The J.K. Rowling approach
This is self-publishing to the max. Rowling is not only publishing the Harry Potter e-books herself, but she has built her own e-commerce platform — thus bypassing the likes of Amazon and Apple. This works best for large authors who have the budgets to build their own e-commerce platform and have the sway to generate sales through word-of-mouth or can afford a marketing team.

WIRED: All revenues and demographic data go to the author
TIRED: Requires upfront costs conventionally footed by a publisher

Self-publishing via Kindle/iBooks
If you don’t have the resources to set up your own e-commerce site, Amazon’s Kindle and Apple’s iBooks will help you out. For a fee. All you need to do is write a book, sign up to the service, upload it and set your price. In return for processing your sales and for providing a platform for your oeuvre, you will need to give Apple or Amazon a cut of the proceeds. In most cases this is 30 percent, but if you price your book too high or too low on Amazon (either below $2.38 or above $11.16), it can rise to 65 percent. You need to get sales and good reviews in order to rise up the search rankings.

This approach has featured in the news recently with self-published author John Locke (not the British Empiricist) becoming the first DIY author to sell more than a million copies of a single book on the Kindle Store.

WIRED: Easy, off-the-shelf solution
TIRED: Self-promotion can be a tough slog

Unbound
Something like a Kickstarter for books, Unbound is the brainchild of QI’s John Mitchinson and Justin Pollard and Crap Towns author Dan Kieran. The platform is specifically for established and emerging authors to pitch their book ideas directly to readers, who then pledge their support through funding. Authors upload their ideas to Unbound.co.uk and readers then choose the ideas that they like and pledge their support (from £10 to funding the entire book). Once the idea has enough supporters, the book is written and supporters receive a clothbound limited Unbound First Edition with their name in it.

It combines the favorable royalties of self-publishing with the literary clout of a traditional publishing house. By featuring books from a curated selection of established authors, the operation acquires some of the gravitas and exclusivity of a traditional publishing house, without being encumbered by the legacy overheads.

WIRED: Generates a community of fans before the book is even published
TIRED: Only for established authors

Agents-as-publishers
If you already have an agent, you might be able to benefit from the agents-as-publishers model that has emerged over the last few months. Traditionally agents have focused on selling their author’s books to publishers, but a handful of literary agents including Ed Victor, Curtis Brown and Blake Friedman have revealed plans to act as e-book or print-on-demand publishers — thus shifting their customer base from just publishers to publishers and consumers.

The idea is to publish the back-catalogues of work from their prize authors, which might not otherwise see the light of day. It provides a new revenue stream for authors and agents, who may be able to move more nimbly than some of the major publishers. There would be limited up-front costs and a long-tail of marginal returns for both stakeholders. Some have criticized the move because of a perceived conflict of interest between their existing business as agents.

WIRED: Gives authors the opportunity to publish more works
TIRED: Lacks the marketing prowess of the publishers