EVENTS


FutureBook Live 2019 Getting to know the speakers


The parallel success and growth of e-books and print books reflect how well each format has been able to evolve separately


Crunching the numbers: how ‘Data Guy’ Paul Abbassi rewrote the digital narrative


A former tech executive in the video game industry, Paul Abbassi’s work crunching e-book sales figures has made publishers reassess their digital strategies. Ahead of his keynote address, he spoke to The Bookseller


Questions Philip Jones 04 8th November 2019


You first came onto the scene as Data Guy, with your Author Earnings reports. What were you trying to achieve, and why the anonymity? In my previous career as a video game- industry tech executive, I led data-driven publishing decision-making for large publish- ers of video games. So as a new author, it was natural for me to seek out similar data on book sales. It quickly became apparent that the industry’s published numbers for e-book sales and reported directional trends didn’t match the realit I was seeing daily in my own sales, and those of my peers. Adding fuel to the fire, Amazon’s frequent vague statements about continuing e-book market growth tended to align with what we were observing, too. All of which made the official industry numbers useless for guiding my business decisions. The first Author Earnings data set was initially compiled to answer my own ques- tions. But when I shared the data with a few writer friends, they convinced me to publish it as a resource to help all writers, and the Author Earnings reports were born in a


collaboration with author Hugh Howey. We wanted to shine a light on a fast-growing


part of the market that had gone entirely unreported, and which represented a significant financial opportunit for authors. We also hoped to shiſt the prevailing narrative about self-publishing away from “fluke indie million-seller” stories, and help encourage a broader industry conversation about the new and large author “middle class” that was emerging, made up of five-figure and six-figure [selling] indie writers, an optimistic trend we did not see in the self-selected “author income” surveys that frequently made the rounds in traditional media. My anonymit as Data Guy was mainly a way of keeping my involvement in the pro- bono Author Earnings reports from becoming a distraction, so I could focus on writing books instead. But being anonymous also served to keep the discussion focused on the then- controversial data itself and how to pressure- test it, and whether that data was able to stand on its own merits.


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