I usually only write for my blog on a M-W-F basis. I have to make a living, after all. But recently I started getting some mail in response to entries I’ve made, and I thought that Tuesday or even Thursday might be good days to answer this.

I’ve said quite a lot about the publishing industry lately, and I’m happy to report that a few people in the industry read my entries.
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewblog.asp?authorid=55121&m=8&y=2007&blogid=23480

To be honest, it probably means that I will never have a book published after insulting them the way I do, but unlike most writers I can claim that an agent and a publisher actually read something I wrote! Isn’t this all just a desperate cry for attention anyway?
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewblog.asp?authorid=55121&m=8&y=2007&blogid=23627

One response summarized what people in the industry had to say about my musings:

“You don’t seem to understand that this is a business. We’re not here to lose money publishing great art, we’re here to make money.”

Well, I thought I made it clear when I referred to writers as the “Primary means of production” that I saw this as money maker. I’m not galled by the money; heck, I want some of it if I can get it. What got my attention was the rather obvious observation that when you force your primary means of production to take all the risk, you are looking at an industry in its death throes. I don’t care if you are making widgets or books, if you pull out the whip and force your manufacturing line make up for all of your other deficiencies you’re in the midst of a catastrophe that W. Edwards Deming tried long and hard to warn you about.

So, let’s see how well the Big 4 Publishers are doing as a business, since I don’t seem to understand this as well as my publisher friends. It’s hard to get a lot of good numbers, since they are all divisions of larger companies. But I was able to get their Return on Sales (ROS) with a little digging:

Publisher Owner 2006 rev, M$ Earn, M$ ROS
Random House Bertelsmann $2,641 $248 9.4%
Penguin Group Pearson $1,704 $117 6.8%
Harper Collins News Corp $1,347 $159 11.8%
Simon & Schuster CBS Corp $807 $69 8.5%
Total $6,500 $592 9.1%

Overall, they are making money – but just barely. Consider that 3M and Johnson & Johnson, both big manufacturers, have an ROS around 28%. News Corp, as a media giant, has an overall ROS of 22.5%, so Harper Collins is obviously lagging other media. And Yahoo!, which might be the future of media, is a healthy 31.1% ROS.

So is the industry in any position to lecture li’l ol’ me on how to run a business? I leave it to you to decide. I maintain that they are leaving a lot of money on the table by not having a system to identify and develop quality the way nearly every other industry has been forced to do. And don’t tell me about technology, because other mass entertainment and media companies have figured it out – movies go to theaters first, cable next, and DVDs last. That’s how the other divisions of News Corp do it, and they seem to be doing just fine.

That’s my mailbag for now, but I love to hear from my readers. Please send me mail as wabbitoid47 at yahoo.com if you like what you see or just think I’m a total gasbag in need of a serious slamming. Either way works for me.

(and I apologize for the inability to do live links – the system here at Author’s Den is pretty lousy)

Additional info:
http://reports2.equitystory.com/cgi-bin/show.ssp?companyName=bertelsmann&report_id=gb-2006&language=English
http://www.pearson.com/investor/ar2006/governance/notes-consolidated/notes-02.html
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=80133&p=IROL-secToc

Click to access 200610kfinal.pdf

Labor Day
Labor Day should be more than just a day off or the end of summer. It’s a day to reflect on how we developed the life we have, and why we should be thankful for it.

A century ago, workers didn’t have much in the way of rights. If you couldn’t do the backbreaking labor feeding a furnace or chipping away at a mine, you were replaced. There wasn’t any health benefits or retirement. And you did it six days a week, getting only Sunday off. The blast furnaces of places like Pittsburgh saw more than coal shoveled into them; these were people’s lives burning hot and hard.

In this world, the air was often heavy with clouds of soot in most cities. No one minded it too much, as this was what industry was simply all about. The men working hard to make the wonderful things of this life had their lives turn into bitter ashes that fell all around them. The rich could escape to the country, but working people breathed their own burned out lives back into their lungs.

Eventually, it all came back out as a shout. A demand for justice.

The union movement that came from this furnace eventually won many rights, but only after they stood together and demanded them. At times an angry mob of destruction, at other times an ashen faced wall of solidarity, those who owned the furnaces and factories and mines eventually were forced to realize that without labor, nothing was possible. What was won was amazing. It made our life what it is today.

Consider for a moment the other holiday this September, which is the High Holidays of the Jewish calendar. Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are important, but they are not the holiest of days in Judaism. That day is a simple one: Saturday, the Sabbath. It seems less important because it comes around once a week, but it is the holiest day of all.

Labor Day is the big day to celebrate all that the labor movement won in America. But one of the greatest things they won was the right to have a five-day week. The most important day we celebrate the victory of Labor is every Saturday that we get to spend with our families or just goofing off. Labor did more than bring us this one day in September, they brought us the weekend.

Perhaps we forget the great holiday of labor that comes once a week, but the least we can do is remember the sacrifices once a year. Without Labor, nothing is possible. Without the Labor Movement, our lives would be bitter and empty. A joyous day with a brief pause to remember the sacrifice is all they would have ever asked for, and I think it’s worth the time on this Labor Day.