I agree with the author of this article. But the cultural cringe goes further to include self-publishing. For several years my literary agent took my book and others to the big name publishers in Australia, who all responded that they had no plans for printing such books in the near future. Convinced that five of his authors needed to be read, this agent then undertook the editing, presentation and other issues required before setting up our books on http://stores.lulu.com/strictlyliterary in February of this year. My book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine sold especially well online and 94% of readers gave it a positive review, causing Lulu to give it five stars and place it on the huge Amazon site. Despite what the writer of this article says about costs, because Wildflowers, wilderness and wine was selling at $29.95 in US dollars, it was costing about $80.00 AD to have it sent here.
Recognizing that this was too high a price for my book in Australia, I then bought the copyright of my publisher to allow me to have extra books printed for distribution within Australia.
Now I face the cringe hurdle of "Oh, you are a self-publisher" as though my book belongs in the Vanity Press category and is somehow of less value than a book distributed by one of the big name Australian publishers. If anyone wants to know more about the wildflowers, the wilderness of national parks and the 60 wineries of the Granite Belt tourism district of Queensland Australia, they can check out http://fayhelwig.com It is a jolly good read about a year in my life and I hope it will continue to raise money for Legacy for many years, as one of the wildflowers is the red Flanders poppy which blooms here for 11th November, Remembrance Day.

It seems that the etablished writers of Australia dont know what they are talking about. They just happen to write the books. But the Productivity Commission and other economic rationalist commentators do. However, the track record of economic rationalists in Australia is not so great and in recent years this country has lost countless skills to offshore - not to fair competition but to obscenely exploited labour conditions and to environmental and public health standards not fit for pigs. So much for the free traders' level playing field. Now we are to stand aside while our cultural industry is 'rationalised' to make greater profits for the big boys and the international players. Ordinary Australians do not like this process. It is simply the Americanistaion and corporatising of our culture. We do not live in a free trade world - we live in a world where the leading economies are mercantilist (eg China, Japan) or where they pay lip service to free trade where and when it suits them (eg USA, EU). Let's get real, show some economic and cultural backbone, and send the Productivity Commission people themselves out into the market place to see if they can cut the mustard rather than sitting in taxpayer funded positions passing judgement on those out in the market place writining the books and trying to make a go of it.

I WANT A KINDLE!

I WANT A KINDLE!

I WANT A KINDLE!