The dirty little secret of publishing

Nick Mamatas has it:

Finally, I saw some question about whether or not the original withdrawing author will be “blackballed” for being a troublemaker. The best answer to this is HAHAHAHAHAHA! The sad fact that nobody ever believes is this: there’s not a lot of competition out there. There really isn’t. It’s hard to find people who can write well, and that goes double for short stories or convincing young adult material. The field may seem competitive because of all the semi-literate baboons out there blogging about their rejections slips, but they don’t count. Remember the try-out weeks on American Idol—it’s like that. Tens of thousands try, maybe a couple hundred are good enough to make it to Hollywood Week, and in publishing there’s no need to find a single winner. Verday, whom Bookscan tells me sells fairly well, ain’t going nowhere. Certainly no book publisher cares about the placement of a story in someone else’s anthology, or any ensuing controversy. Verday almost certainly made back her lost $250 and more in terms of goodwill and linking and solidarity purchases of her books. So good for her, bad for the editor, and bad for the publisher for being snotty and defensive in its public statement.

Context available at his original post.