According to VentureBeat, aspiring book authors face two hurdles: Rejection from publishers, and the high cost and hassle of trying to publish a book themselves. Self-publication company FastPencil has come up with a clever new option: Authors who sign up with FastPencil can now publish their books directly into Apple’s iBooks catalog.
No permission required,” CTO and co-founder Michael Ashley told me in a phone interview. “Anyone can upload a manuscript to FastPencil, click a few buttons, and have access to a few million readers for under two hundred bucks.”
Unlike apps, Apple doesn’t review books individually. FastPencil is an approved publisher, so if FastPencil publishes your book, it goes right into the iBooks catalog.
One more thing: FastPencil neither offers advances nor takes an up-front charge. The company’s business model, beyond the sub-$200 setup price, is a revenue share on individual sales. “We don’t make money until the author makes money,” Ashley put it.
Photo by neurosoftware.