eh, honestly, I think the publisher-hate is as much from non-authors than authors. Now, of course, if you are an author, and you don't need what a publisher pr

eh, honestly, I think the publisher-hate is as much from non-authors than authors. Now, of course, if you are an author, and you don't need what a publisher provides, by all means, go at it without a publisher. Modern technology now means that many of the things that were the exclusive domain of the publishers are now available to even us little guys. But, speaking as an author, I /do/ need what the publisher provides, therefore I went with a publisher rather than going it alone. And this is common and valid as well. Now, in my field, Technical books, very few authors expect to more than pay for the pizza consumed while writing. Anyone remotely qualified to write a technical book can likely make a lot more money in less time consulting. You write a technical book to educate people, and to give yourself credibility. Really, trading away the bulk of the money in exchange for that credibility would be a good deal by itself; the fact that the publisher also takes care of all the minutia of actually manufacturing the books and getting them out to the stores is just gravy. Hell, in my case, the publisher talked me in to writing the book in the first place, and rode me until I actually finished it; something I almost certainly would not have done on my own. I mean, to give you some idea, "The book of Xen" took me and a guy who is better than I am three years to write. We've sold something like two thousand copies. Even if we kept $30 a pop (about what amazon sells the thing for) that's only $60,000; maybe half a year's pay for one of the two people doing it (counting benefits, etc...) Now, we wern't working three years full time, but it was more than 6 months full time, and this ate some of our best and most productive hours. Now, of course, in reality, my friend and I split 15 percent of the wholesale price, which is something like half the cover price, so we earned considerably less than we would have if we could have moved that many books on our own and paid zero for printing. Yeah, if you are Knuth, you move a lot more books than I can. But, if you are Knuth, you can also make a lot more money doing other things. Would you give Knuth a cut of equity to sit on your board? I would. So yeah; money (at least money directly from book sales) is not the reason why anyone writes a technical book, so it doesn't really matter that the publisher takes a cut. The number one thing a publisher brings is: Credibility. Next time you are at a cocktail party, mention you are working on a book. I guarantee, the first thing someone sizing you up will ask is "do you have a publisher?" I mean, there are many other useful things my publisher did for me, but the credibility is at the top of the list. Even assuming near superhuman levels of perseverance, enough to hire and supervise a good editor, etc... I still couldn't gain that credibility by myself. Figure out how to replace the credibility function of publishers, and you will have a reason for technical authors to publish indie.