Mon 23 May 2005
Should you write a computer book-will it pay off $$ wise?
Posted by Gary Cornell under Gary's Eclectic Thoughts—From The PublisherThere is an active thread on one of the newsgroups frequented by computer book authors on whether one can make a good living by “just” writing computer books. Many of these authors write user level books and if you are thinking about writing books in those areas, I can’t really help you. (Actually in the dim and dark past I wrote a user level computer book but that was long ago in a galaxy far away–and I didn’t make much money from it come to think of it.)
Given that I have written a couple of best sellers for this market and I’m also the publisher of Apress, people often ask me, is it still worth writing a computer book for IT professionals? They ask: why should I write if my book is not going to sell >100,000 copies (like many books, including my own, did in the glorious 90’s and which no programming book currently does to the best of my
knowledge…)
Well the answer is that you shouldn’t write our kind of books if you think you are going to get rich from your royalties. Any publisher that tells you that your programming book is going to sell 100,000 copies nowadays or even 50,000 copies is, I believe, not telling you the truth. Even 25,000 copies is very unusual nowadays. It is a real tough business being a full time writer in our neck of the woods nowadays although I know it is still possible.
On the other hand, now is an excellent time to be writing a book to help your consulting business, your training business, or improve your stature within the community and thus better your job prospects. I believe the money that you get from your royalties will be dwarfed by the increase in what you can get from more consulting, more training or that promotion or great job offer you got after you wrote that great book. This isn’t just me talking out of my hat by the way: quite a few of our authors report that the amount of time they spent writing their book has paid off immensely — both in the rates they can charge and the amount of business they are getting. In fact, it is sometimes hard to get those authors to do a second edition because their consulting business or jobs have gotten so much better after their book came out!
More to the point: what they tell me is consistent with what currenlty seems like lucrative (If you get the gig). but still tough (lots of people competing for those gigs), consulting and training business. After all, one needs a way to distinguish oneself from the rest of the consultants or trainers who are simply jumping on a bandwagon-and nothing does that better than a well received and well written book.
June 17th, 2005 at 6:48 am
Really spot on article. As you know we didnt make much but the publicity etc did no harm at all both in private and current employment. Have to also say that writing a book was not easy!
September 27th, 2005 at 9:39 pm
Some do-it-yourselfers will buy a Haynes (r) or similar manual for their car. When they get a new car, they’ll buy a new manual for it, too — and they’re almost invariably appauled by the miniscule amount of differing text between the two. It doesn’t matter if they had a Volkswagen and then bought a Honda. And these manuals are borderline worthless for all vehicles for precisely the reason that they’re applicable for all vehicles. I’m seeing this from some publishers (not to name names, but I did tech review for one of these once, and it’s on my resume). Some imprints are nothing but shelters for these sorts of goons.
Some authors write essentially the same book for half a dozen different publishing houses. These folks generally run out of bridges to burn before long.
Some authors constantly write about different subjects, trying to identify what the next big up-and-coming thing is. This is probably the best way to make money writing. However, unless you’ve got your finger on the pulse of the community, you’re not going to capture the philosophy that makes the technology workable, and none of your books will be hits.
The hardest way to make money writing (in this commenter’s opinion) is to write good books. Effort approaches infinity as the book approaches “hit” quality. Some of the classics, such as The Mythical Man Month, churned in their author’s stomach for 20 years before they coagulated into something that could be put on paper. Others, such as Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Software, have an equivalent amount of churning in them, but it’s harvested from a University department worth of like minds. Others, such as Matt Wright’s Perl book on CGI (the one that made Perl the largest spam relay on the ‘net second only to sendmail — yes, I’m talking about formmail.pl) are apparently propelled into success by pacts with Satan.
I’ve heard other authors sigh and justify the work as a labor of love, as if writing needs justification — but now I understand. In a lot of ways, it’s like a cross country bicycle trip. It’s possible to make a tidy living writing books, but you don’t want to do it that way. Treat it as a journey. Do it as a strange compulsion, if that’s what it is. And don’t expect other people to understand why you’re doing it. And you’ll be a more interested person for having finished — and having survived.
-scott
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October 20th, 2006 at 8:27 am
Gary is absolutely correct!
I realize this is an old post, but I wanted to take a moment to authenticate his statement that writing a tech book certainly does solidify other aspects of your career. After my Pro Ajax book came out, I’ve had an incredible time dealing with the fallout from the book. I’ve gone independent and have a heavy schedule of work ahead of me. And I’m able to build at a decent rate, which in turn, means a much higher salary that I simply would not command as a full time I.T. worker.
Even if the book doesn’t make another dime for me (royalties wise), it has paid huge dividends in salary and reputation.
I should also note that Apress has an incredible infrastructure for support. You’ll never feel as if you’re writing a book on your own. It’s a team effort and you’ll really feel confident when the book is released that the best people have worked on the project.
April 27th, 2007 at 5:38 am
Given the current market, I don’t think anyone should expect to get rich off of any one book. A book may add creditability in some cases and, at the least, the research required to create the book is a good learning experience. Even if an author isn’t an expert before writing the book, if he does a good job he will be afterward. There is still some money that can be made from writing books, but there is also a lot of competition. Authors with multiple books will do better than author with just one book and there are still a few authors who happen to get their book on the market at just the right time to make a good profit. But overall, I think it is best to set more reasonable goals, such as documenting accumulated knowledge and providing people with the information they need. We need the money to live, but an author should write for better reasons.