StephanieCordray
New Member
I belong to a few writers' groups. This subject came up in one of those groups and I remembered some advice Ian had imparted here in another thread.
This particular writing group is very active against bad publishers. There is a 238 page thread against one particular publisher who stands head and shoulders below even the worst of the other publishers. One post on that thread was a link to another message board where one published author, deciding that now that he is a writer, quit his job to concentrate on writing. His chances of making a living as a writer based on being published with this particular publisher are nil. Not practically nil, but absolute nil.
If there is one offline career one would equate with starting up a web business, writing would be one of the closest matches. For every writer who makes a decent living at it, there are at least 100 who don't. Note the word decent rather than lucrative. When working on any career you still have to eat and pay bills.
It is not wise to give up a paying job for the future millions you hope to make. You may hate the job you are getting paid to do but it pays the bills while you work on a solid foundation for your future career. This is not saying it can't be done, but dreams of overnight success, like the writer published with the bad company dreams of being an instant bestseller, are just not realistic... especially in these economic times.
I worked in a pizzeria while getting both my degrees. I hated it but it paid my bills, including tuition. The irony is, I don't work in the fields I studied either, lol. Had I needed to, I could have and would have stuck it out for however long it took me to realize my true career goals.
Start with a realistic plan of what you want to do with your business, plan for slow growth rather than instant success. Success sometimes takes years to realize. Other times one might get lucky and have instant success but to expect it is to let both yourself and your customers down. If you go bankrupt because your plan is unrealistic, your customers who depended on you are left high and dry as well.
I just thought that little piece of advice buried in the middle of another thread deserved a thread of its own. Thanks, ian.
This particular writing group is very active against bad publishers. There is a 238 page thread against one particular publisher who stands head and shoulders below even the worst of the other publishers. One post on that thread was a link to another message board where one published author, deciding that now that he is a writer, quit his job to concentrate on writing. His chances of making a living as a writer based on being published with this particular publisher are nil. Not practically nil, but absolute nil.
If there is one offline career one would equate with starting up a web business, writing would be one of the closest matches. For every writer who makes a decent living at it, there are at least 100 who don't. Note the word decent rather than lucrative. When working on any career you still have to eat and pay bills.
It is not wise to give up a paying job for the future millions you hope to make. You may hate the job you are getting paid to do but it pays the bills while you work on a solid foundation for your future career. This is not saying it can't be done, but dreams of overnight success, like the writer published with the bad company dreams of being an instant bestseller, are just not realistic... especially in these economic times.
I worked in a pizzeria while getting both my degrees. I hated it but it paid my bills, including tuition. The irony is, I don't work in the fields I studied either, lol. Had I needed to, I could have and would have stuck it out for however long it took me to realize my true career goals.
Start with a realistic plan of what you want to do with your business, plan for slow growth rather than instant success. Success sometimes takes years to realize. Other times one might get lucky and have instant success but to expect it is to let both yourself and your customers down. If you go bankrupt because your plan is unrealistic, your customers who depended on you are left high and dry as well.
I just thought that little piece of advice buried in the middle of another thread deserved a thread of its own. Thanks, ian.
