Are You Ready To Build Your Publishing Empire

By Author: Terry Sanders
Total Articles: 37
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A. J. Liebling (1904-1963) once said, "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one." The renowned New Yorker writer knew what he was talking about because he lived in a time when printing press owners had enormous power in American society.
For example, at the beginning of the Spanish-American War, artist Frederic Remington sent a cable to his boss, New York Post publisher William Randolph Hearst, saying, "There is no war. I request to be recalled." Hearst allegedly cabled him back saying, "You furnish the pictures, I'll furnish the war." Hearst's word was good on that-he promoted the war with a vengeance and soon had the support of the politicians and the people. Hearst had the presses and the staff to change American history.
The Internet changed everything. Suddenly, everyone had a printing press even though they may not have known how to use it. You would have thought the real change would have come with the rise of radio in the 1920?s or television in the 1950?s, but the electronic media did not have the same effect on people as did the Internet. Newspapers continued to flourish during the broadcast ...
... age, and their circulation and influence only began to fade as acceptance of the Internet began to grow. Today, newspapers are still trying to figure out how to have a successful online presence.
What does this mean to you? It means that you can now gather together the reins of power in your own hands. You can sit in your underwear in front of your computer and have the potential to change the world. The Internet is your printing press and your means of distribution. All you need to do is capture the attention of the public. Lots of people are doing it (ask Arianna Huffington, who founded the extremely popular Huffington Post, about that), and you can do it too.
People are adapting to using ebook readers at a very high rate. They can read books, magazines and newspapers on them, and they like that. But even that is changing rapidly; people don't need dedicated ebook readers anymore because they can use apps to read anything they want on tablets and smart phones. That provides a wide-open audience to anyone who can promote their writing to the world.
You can also influence people by writing books. You no longer have to deal with the archaic fellowship of New York publishers who used to sit in judgement of all things literary. You can now easily and inexpensively publish your own book in either in print or ebook format. You write what you want, distribute it as you like and take all the profit (or loss) yourself.
I wonder what A. J. Liebling would say if he was alive today? Perhaps something like, "Freedom of the press is guaranteed to anyone who can capture the imagination of the American people."
There is only one thing that stands in your way to achievement as a media mogul. That is the quality of your ideas and the way you express them. My advice is to do your best work, get it before the public, and then see what happens.

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