Seth Godin Defects from His Book Publisher

This is one of those bellweather events that will be remembered. At least, in the book publishing business, today could turn out be a very bad day.  Author Seth Godin has deleted his publisher.  A story in the WSJ said the author of a new book called “Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?”  has sold 50,000 copies since January, but he says that it takes way, way too long for a book to go from idea to the local Barnes and Noble.   You’ll find this one still published by Portfolio, but after this he’ll do it all direct to his fans. There are plenty among the 438,000 followers of his blog.

Godin added in the article that he felt that mid-level authors, moderately successful, get minimal marketing help from publishers.So they may want to follow his lead, after all, more and more of the percentage of every book today is delivered in Kindle, iPad or other device-ready formats.

I wonder if August 24 will remain a date of infamy…or not such a big deal?