Have you considered the equivalent of selling stock? Taking a small part of your value/assets and letting authors buy a stake in Shepherd? Formally, so we share in any success/loss? Not even a voting stake.
Just floating an idea based on the idea that I'd love to own a small share of, say, BookBub or something similar.
As with all stock, it can become valueless if things don't go well, but I'm very happy with my Apple stock.
I thought about it, but it isn't something I would personally want to do. It is incredibly complex from a cost/paperwork standpoint (with rules around doing this at scale), and a lot of what I love is the ability to sell my own ship. The more chefs in the kitchen the harder it is to get things done.
Now if Stephen King or Brandon Sanderson wanted to be a silent investor that is a lot more straightforward legally (as having one or two investors is straight-forward) and I would be open to that.
I should also note that I don't take investors primarily because books are an incredibly bad market to make money within. There is more passion than revenue and I don't want an investor who is not aligned with that. I also never plan to sell Shepherd so it would be ethically hard to have investors as they are not my mission.
And I think that sharing in the success/loss is heavily tied to that, as authors who join as members get a lot of perks tied to that success. And I am working on more :).
Have you considered the equivalent of selling stock? Taking a small part of your value/assets and letting authors buy a stake in Shepherd? Formally, so we share in any success/loss? Not even a voting stake.
Just floating an idea based on the idea that I'd love to own a small share of, say, BookBub or something similar.
As with all stock, it can become valueless if things don't go well, but I'm very happy with my Apple stock.
I thought about it, but it isn't something I would personally want to do. It is incredibly complex from a cost/paperwork standpoint (with rules around doing this at scale), and a lot of what I love is the ability to sell my own ship. The more chefs in the kitchen the harder it is to get things done.
Now if Stephen King or Brandon Sanderson wanted to be a silent investor that is a lot more straightforward legally (as having one or two investors is straight-forward) and I would be open to that.
I should also note that I don't take investors primarily because books are an incredibly bad market to make money within. There is more passion than revenue and I don't want an investor who is not aligned with that. I also never plan to sell Shepherd so it would be ethically hard to have investors as they are not my mission.
I do have the membership and do ask members for a lot of advice/input from members: https://forauthors.shepherd.com/membership
And I think that sharing in the success/loss is heavily tied to that, as authors who join as members get a lot of perks tied to that success. And I am working on more :).