Self-Publishing and the Digital Public 

The term “publishing” connotes a process. It extends a written work beyond just its author, including teams of editors, marketers, printers, and, to some, the work’s readership. Traditional models of publishing have maintained the structure that they have today for a long time. An author submits their works to a publishing house, or the house solicits work from the author. It then goes through a rigorous editing process, with developmental, line, and copy editors combing through the piece and making changes that they see fit to improve it. Meanwhile, marketing teams work together to advertise the piece and make readerships aware of its impending release. Managing editors oversee the entire process and bring it all together to ensure that a polished, final product makes it to shelves on time. 

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Self-publishing, on the other hand, breaks away from this model, placing much more emphasis on the author. It requires them to be their own publishing house, putting them in charge of writing, scheduling, editing, marketing, and financing their books—or hiring someone to do it for them (Harris). Companies like Amazon and Ingram offer services for publishing digital works, allowing authors to self-publish their works. These services are accessible for independent authors to use, if they have the funding for it. Because of this accessibility, the number of self-published titles out in the marketplace is increasing (Cutler 87). Self-publishers have had to figure out ways to compete in a saturated market and spread their works to a large audience. 

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As a result, self-published authors depend on online communities to be successful. On IngramSpark, Ingram’s website dedicated to helping self-published authors plan, write, publish, and market their books, they suggest that authors take advantage of online resources to market their works. These include building author websites, email lists, blogs, and social media followings. Of course, authors that published through publishing houses use these tools as well, but, without a house’s assistance, these are essential for self-published authors for marketing. Websites, for example, allow readers to learn more about the author. This can help readers connect to the author and become interested in their current and future works. It also creates an atmosphere of professionalism, attaching it to the author and their writing (“How to Market Self-Published Books in the Digital World”). The site inherently is a piece of ethos that pulls readers in and markets the author’s works to them. Email lists, while less common, can also be helpful in keeping audiences up to date and informed about the author’s self-publishing progress. Their feedback is one-way, limiting the interaction between sender and receiver. Social media and blogs, on the other hand, help build community by enabling reader-to-reader and reader-to-author interactions. They allow the author to post about their work, their professional life, or even their day-to-day life, while followers can comment on the author’s post or with other followers (“How to Market Self-Published Books in the Digital World”). This creates opportunities to establish an online community, drawing readers and authors close together. Authors can then use these online platforms as tools to gauge their audience’s reactions to new ideas and promote new works. This is especially prevalent with self-published authors, since they lack the marketing resources that publishing houses provide (Ramdarshan Bold). 

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Creating this sense of community is key to marketing self-published works online, whether it be a novel or a piece of fanfiction. Because of this, the use of the internet has caused a shift in the “public sphere.” According to Melanie Ramdarshan Bold, in “The Return of the Social Author,” independent authors and digital publishing have caused a shift “from the mass-mediated public sphere to a networked public sphere” (Ramdarshan Bold). Whereas traditional publishing models use mass-media models to market their books to as many people as possible, alternative models emphasize networking and community. While self-publishers can use mass-media technologies like email lists and social media, the establishment of community creates this networked public that sets them apart. This network-based sphere blurs the lines between private and public, as authors update readers about events in their lives along with progress in their work, and this is especially so with self-publishing authors. Some self-publishing platforms like Wattpad are built on these ideas of independence, authorship, and community, furthering the networking public sphere of self-publishing. These platforms encourage serialization, allowing authors to release parts of a larger work, get feedback from their community, and take this feedback into account for future installments. 

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As a result, self-publishing is a more democratic process than traditional publishing. Authors have the freedom to write their own works and promote them to an interested community. Readers, in turn, have a say in what is published and can support authors that they love and want to see thrive. This allows authors to write about and readers to share works that explore diverse topics like gender identity, pansexuality, polyamory, and BIPOC perspectives—which might otherwise be gatekept by a publisher. It is worth noting, however, self-publishing does not eliminate gatekeeping completely, since many authors are at the mercy of algorithms, whether that be in selling their works or in gaining followers (Ramdarshan Bold). 

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Although not perfect, the internet has greatly reduced the amount of gatekeeping involved in the publication process, allowing self-publishing authors to flourish through grassroots community efforts. By targeting marketing efforts towards community interaction and exposure, self-published authors can reach a wide audience and sell their works. This strategy, in turn, alters models of the public sphere, creating a new, digital-based model for other authors and creators to follow.