A Necessary Evil

More and more, I see the similarities between the music and publishing industries, but one common thread between them is the fight between the indies and the corporations. It seems to me that writers (and musicians) begin their careers as independents for whatever reason (be it lack of interest from the conglomerates or a passion for the indie world) but aspire, secretly or not, to break into the commercial realm eventually. Its that bar that no one would mind hitting. But in reality, as Temple makes a great point about, these two worlds are not much different. Its the stigma, the stereotype of each world, that makes either seem better when in reality the indie world has as much, sometimes more, to offer than their larger counterparts. So why do we even have the two separate at all? Why is there this division in the literary and musical worlds of big labels and indie labels when they provide the same basic services? Well, its the necessary evil. One has to have the other to compete with to make themselves look more enticing. If everything were equal in the literary world and small presses didn't have the conglomerates, they couldn't distinguish themselves from anything. They couldn't say, "We're better than HarperCollins because we do *insert any extra freedom small presses offer here*." They would only be able to say, "We *insert any extra freedom offered by said press here*" and would have to distinguish themselves from other small presses creating a competition in a world with a strong sense of community and support. We all love each other, we all want each other to succeed. Because we're all batting for the home team. We're in this together because we are fighting the same fight. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. *Insert any other inspirational, togetherness colloquialism here*. Without the conglomerates, that sense of community between indie presses would be diminished to the likes of , for lack of a better analogy, Hillary slamming Obama. The conglomerates are Hillary and Obama's Republicans, providing everyone that's not a "Republican" a community to join to fight against them, bringing everyone together. In politics its different because its not a community, its a constant battle between people and parties alike. But in the literary world, only the parties fight. Sure it doesn't make much sense at times - "Man, its a party! Make love not war!" says the hippie spilling beer on his sandals as he dances to some Janis Joplin. But would it be nice if we all could "just get along"? I don't even think anyone can imagine how the literary community would be without the fight between the indies and the conglomerates. I know its hard for me to do. So maybe HarperCollins is the bad guy. And maybe everyone wants to be in with the bad guy at some point - I mean, they're cool, they kick ass, they do things the easy way, and they get the coolest costumes. But in the end, fighting for whats right with your underwear on the outside of your clothes wins out over the ass-kicking, sleek black spandex of the bad guys. And they may be evil - but they are a necessary evil. Without the knowledge that worse things existed, we couldn't appreciate that good things we have at our fingertips.