SciFi and Fantasy Book Club and Indie bashing

[Christina]

Well, to be fair, what people think of when they think of indie music isn't. There is a genre called indie, produced by major labels. I live in a very music centric area of the world. Yes, even here, there is a stigma as far as who produced your album. Yes, those who can afford to pay the likes of Steve Albini do and then on the opposite end of the spectrum you have your diy kids who make everything themselves and scoff at indie labels.

But...

The biggest difference is that in terms of cost, be it diy or indie label musicians, music is not cheap and you have very little opportunity to make any kind of profit outside your tiny neck of the woods. Whereas, we, all of us, whether we do it ourselves or hire outside help, have a zillion resources that allow the public easy access to our work. In that respect, we should be happy. Who cares if a few whiners on Goodreads bash us? The majority of our readers have no idea that we are any different from the major players and will judge us on our merits.

[Micah]

I think the biggest reason indie musicians* are seen as cool but indie writers are bashed as lazy is that popular music comes out of a grassroots history. Rock 'n Roll was all indie to begin with. It's paradigm is a young kid learns to play an instrument, forms a band of nobodies, writes their own music, plays live, gains fans, attracts fame and money and groupies, then burns out in a drug-induced stupor.

Cool.

Writing has always been tied with publishing, which was expensive and required huge presses and organization. It's pretty much always been an ivory tower "establishment" thing. And part of that establishment was the "I've paid my dues, earned my chops, been accepted into the inner sanctum" thing.

Technology has changed that and society/culture is still catching up to it.

* Christina's point about "what is an indie" musician is well taken. In fact during the late '70s and '80s there was a whole movement of truly indie musicians who back then were not seen as lazy, but were looked down upon by all but the avant garde (or at least "underground" music scene).

I'm thinking of the whole DIY tape music scene (like R. Stevie Moore) and outsiders like The Residents who first did self-published mail order small run singles and then formed their own record label primarily to sell and distribute their own work.

[Mathew]

Micah: yes, society is still playing catch-up. But indie writers are getting cooler all the time. It's impossible to continue ignoring the great stories AND success of indie writers with authors like Hugh Howey (and myself :P) blazing the way.

[[deleted user]]

Mathew wrote: "Micah: yes, society is still playing catch-up. But indie writers are getting cooler all the time. It's impossible to continue ignoring the great stories AND success of indie writers with authors li..."

Yea. You know The Martian? Author was indie before he got picked up. Success comes in all forms now.

Anyone bashing indies loses all credibility to me. Content is content. Traditional content can suck and so can indie. Saying one form is inherently better than the other is laughable.

[DavidHulett]

More and more of my reading these days is Indie and what I've found is that it's like girls looking for princes, you have to kiss a lot of frogs. But be sure of this, the princes and princesses are out there.

I think part of the problem with "traditional" publishing is that they've settled on a formula for books that sell and anything outside what they're looking for doesn't get a look-in.

[DavidHulett]

Mathew wrote: "Micah: yes, society is still playing catch-up. But indie writers are getting cooler all the time. It's impossible to continue ignoring the great stories AND success of indie writers with authors li..."

Just keep telling yourself "I am the new Hugh Howie!!!!!!!" (just waiting to be discovered).