How Internet Advertizing Impacts What Gets Written About

In an interview last May, Jessa Crispin told "Vulture" why she was closing down her literary blog "Bookslut" after 14 years.

One of the reasons she cited has to do with the changing nature of on-line advertising.



"It used to be you could get an advertiser for a month; now it’s all directly linked to how many pageviews you get. So you can’t write about obscure literature that only ten people care about and make eight cents. You have to write about the books that all the people already know about. And then it just orients you toward clickbait, and you have to come up with stunts and your design has to be beautiful," she said.

Crispin also said that as her (unprofitable) blog began to attract attention, it became difficult for her to secure employment.

"I moved to Chicago and tried to find work and they would Google my name and find that I had this whole thing going on the side. They would say, 'I think it’s clear your attentions lie elsewhere.' I had to make Bookslut work financially just so I could eat food."

But it proved impossible to do so in an acceptable fashion, she said.

"I didn’t want to become a professional. It’s like using the critical culture as a support to the industry rather than as an actual method of taking it apart."

"Part of the reason why I disengaged from it is I just don’t find American literature interesting" Crispin continued. "I find MFA culture terrible. Everyone is super-cheerful because they’re trying to sell you something, and I find it really repulsive. There seems to be less and less underground. And what it’s replaced by is this very professional, shiny, happy plastic version of literature."

I suspect many self-published authors of books qualifying or labeled as "literature" know exactly what Crispin is talking about.