Fantasy author Brandon Sanderson has established himself as the king of neopatronage with his record-smashing Kickstarter campaign. And while his secret novels project earned him four times more than his publisher pays him, the oldpub gravy train turned newpub mogul has a beef with an industry player that’s not Tor Books.
It’s Amazon audio book subsidiary Audible.
The books will not be on Audible for the foreseeable future.
This is a dangerous move on my part. I don’t want to make an enemy of Amazon (who owns Audible). I like the people at Audible, and had several meetings with them this year.
But Audible has grown to a place where it’s very bad for authors. It’s a good company doing bad things.
Again, this is dangerous to say, and I don’t want to make anyone feel guilty. I have an Audible account, and a subscription! It’s how my dyslexic son reads most of the books he reads. Audible did some great things for books, notably spearheading the audio revolution, which brought audiobooks down to a reasonable price. I like that part a lot.
However, they treat authors very poorly. Particularly indie authors. The deal Audible demands of them is unconscionable, and I’m hoping that providing market forces (and talking about the issue with a megaphone) will encourage change in a positive direction.
If you want details, the current industry standard for a digital product is to pay the creator 70% on a sale. It’s what Steam pays your average creator for a game sale, it’s what Amazon pays on ebooks, it’s what Apple pays for apps downloaded. (And they’re getting heat for taking as much as they are. Rightly so.)
Audible pays 40%. Almost half. For a frame of reference, most brick-and-mortar stores take around 50% on a retail product. Audible pays indie authors less than a bookstore does, when a bookstore has storefronts, sales staff, and warehousing to deal with.
I knew things were bad, which is why I wanted to explore other options with the Kickstarter. But I didn’t know HOW bad. Indeed, if indie authors don’t agree to be exclusive to Audible, they get dropped from 40% to a measly 25%. Buying an audiobook through Audible instead of from another site literally costs the author money.
Again, I like the people at Audible. I like a lot about Audible. I don’t want to go to war—but I do have to call them out. This is shameful behavior. I’ll bet you every person there will say they are a book lover. And yet, they are squeezing indie authors to death. I had several meetings with them, and I felt like I could see their embarrassment in their responses and actions. (Though that’s just me reading into it, not a reference to anything they said.)
Related: Sanderson’s Neopatronage Masterclass
Here’s the problem. (I’m sorry for going on at length. I’m passionate about this though.) There are no true competitors to Audible. Sure, there are other companies that can buy your book—but they all just list on Audible, and then take a percentage on top of what Audible is taking. Apple? Their books come in large part from Audible. Recorded Books? They are an awesome company, whom I love, but their biggest market is Audible. Macmillian, my publisher? They just turn around and put the books on Audible.
I had a huge problem finding anyone who, if I sold the Secret Projects to them, wouldn’t just put them on Audible—and while I can’t tell you details, all of their deals are around the same low rates that Audible is paying indie authors. Audible runs this town, and they set the rates. For everyone. Everywhere. (I had one seller who really wanted to work with me, who will remain unnamed, who is consistently only able to pay authors 10% on a sale. For a digital product. It’s WILD.)
Watch – Video breakdown of Sanderson’s challenge to the Audible monopoly:
For years, prohibitive recording costs and low royalties have deterred newpub authors from offering their books in audio.
Now that a heavy hitter like Brandon Sanderson has called out Audible for their monopolistic practices, perhaps the company will have an impetus to give writers just compensation. Or if they refuse, a competitor may arise to undercut Audible as Amazon did to the Big 5. Authors and audiences alike can only wait and see.
In the meantime, newpub fans and authors can join the Neopatronage revolution. Access our patron-exclusive Discord for insider tips, spirited discussions, and first looks at my new projects.
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Brian.
Do you still see barriers to entry for competitors? I’m looking at the capital cost for the recording special effects, then paying narrators and authours a more favorable rate?
Is that the case? Or other factors I’m overlooking?
xavier
The biggest barrier to entry is the Amazon-Audible cartel. If I were Sanderson, I’d use my newfound money and clout to make deals with outfits like Spotify, Speechify, and Apple that let indies circumvent Audible.
Crowdfunding/neopatronage seems like a great alternative for offering audiobooks. If readers really want them, they’ll help finance them, and everybody wins. And good on Brandon for using his considerable platform to raise awareness for the sake of small authors getting a better deal, hopefully.
This highlights the issue, at least for me. Every campaign I’ve seen with audiobook as a stretch goal is rarely ever reached because the cost outweighs the number of patrons who will back in the first place. Unless you’re the size of someone like Sanderson, I don’t see the point in making them.
I recognize that there are readers who prefer the format, but it’s much too expensive to be made feasible and with little in return for creating one even if it is.
It’s often pointed out that few authors succeed. Two major hurdles to success that a mindboggling number of writers run headlong into are:
1) Working with anyone whose pitch boils down to “Make me a partner even though I have little or no skin in the game.”
2) Caving to online randos saying, “You need to adapt your books into [A/V medium X]. No, I won’t buy the adaptation, and I don’t know anyone who will. But everyone says it’s cool, so it must be the smart move.”
My only quibble with Brandon’s statement is that Audible does have competition. But it should tell you how bad things are when Piracy on YouTube is your only real competitor.
Another observation Joe Konrath got right is “You fight piracy with price and convenience.”