Book authors and their changing circumstances: survey method and results

This paper reports the results of a survey investigating the experiences of Australian authors in the contemporary international book industry – in particular, whether authors are adapting their creative and work practices in response to the technological changes that are currently affecting the book industry worldwide. More than one thousand authors completed the survey, which was conducted during February 2015. The researchers recruited a diverse range of authors including literary and genre authors, educational and academic writers and experimenters with digital forms. Authors were asked about their employment, time allocation, publishing formats, income, relations with their publishers, promotion activities, funding sources, and copyright issues. Only the aims, methods and main results of the survey are reported here; the testing of specific hypotheses and more detailed analyses will be reported elsewhere.