out of the Media Criticism game day-to-day, thanks to having two other careers).

It’s potentially a very smart approach – and one that most of these proliferating paid services are following. HBO, Netflix, Hulu, Kindle Unlimited, all of them are bringing in or commissioning exclusive content to serve as Killer Apps for their individual services.

But here’s the thing about that proliferation – if every service has its own killer apps behind their pay walls, most consumers are very quickly going to max out on the $ they can or choose to pay for these services.

 

Consumer Side

An example – I have a steady, middle-class day job and I have a writing career. I’m married to someone who also has a steady job, and we have no kids. So we have more disposable income than a lot of US families. Between us, we pay for Netflix, Hulu, and High-speed internet. I get my razors on a subscription, I subscribe to a fiction serial (Bookburners), I’ve been an intermittent subscriber to Oyster and Scribd, as well as supporting a half-dozen creators on Patreon and intermittent subscriptions to broadcasters on Twitch.tv. As a household, we’re probably in the top quartile of subscription service users in the US. And I’m very much at the point of ‘Okay, that’s all I can do’ when it comes to subscription services. If I add one at this point, it probably involves dropping another.

And there are *so many* of them these days:

Twitch, YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, Crunchyroll, HBO Now, CBS Access, Spotify, Apple Music, Kindle Unlimited, Scribd, Amazon Prime, etc.

And that’s not even counting subscription boxes (L00tCrate, etc.) and subscription services outside of entertainment, like Harry’s, Blue Apron, StitchFix, etc.

Economic recovery in the US is happening, but it’s slow, and it’s accompanied by wage stagnation and income inequality (I can’t speak well to the economic situation elsewhere, so I won’t). So the % of people in the US that can afford numerous subscription services without seriously re-framing their budget is still not too large, from what I can tell. Whether this is part of an overall paradigm shift in how people budget and consume content is a different discussion (there are too many ways this could go – I have to focus).

 

Creator Side

Switching hats now – what does this look like on the creator side of the equation?

I see this proliferation of paid/gated services as a double-edged facet of the overall creative & commercial ecosystem. There are opportunities, but they’re potentially fraught.

Here’s what I see as the dominant progression for a creator trying to make money from their work (visual art, music, prose, comics, video, etc.)

Level 1 – Start small, give stuff away for free, sell some stuff. At Level 1, a creator is almost totally reliant on big systems, for both discovery and fulfillment/delivery. Basically no one knows who they are, so they join larger infrastructures and services to get the word out about their material through algorithmic and organic discovery.

Level 2 – Building Audience & Relationships — At this level, it becomes viable to sell some merch (T-shirts, mugs, stickers, patches, etc. Here, a creator can bring dedicated fans onto a growing mailing list. This level enables direct sales and stronger performance on retail sites, but the creator may still be largely dependent for discovery-enabled growth and a lot of fulfillment/delivery

Level 3 – Big Creators – Here, creators have a dedicated audience large enough they can get a living wage directly from their base, either totally direct or through Patreon/Kickstarter. Maybe they supplement their income speaking/appearance fees etc., being large enough that they are in demand not just as creators, but as entrepreneurs/thought leaders in their field. They may still use large systems, but if they do, they do so from a far stronger position – they are less dependent on any given system, since their base is strong, a base that is specific and mobilized, not platform-dependent.

This system is reductive, and by applying it broadly across media, I lose some nuance. Musicians can tour and get money from in-person appearances and sell merch there – novelists and poets largely cannot. Visual artists can sell commissions at conventions for solid income, writers have less opportunities in such situations. Etc.

Some take the pure indie path and are less reliant on the bigger systems, but then don’t have access to their discovery engine.

As the landscape moves toward more gated content, more push for exclusives as killer apps, more and more places to publish and publicize, creators have to have our eyes wide frakking open as we consider every new platform, every new distributor agreement, every new book deal, and so on.

Because things are moving fast, and these big platforms are only allies for as long as we’re useful to them. ACX changed its payout terms last February, and because ACX was the only real game in their town (self-publishing audiobook service), creators were forced to sign the new terms or walk from that service entirely. It’s the same type of choice YouTube creators have been forced into, though with notable differences (ACX was a flat-out rate cut, YouTube might come with additional payment, but requires more opt-in and cuts off other options). Any creator that relies on a single or small # of services/sites/retailers for a large % of their business is vulnerable to disruption, as Chuck says in the link re: ACX.

Anytime one of these big companies makes a shift, it causes huge ripples, and creators, especially those of us reliant on platforms for fulfillment, discovery, or other services/opportunities they offer have to roll with the changing tides.

In my opinion, creators right now have more to fear from Monopsonies and monopsonic behavior, than monopolies. Since so many creators are currently beholden to retailers and/or content services (writers and Amazon/B&N/Kobo/iTunes/Physical Bookstores, musicians and iTunes/Spotify/Pandora), if a creator wants to retail their work but doesn’t have enough reach/audience on their own, they use a seller/vendor. But if there are few enough vendors in their world, and those limited vendors exhibit monopsonic behavior, the result tends to be a major squeeze on the creators.

Paradoxically, the creators are the only reason the monopsonists can survive – if a majority of creators pulled out of monopsonic vendors, those vendors would collapse. But in the meantime, the lost income, the lost access could easily bankrupt a huge % of the creators pulling away from the monopsonist.

In a healthy market, there are a range of options, and creators can respond to a change of terms they dislike by removing their content from that platform. But for most video creators, removing everything from YouTube stands to present a loss of a huge % of their access and income, just as a prose writer would stand to lose a huge % of their access and income if they decided to not sell through Amazon.

Monopsonic behavior also impacts larger creator groups, like publishers – if one retailer or wholesaler gets too strong, it can create problems. It’s the WalMart problem. Wal-Mart pushes down prices, then makes up their $ in volume and by demanding better terms from their vendors, The vendors (publishers, manufacturers, etc.) then get to choose – pull out of the single-largest physical retailer, or accept the terms. Because individually, Wal-Mart doesn’t need most vendors. They need a plurality or majority, but as long as the selection adds up, individual vendors can come and go.

So when you’re one of those vendors, one of those creators, you end up in a really terrible situation. And that worries me. I want a healthy marketplace, where creators (authors, musicians, etc.) and the publishers/labels/etc that work with them have options, have recourse for if/when terms change in a way that becomes untenable.

The sky is not falling. But I will continue to point out rain clouds when I see them forming. Because then the smart folks can put out buckets and save on the water bill, or pull the lawn furniture inside before the storm breaks.

I’ll stop there before torturing the metaphor any further.

What do you all think about these streaming service moves – YouTube Red, and Star Trek on CBS All Access?

Mike’s latest book is Hexomancy, the fourth Ree Reyes urban fantasy. Geek magic squares off against a quartet of fate witches hell-bent on revenge.

Hexomancy cover

Baltimore Book Festival schedule

Hi all! One of the best things about being a writer in Baltimore is that the city’s book festival every fall. SFWA runs an entire mini-convention throughout the festival, and I’ll be there this weekend (as well as splitting my time with the Baltimore Comic-Con, checking in with my comics friends).

Here’s where you can find me at the book festival:

 

Friday, September 25th

11am – The Revolution Will Be Science Fictional and Fantastic

What to read in SF/F and where to find it! Our panel looks at the latest trends in SF/F and the books people are talking about this year.

Emmie Mears, Cat Rambo, Fran Wilde, Michael R. Underwood

12pm – Comics! Science Fiction! Fantasy!

POW! BAM! See how comics, science fiction, and fantasy inform each other. Are superhero stories fantasy, science fiction, or both? Which non-superhero SF/F comics should you be reading? What’s up with novels about superheroes? From Saga to Ms. Marvel to Kavalier & Clay, our panel will discuss it all.
Bill Campbell, Anne Gray, Cat Rambo, Michael R. Underwood

1pm – Reading Group 1 – Superheroes, SF, and Action!

Sit down and discover your new favorite author! Four writers, one hour.
DH Aire, Tom Doyle, Cat Rambo, Michael R. Underwood

 

Saturday, September 26th

12pm – Dangerous Voices Variety Hour

A fast-paced quiz show in the vein of Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me! brought to you by the Baltimore Science Fiction Society. Win free books and learn things you never knew about your favorite authors.
Tobias S. Buckell, Sarah Pinsker, Michael R. Underwood, Diana Peterfreund

6pm – Meet The Authors Social

Rub elbows with your new favorite science fiction and fantasy authors at this annual event.
All the Attending Authors

 

Here’s a map of the festival:

BBF15_Map - SFWA

The fine folks at Ukazoo will be handling book sales, and I’ll be bringing some swag for my various books, current and upcoming. See you there!

Hexomancy is here!

 

 

 

Hexomancy cover

 

At long last, Hexomancy has arrived!

It’s been over a year since Attack the Geek, the last Ree Reyes story, was released, and now Hexomancy closes out the first story arc of the Ree Reyes universe.

If you’re not familiar with the Ree Reyes stories, check out this series summary I wrote for XOXO After Dark to see if it catches your fancy.

For long-running readers, here’s what you can expect from Hexomancy: More Lucretia, more Drake, more Eastwood and Grognard, but also more of the Rhyming Ladies, and plots from the first three books to come back around for a reckoning. Expect Eastwood’s history to figure in a big way, and as always, there’s more of the patented Ree Reyes series pop-culture references, geeky jokes, and energetic action-adventure storytelling.

I’m really proud of Hexomancy – I think it’s the best novel I’ve written to-date, in terms of pacing, action, characterization, and interpersonal relationships. I hope you’ll enjoy it.

Click here for links to ebook retailers to get your copy now.

Until next time, Geek on!

HEXOMANCY on NetGalley

Hello, all!

For the reviewers among you, I’m very excited to share the news that HEXOMANCY is now live on NetGalley, ready for your requests and reading.

Hexomancy cover

I’m very proud of this novel, as it brings together a lot of threads from the three previous Ree Reyes stories, and is the conclusion of the first major arc for the series.

Go forth and happy reading!

The Many Sides of Bundling

Earlier this week, Tor announced that it had partnered with BitLit to offer discounted ebook editions to readers who already own print editions ($2.99 per book).

Books

Angry Robot has had a bundling promotion running for some time, offering free ebooks to customers who buy the physical from one of several bookstore partners, or at conventions.

Bundling has been an on-again, off-again hot-button topic in the publishing world, as readers lobby for getting the ebook edition for free with their physical purchase. A frequent argument I see is that if a reader pays for a book, they feel like they should be able to consume that book in whatever format they want – they’ve bought the content, so format shouldn’t matter.

The production realities in publishing aren’t quite that simple. The final steps in book production diverge between print and ebook – so the  work-hours that make an ebook are different work-hours, with different skills and programs needed, than the work-hours that produce a finished physical book.

 

Don’t get me wrong – I think print + ebook bundling should be universally available. TV and Film companies have already figured this out – in the US at least, consumers can by a DVD, DVD + BluRay, or DVD + BluRay + Digital Download. Sometimes there’s even a 3D BluRay in there. But the different formats are available together. And sometimes the programs involved in the digital download even work (and sometimes they don’t – I’m looking at you Ultraviolet).

To sell a bundled print + ebook edition, here’s what publishers have to do:

1) Partner with BitLit or similar companies, selling companion ebooks at a discounted price to verified print owners (who mark up their physical book to claim the ebook).

2) Create a separate edition (with a separate ISBN) for bundling. That bundling edition would likely cost $1-$5 more than the normal physical edition, just as the DVD + BluRay + Digital Download edition of a film/TV show costs ~$5 more than the DVD + BluRay edition (though digital films/TV shows tend to cost more than individual ebooks). This probably means creating a series of download codes for every book, printing a pull-off-sticker on the inside cover or the like. Printing download codes in plain sight in or on the cover would be incredibly rife for abuse, so some precautions are expected. Marvel comics does this as the default for some comics, offering a free digital download.

2a) As above, but offer universal bundling for no additional cost. That has its own difficulties, as expressed below in Show Me The Money.

3) Publishers broker deals such that every print edition retailer creates a partnership with ebook retailers to enable bundling up-sales at point of sale/checkout. Buy a paperback book, automatically get prompted to buy the ebook at a discounted rate. Amazon has something like this with MatchBook, though only a few publishers have signed on for the program.

 

 

Show Me The Money

Here’s the big question, the one I don’t see asked as often.Who gets paid, and how much?

How does bundling impact how authors are paid?

For this, I’m going to get very hands-on with #s and $. There will even be charts. You have been warned.

Royalties, the amount per sale that writers are paid (against advance or directly) is determined by the specific contract with the publisher. In self-publishing, the terms are not royalties, but instead the creator’s share (as the author-publisher).

But if a physical edition AND ebook edition are being sold at once, how is the royalty calculated? If the ebook is a free add-on, then the author only gets the paperback royalty despite that when looked at from the current paradigm, the book is being sold twice, once in each format.

Part of the trick here is that physical royalties are calculated differently than ebooks. In most contracts, print royalties are calculated off of list price (aka the published price on the cover), 6-8% for Mass Market, 8-10% for Trade Paperback, and ~12% for HC. These rates vary by contract.

Ebook royalties, however, are calculated on net sales, the publisher share of the list price. That’s usually 70% of list price in agency agreements, and usually 50% in Wholesale agreements.

This means that in many cases, authors can get more $ proportionally and in real $s.

Let’s do some comparisons:

For each format, I’ve market the highest royalty for the author in Bold, the 2nd best in Italics, and the third is left in plain text.

Paperback Price ($) Royalty ($) 8% Ebook price ($) Royalty ($) – Agency 70% Royalty ($) – Wholesale 50%
Mass Market (8% Print royalty) 7.99 0.64 6.99 1.22 0.87
Trade Paperback (10% Print Royalty 14.99 1.49 9.99 1.75 1.29
Hardcover (12% Print Royalty) 25.99 3.11 12.99 2.27 1.63

 

So we see that Agency Ebook is the best deal for the author in paperback, but Hardcover tends to pay more than even agency. This is due to the fact that ebook prices scale up as the formats get more expensive, but not at the same rate that print edition prices increase. There’s been major consumer pushback against fiction ebook prices above $10, and especially over $12-13. Ebooks for titles released in Hardcover would need to be priced at $17.99 for the ebook to earn a higher $ royalty than the Hardcover.

N.B. – These price levels are not universal, nor are the royalty rates. Angry Robot prices all ebooks for individual books at $6.99, and Saga Press’ recent release of Ken Liu’s Grace of Kings is priced at $7.99 in ebook, even as the hardcover sells for $27.99.

Price elasticity of demand is a thing, here, and it’s likely that when a book is cheaper than the physical edition, they ebook may sell proportionally more, makin up the per-unit royalty loss with volume sales. Several publishers have tried this approach, and it is the default approach for author-publishers, who tend to set the print $ far higher than the ebook price to show the discount, while usually pricing ebooks at $4.99 and below (sometimes far below). And yet some of these author-publishers have made incredibly good $ selling at those bargain prices, even with a lower author’s share due to vendor agreements (bringing in 35% per sale instead of 70%).

Given that authors tend to receive a better $ royalty for ebook sales when the title’s physical edition is a paperback, how do publishers adjust the sale royalty for a bundled edition?

If the bundling happens with its own edition, how will royalty be calculated – List or Net, and at what rate?

I’d propose that a bundled edition, being sold as a physical book, would probably need to be based off of the print royalty, with a bonus for the ebook, maybe around +5-8% of list.

 

So 8% of list for the MM, but +5% bonus for the ebook, for 13% of list. The reader is effectively paying $2 extra for the ebook, and the author is getting about 2x the royalty as they would on a $7.99 MM.

The result would look like this:

Bundle Edition Price ($) Royalty $
Mass Market + Ebook (13% List) $9.99 $1.30
Trade Paperback + Ebook (15% List) $17.99 $2.70
Hardcover + Ebook (20% List) $29.99 $5.99

 

The royalty gain is higher in Hardcover due to the fact that the promotional price increase of adding $2 is very small in a Hardcover, and publishers margins on a Hardcover are quite good, so I added 8% to the royalty rate instead of 5, especially since Hardcover books are the ones most vulnerable to losing sales to their ebook edition counterpart (due to the larger price difference).

The question then is – would readers pay these rates to get print + ebook as a default? I know I would, as I like to have both editions when I can. you have other thoughts on how to implement a bundling model? Do you want bundled ebooks with physical editions? How would you want them?

Do you have any other thoughts on how to implement a bundling model? Would you want bundled ebooks with physical editions? How would you want them? How much extra is a fair price to get a bundled ebook?

The Tricky Thing About Reading ‘Neutral’

The following was prompted by a recent Telegraph article responding to K. Tempest Bradford’s reading challenge on XOJane. (I’m not linking the Telegraph article because I think it’s a steaming pile of crap – it’s poorly-researched, uses terrible argumentation, and includes personal attacks)

A response I see come up frequently when people talk about reading challenges or pushing for greater diversity in reading is some variation of the following:

‘I don’t pay attention to gender or race or sexuality of authors when I read. I just read what I like and what looks good.’

On the surface, that’s a laudable approach – it’s meritocratic, it avoids bias based on the background of the author.

But…

Continue reading

#TotallyNotFantasy and the Pointless Genre Cage Match

So, this review of Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant dropped Monday on Salon, and it’s been making the rounds in my part of the internet.

Last evening, Scott Lynch wrote a few tweets which I took to be responding to that article and/or to related claims that The Buried Giant is Not Fantasy.

I joined in, tweeting about my own fantasy novels and adding the Hashtag #TotallyNotFantasy.

And then…it took off. (more below the Storify)

I think it’s not a coincidence that people jumped in. The ‘It’s totally not fantasy/science fiction’ meme has been around for a while.

Pointless Genre Cage Match

I haven’t read Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant yet. Maybe I’ll love it. And for this conversation, The Buried Giant is really just another work framed in a way to re-hash up a conversation that’s been around for a long time – Genre Vs. Literary, as if they’re somehow mutually exclusive. I’ve seen a lot of literary establishment-approved writers writing genre novels (cool!) and then getting treated by major review venues like those works are ‘transcending’ or ‘redeeming’ the genre, as if we don’t already have grand masters of high literary styling in speculative fiction.

I vehemently defy those assertions. Be proud of what you’re writing, and cite your sources. I’m very happy for writers to be producing genre novels that are then released by non-genre houses. Recent novels like Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven or Glen Duncan’s The Last Werewolf or novellas like Karen Russell’s Sleep Donation deploy the tools of speculative fiction in stories marketed to readers as literary fiction audiences. Sweet! These works can be used by readers to bridge the gaps between speculative fiction and literary fiction audiences. This is great – it helps readers find new stories to appreciate, especially since there are writers in both fields that write hybrid work which can satisfy aesthetic demands of primarily-speculative or primarily-literary readers. They’re just different styles of art, different traditions which have overlapped numerous times.

But if you come into the territory of speculative fiction, grab some unicorns and dragons and orphan heroes and wizards, and then go somewhere else, build a novel, and say ‘Oh, this isn’t fantasy,’ then you and me? We’ve got a problem.

And not just me. Science Fiction/Fantasy’s no-nonsense fairy godmother Ursula K. “National Book Fellowship Medalist for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters” Le Guin had some words as well.

I stand with Ms. Le Guin. Not surprising, since her Earthsea books were some of the first fantasy novels I ever read and they have left an indelible mark on my conception of the genre.

Embrace the Power of And

A work can be more than one thing. A novel being fantasy doesn’t mean it isn’t also Literary, or Young Adult. I think genres are most useful as a tagging system – a way of describing and delineating additional points of entry and accessibility for a work.

The genre gutter is an illusion. It’s just another way of casting aspersions, of creating hierarchies between camps of art that are often trying to do different things and have little reason to be opposed. Retreading those hierarchical conversations is about as useful as complaining that an ATV is a terrible vehicle because it isn’t a bullet train. They do different things.

It’s all art. Appreciate it for what it is – learn what the work seems to be doing, and help get it in front of readers that might enjoy that aesthetic experience.

The Ultimate Genre MFA

So, this article about MFA programs has been going around for the last couple of days.

Unsurprisingly, the ever-thoughtful, ever-incisive hilarious Chuck Wendig has a point-by-point response which is dead-on (standard heads-up: Chuck is virtuoso of inventive swearing).

So rather than add my own point-by-point response, I want to take the conversation in a bit of a different direction, which is to say toward genre fiction.

The State of the Field

This whole article and the discussion around it reminds me of how poorly-served I think a lot of genre writers are vis a vis the MFA establishment in the USA. There are some MFA programs that are more oriented toward commercial fiction, like Seton Hill and USC, and some genre-friendly programs with SF/F writers on-staff like NC StateTemple, and Stonecoast (and there may be some others with Crime or Romance writers), but as recently as 2011, when I was looking at MFA programs, the schools listed above seemed to be pretty much the extent of places where a SF/F fiction writer could go and expect to not just be tolerated, but to be at least marginally well-served – with instructors qualified to assist the writer in becoming better in their chosen genre. When I applied to MFA programs, I got zero feedback as to why. No ‘we had to many genre fiction writers apply this year,’ no ‘your writing sample wasn’t quite up to snuff because <insert craft element>. Just a form rejection. Alas.

So when I sold Geekomancy the next year, I didn’t bother applying again to programs. I have a career in writing, I can share my knowledge through classes offered on the web, and I have the skills to sell stories and novels to professional markets.

Which is annoying, because I *really like* teaching (I’ve taught creative writing, tango, web design, public speaking, and historical martial arts), and I especially love talking shop and sharing knowledge about writing and the business of writing.

Word on the net and in the business is that for most MFA programs, genre fiction is at best an also-ran, at worst an outcast forbidden style. And that seems silly, given how many writers want to specialize in these genres, and how much money those genres make in the industry. So many MFA programs seem to be designed to very specifically train writers to become teachers at MFA programs, to just replicate across the literary  fiction landscape. Except that just like almost everywhere else in academia, there are nowhere near enough jobs for the # of MFAs granted. So an MFA can be a teaching credential, but it’s often more a chance to spend two years focusing on craft. And that’s cool.

Unless you’re a genre writer interested in writing commercial fiction as a career.

So What?

Here’s the fun part.

One of my ‘If I Had All Of The Money’ dreams would be to found and endow a brand-new, world-class Genre Fiction MFA program, with faculty in Crime, Romance, SF, Fantasy, etc – adult and YA. The program would focus exclusively on genre fiction, and whwre most MFA programs do their cross-training between fiction and poetry, or fiction and memoir, this program would cross-train between fiction genres – since those three main genres cross over so much as-is, and current publishing trends are inviting that hybridization.

Some of the faculty would be chosen as much if not more for their business acumen as for their writing experience – their chairs would be for that business knowledge. And as a result, my dream MFA program would have a strong professional development/business knowledge component. Every MFA that graduates from my program would have training in pitching a book, participating in panels, hand-selling in a convention environment, writing query letters & synopsis, self-publishing skills (art direction, hiring freelancers, etc.) social media skills, as well as managing their writing as a business (taxes, expenses, budgeting). You know, skills a professional writer needs to prosper.

I love Clarion West. It taught me a ton about writing. But CW is not a be-all-end-all writing and professional development course. It can’t be.

But you know what can be? A modern two-year MFA program. A good curriculum, consistently evolving to adjust with publishing trends, should be able to give its graduates the most up-to-date information and help them launch their own careers, while also making them incredibly enticing to any smart Creative Writing program, which should leap at candidates with not only craft skills, but business skills. The Low-Residency MFA programs just don’t allow for as much teaching experience, which I would think puts those MFAs in a weaker position when applying for teaching posts, something likely exacerbated by their genre fiction focus. (Note here: much of this is based on limited knowledge – folks are welcome to correct me).

In a few years, it would become The Ultimate Genre Fiction MFA, and other people would copy the model, either adding strong commercial fiction and business development aspects to their programs or retrofitting them entirely.

Yes, it’s a pipe dream. But boy would I love to give it a try. I think the writing would would be notably better for it – as-is, the MFA ecosystem seems to be dominated by literary fiction and poetry, while leaving commercial fiction and genre fiction largely out in the cold, which serves to re-instantiate that divide, as commercial writers often avoid the MFA system and develop their skills elsewhere, or focus on developing their basic craft elements without getting support with genre-specific skills or business development.

Those of you out there who have attended MFA programs, either with or without a commercial fiction focus, low or full-residency – how were (are) your experiences? What would you want out of a MFA program if you could start over?

How We Can Save Borderlands

A while back, Borderlands Books announced that they would have to close up shop. This was met with much despair and many calls to investigate options to avoid closing.

Borderlands held a planning meeting earlier this month to consider options. Writer and Reviewer Sunil Patel took notes at the planning meeting, which I Storified here (N.B. these are not official meeting minutes).

And last night, the staff announced a proposed plan for how they would be able to stay open: yearly sponsorships at $100 each, offering special perks.

On Twitter last night, I saw a huge outpouring of support for Borderlands, and it looks like they’re well on their way to reaching the goal of 300 sponsorships to stay open through at least the end of 2015. I will be buying a sponsorship, for sure. And I would invite you, dear readers, to take a look at their website, look up the events they have hosted, the role they play in the SFF community, and to consider buying a sponsorship if it is within your means and your giving allowance.

Even though I’ve only physically been to Borderlands twice, I have felt the positive impact their presence has on the community. There are a very small number of specialist SF/F bookstores in the country, and Borderlands is one of the very best. It is my hope and sincere belief that the broader SF/F community can come together and give them the boost they need to continue to serve the San Francisco SF/F community, the city that is their home, and the genre writ large.

Side note – this post is not the place for discussion of the minimum wage regulations or Borderlands’ state reason for closing. That has been much-discussed elsewhere. This is about coming together to help the store.

Introducing GENRENAUTS

Tor.com has announced their launch roster for The Imprint, including two books by me in a new series!

When I heard the news of Tor.com launching a novella imprint, focusing on digital sales and experimenting with different sales and promotion strategies, as well as offering a higher royalty rate on digital sales, Macmillan had my curiosity.

When they hired my former Angry Robot colleague Lee Harris as the Imprint’s Senior Editor, well…

Django Unchained Gif ' You had my curiosity, but now you have my attention.'

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