Fear. Uncertainty. Human nature makes us want to create us-and-thems, even when they don't exist. (See how I did it, even there?)
Another thing to note is that a looooot of those people lump vanity press with self-publishing, and that doesn't so much lower the average quality of that pool as plummet it out of view.
Most self-publishing (especially when you include vanity press) makes it easy to target the group as a whole as worthless drivel and unpolished trite - the last question in the poll was "what editing quality do you expect from a self-published novel?" and honestly, if it were a case of being handed 100 self-published novels at random from a box, the answer is going to be zilch. By basic odds, NONE of them saw an editor, because self-publishing doesn't require or so much as suggest one in most cases, and there are billions of self-published books. Millions of them are really awful. Perhaps, the question should be: "what level of editing do you demand of the self-published books you would buy?" Because that's a lot different.
Self-publishing can be done right, and with class. Mostly, it isn't.
The whole publishing industry is undergoing a massive change, and the economy itself is in serious trouble. This scares people, and when they're scared, they often react with anger and defensiveness. If it weren't self-publishing they were reacting with anger towards, it would be someone else. Self-publishing is a fairly safe target because it won't lose them any potential jobs, and they have a pre-existing (and frankly justified) poor opinion of them as a group.
no subject
Fear. Uncertainty. Human nature makes us want to create us-and-thems, even when they don't exist. (See how I did it, even there?)
Another thing to note is that a looooot of those people lump vanity press with self-publishing, and that doesn't so much lower the average quality of that pool as plummet it out of view.
Most self-publishing (especially when you include vanity press) makes it easy to target the group as a whole as worthless drivel and unpolished trite - the last question in the poll was "what editing quality do you expect from a self-published novel?" and honestly, if it were a case of being handed 100 self-published novels at random from a box, the answer is going to be zilch. By basic odds, NONE of them saw an editor, because self-publishing doesn't require or so much as suggest one in most cases, and there are billions of self-published books. Millions of them are really awful. Perhaps, the question should be: "what level of editing do you demand of the self-published books you would buy?" Because that's a lot different.
Self-publishing can be done right, and with class. Mostly, it isn't.
The whole publishing industry is undergoing a massive change, and the economy itself is in serious trouble. This scares people, and when they're scared, they often react with anger and defensiveness. If it weren't self-publishing they were reacting with anger towards, it would be someone else. Self-publishing is a fairly safe target because it won't lose them any potential jobs, and they have a pre-existing (and frankly justified) poor opinion of them as a group.
Those are my thoughts as I think them...