It sometimes amuses and sometimes saddens me when I see how people are more likely to demean something rather than support it, and how that attitude spreads much faster than a positive one.
CDP is gathering some attention and whether we like it or not, not all of it is good. As authors ourselves, we understand the concerns others feel when they submit to us. We are new, we are not a corporation, and we are relatively poor. What’s worse, we’re (GASP!) honest about it. All of these issues have been addressed in this blog: Those little minnows in the epublishing business, which is based on comments originally made here.
What’s wrong with honest? No, we are not rich, no we do not have the money as of yet to start up a print division, but we aren't destitute people trying to build a business. What company starts off having everything they need? If we need to sell e-books at first to help fund a print division, so what? As long as we turn out quality, who should care? If we pay our authors out of our own pockets, at least they get paid, which is more than I can say for some publishing companies.
Besides, I think I’m getting to like these funny things called e-books. They’re different, but they’re not all bad. Getting to know the e-book industry through co-owning CDP has opened up my horizons, really. I think I’m going to go check out Cerridwen Press after writing this blog entry, and buy some e-books in support of all those hard-working authors.
The point of this mini-rant is this: Why is it these people must attempt to degrade something new just because the people running it are honest about themselves? Yes, we’re poor in the grand scheme of things. No, we aren’t getting rich off this venture. YES, we will do everything in our power to protect our authors and make certain they are paid. Period. We could hide the fact that we have little money on the side to spend, and worse, we could attempt to rip off writers, like certain unnamed publishers who supposedly had more income that we do.
Bottom line, Circle Dark is not going to hide, or lie, or try to cheat anyone. We may not have a lot of money, but we do have high standards, both ethically and morally. We’re learning, sometimes the hard way, but we do learn fast. An author published with us does not only gain publication status, but a publishing company of dedicated people, yes dedicated (seriously, do you think we’d be poor people doing this without getting paid if we WEREN’T dedicated?), who will do their absolute best for every single author. We work out of love for the writing and love of the industry’s ideal, and with each moment we do this thankless job we love it more.
So, you know, instead of talking about how we said we're poor and that doesn’t inspire your confidence, you could support our efforts to create a company that operates with integrity, not greed. You could talk about how we’re trying to do something new, something good.
Oh well. While you make me sad, you don’t bring me down.
Next month, NIKOLAI!
--Sabrina