Want a publisher? Look at crowdsourcing

IT professional and debutant author Uday Satpathy has many reasons to celebrate — not only did his book Brutal become the first ever to be e-published via content crowd sourcing, it was also ranked highly on Amazon and Kindle.

Brutal had an unusual journey from being a manuscript to becoming an 'unputdownable' thriller that it is today. Like many emerging authors, Satpathy had submitted his manuscript to several bigwigs in the publishing industry only to end up on a perpetual waiting list. "I got an offer from a publisher who said there were thousands of books in the pipeline before my work would see the light of the day. This made me take a leap of faith and opt for the content crowd sourcing website, Bloody Good Book (BGB)," he said.

Satpathy put a few chapters of his manuscript on BGB, created by well known author-entrepreneur Rashmi Bansal. A first of its kind in Indian publishing, BGB is a platform where writers can share their manuscripts with the website's members to review and rate them. "We have an algorithm that generates the top 10 books of the month. From these top-rated books, our editorial board selects one manuscript a month to publish. Currently, there are 120 manuscripts and more than 7,500 members on the BGB website," explains Bansal.

The West has already embraced online content crowd sourcing as an extension to their publishing operations. Swoon Reads, a Macmillan imprint, and Kindle Scout are BGB's international precursors that have gained acceptance by readers and writers alike.

India, too, has seen individual crowd sourcing and crowd funding attempts. Author Ravinder Singh, known for his I Too Had A Love Story, had called for manuscripts from budding authors, which he would publish after crowd funding. Author Harsh Snehanshu crowd sourced the title for his book Ouch! that 'Hearts'. But BGB is the only dedicated website for publishing via crowd sourcing in the country.

There was a time when the only way an author could hope to get noticed was via a published book. Renowned author and poet Jerry Pinto, who translated into English the Dalit autobigraphy Baluta, places in context the emerging online space. "There was a time when there was no email. That meant you typed out your book and sent a manuscript in to the publisher. The publisher might lose your manuscript and you would have to make another copy and send it out again."

A platform like BGB also breaks down the barrier between the writer and readers who can directly share their review and offer criticism. Describing his experience on BGB, Satpathy says, "I came across a lot of true admirers of literature and a few talented writers as well."

He says the interaction with the readers helped him shape his book as the inputs he got went a long way in making the manuscript stronger and racy.

However, not all authors are keen about getting reader inputs before their work gets published. Sidin Vadukut of Dork fame says that while such portals can provide useful feedback, which is crucial for first time writers, it could also hinder them from finding their own voice. "They could end up saying what their public wants to hear, instead of saying what they want to say as authors. So it is a double-edged sword that behoves maturity on the part of the writer."

For budding authors who want their work to be seen, any place could be a good place to start. Pinto says: "I think every platform helps. We can never tell which ones will work and which won't because few of us have the ability to tell the future."

According to Satpathy, a readily available response of the mass helps as the publishers and editors cannot always read the market. "Very often they misjudge the opinion of the public. Movies like The Shining and Fight Club were initially trashed by critics, but then accepted wholeheartedly by the audience. Such situations ask for a direct evaluation by the audience and readers than the editors in the middle. That's where crowd sourcing comes in."

But wouldn't mass-opinion generate limited forms and genres of writing? Vadukut says writers must tread carefully while using such websites. "Platforms like this have a tendency to nurture homogeneity. Authors can get cubby-holed into writing for a very small but active audience who participate in such platforms. The opportunity is the feedback you can get. The danger is that you start writing to make other people and not yourself happy."

Though the content crowd sourcing concept comes with some limitations, it sure provides much needed visibility to aspiring authors. And that is what counts the most, say publishing houses. The CEO of Westland, which has the first right of refusal to publish BGB books, Gautam Padmanabhan, says that the platform helps in discoverability as well as acceptability of authors." He thinks other publishing houses too could take to the concept as it creates an ecosystem of writers and readers.

According to Jaico's MD Akash Shah, many in the industry could be open to such collaborations with websites like BGB. "Publishers would like to look at all options as they don't know where the next best-seller could come from," he says.

While it is yet to be seen whether the industry warms up to this concept, BGB is taking forward the online evolution not to only to the website but also to the craft of writing. "We intend to develop an app and an e-book club. We are also building an app to allow short stories in SMS and WhatsApp format," says Bansal.

Looks like a revolution, not just in publishing, but also in writing may shake up India's literary scene.