I've also been following self publishing probably for about four years. Not as long as you, probably, but considering that I haven't actually published a book yet, it's a considerable period of time I think. I've listened to writing podcasts as authors literally went from warning against ever self-publishing to cautiously saying that self-publishing is something to consider, to announcing that they are no longer going to be going with traditional publishing at all, and moving exclusively to self-publishing. It's been quite astonishing.

Thank you for turning me on to the crowdfunding community! I've heard of something like this happening in a few different places and I'll likely join. It's a great idea, and something I think is of huge benefit to both fans and creators. I've also heard of Kickstarter as something that several authors have done, for example, to determine whether they'll write a further book in an old series on their backlist. It's really super cool.

This is one of the reasons I started a blog, for sure, so I could participate in the discussion and learn as well. I'm also part of an epublishing community on LinkedIn, which has been very interesting to watch. The people on there range from publishers to editors to authors both in traditional publishing and purely self-published, and while the majority of them seem to be non-fiction rather than in genre, the discussions are quite enlightening.