The informative:

Courtney Milan did a great post comparing the costs to her of self-publishing vs. being traditionally published (via PV, and she provided more financial detail in the comments).

So, what's the bottom line?

But for those who are looking for information, the bottom line is this: As an author, I spent 50% more on a traditionally-published novella. And I made half as much in twice the time.

That is something that people who are worried about the out-of-pocket costs of self-publishing need to think about. In theory there are no costs to you (other than that pesky lost revenue) when you publish traditionally, but in reality, if you want the book to succeed and you want publishers to think of you as someone who is willing to support your own work (i.e. someone it's worth signing a second contract with), you have to pony up.

And of course, that's after you get published. Remember, I spent more than $400 in postage alone trying to get published.

The annoying:

One of the things that really irritated me about yesterday's dumb agent post was that he said:

Needless to say, she is off to run and “self-publish” her books and be able to now essentially retire with the amount of money she will make on her own.

And then Konrath found another agent who decided to piss all over Ann Voss Peterson because she wants to be able to afford braces for her kid. This agent says:

Multiple clients sent me Peterson’s “Harlequin Fail” article and wanted my opinion. My first thought is that this was the typical “a publisher is ripping me off” fodder.

The sneering--that is what gets up my nose. A writer wants to be able to retire! Writers get upset when their publisher rips them off! What silly expectations they have!

I'm curious--does Scott Eagan hope to retire one day? (Actually, the way things are going he may have to do that a lot sooner than he thinks.) What kind of retirement does he hope to have? The kind where he eats dog food because he can't afford anything else?

Is Steve Laube OK with it when his mechanic rips him off? Does he enjoy it when the bank that owns his house pulls a fast one that costs him a bunch of money? Does it make him feel all warm and fuzzy inside when someone takes advantage of his ignorance and desperation to screw him to the wall?

I'm curious--how long did it take? Most agents at least pretend that they started agenting for a living because they wanted to help writers. How long did it take before these guys became completely desensitized to the fact that these writers are being ruined? At what point in their careers did they decide that it was OK for writers to be miserably poor and constantly taken advantage of? How do you get to the point where the biggest problem with all the thieving is that writers whine about it?