No wonder with Amazon taking 70% of the sales price if the e-book goes even one cent above $9.99. If the e-book is sold below that it's "only" 30% - those are absolutely exploitative conditions!
I'm glad that more books are being self-published, I don't trust publishers. I don't know how many times I was aproached on Linkedin and invited to write a book on a topic, just because I've listed it on my profile.
If that's how a lot of technical authors are chosen, that could explain a lot about the quality of a lot of books.
I also don't like the page quotas that publishers have, like it has to be at least 400 pages. Well, what if there is only relevant information for 300? I would rather spare myself the time of reading 100 useless fluff pages.
Also, a lot of potentially good authors get rejected by publishers or not even invited, as publishers have no idea who to ask to write a book to.
The publishers take a premium cut and leave the authors with minimal royalties, meaning that most authors can't make a living from their books, meaning that less books get written.
Allowing authors to self publish lets more authors have a bigger share of the sales, allowing them to continue to write and everyone benefits.
I don't think that the odd quality author that writes a crap self-published book is a good enough of a reason for introducing a middleman, let the market decide. If the book is crap, no one will buy it and it will show. You can only fool the internet for so long.