ellegriffin

Here's how we create 120 million equity-owners in one generation.

That's why we need to build better ones.

Not true, 90% of employees with an ESOP account also have a 401k or other retirement account. The ESOP account is not instead of a retirement account, it's in addition to it.

90% of employee owners also have a 401k or retirement account. An ESOP account is in addition to their retirement account, not instead of it. So it's actually more of an upside without any downside.

Usually businesses become an ESOP because the founder sells it to the employees. To even qualify to become an ESOP, the company has to be successful, so by default most ESOPS are. I advocate for incentivizing the model, not requiring it. But I have a follow up piece coming out soon with more detail.

I'm a big fan of the library, but that doesn't mean I can get access to every film that exists on Netflix.

I check out a lot of books at the library, but I can't get access to all of the books I would like to access.

Should a tech solution replace the library? No. But there should be another option than buying it from Amazon.

An alternative to the internet making us stupid.

Yes exactly. There's this red thread you can follow through the platform. My favorite kind of discovery!

Honestly, I hope this doesn't change. As an author, I think the reason why the comments section of my newsletter is such a positive place is because all of the commenters are doxed and have a profile. In addition, that's how I find other writers to follow—you can see who follows what and follow that thread which is nice.

I am EXACTLY the same way. I write each of my novels in a different font depending on the aesthetic of the novel. The font helps me stay in character as I write it.

I mean, I love this idea. And I love your newsletter!

Agreed.

Thank you so much! These are excellent case studies. Will look into all of these.

Yes! Exactly! It seems doable....

I think about this all the time when it comes to archeological finds. How do we know this wasn't one of their worst works?

Maybe this is the case for books after all. None of our television shows or movies will make it this long.

This is true, the creative arts have always been volatile as a career choice. And it's true that some of those artists become successful as a fluke or as an accident of their death.

But it's also true that many of the successful creatives intended to be successful, or at least tried very hard to be, and those were the seeds that set up for some kind of "big break." For example, in the case of Dan Brown, one of the most successful authors to date, he scheduled his own press tour, booked his own interviews, sent out press releases, etc. And his early books actually did pretty well, selling about 10,000 copies each because of his promotional efforts.

Of course he went on to sell millions of copies, but I don't think he would have accidentally become a best seller without developing a platform for his work with those early novels.

Agree.

It's interesting because reading is so subjective. I think I've only ever liked a "best selling" book once or twice, because I like things that are severely strange and that is not to commercial tastes. So it's hard to judge "quality" collectively. It's hard enough to judge "quality" individually!

Yes! I actually interviewed Andy Weir for another piece for this exact reason. https://ellegriffin.substack.com/p/publishing-industry-truth

Thank you!!!! This is very helpful. Looks like they aren't tagged as fiction which is why I couldn't find them. I'll definitely dig into these as some amazing case studies!

Ha! I definitely won't...

Very excited to check this one out. Thank you!

I disagree that fiction by top publishing houses tend to be more lucrative for the author. I wrote an article about that one too if you're interested. https://ellegriffin.substack.com/p/publishing-industry-truth

This is great!

This is the best thing I ever heard of. I want nothing more than permission to write badly and still love it.

ME TOO. I pretty much only read classics. They are just so philosophically complex! I wish that we read now, like we read then. But I suppose television and video content are an art in their own way, and I could adapt my writing preferences to the screen. But I just have no interest there. Perhaps I'm just stuck in another century!

Well reasonable is a whole other thing. And I'm definitely not being reasonable! :)

This is certainly valid, but it also assumes the current publishing model (as in, how could I, one writer, make $100,000 of the $28 billion pie). Which also assumes that I would need to reach mass appeal (re: sell lots of copies) as an author to be successful in that paradigm.

What I am asking is, is it possible for me, who already has a niche audience for my writing, to have those followers support me as a writer? Can I add enough value to that small audience, that they want to pay to subscribe to my work? Would 1,000 people pay $100/year? Or 2,000 people pay $50/year?

This is different from selling books. It's selling a platform.

It STILL might not work. And I STILL might never reach that income. But it's an entirely new way to think about books and publishing and I'm curious to see if there's still a path for fiction writers in there somewhere....

Oh I've heard that. The classic "third book" being the one that goes viral. (Gillian Flynn, Dan Brown, etc.)

I agree with you on considering most books (most books don't market), but even trying to learn from the successful books isn't entirely encouraging. Even the best ones don't see a lot of reads.

But the industry is rapidly changing. We don't all watch the same three television channels anymore. Niche content is more the norm than mass marketed content.

I think the whole "creator economy" is still in its infancy, and we have yet to see whether it will actually allow creators to monetize in a meaningful way. But it's worth engaging with it as an experiment to see what happens!