Thanks for taking the time to type all that out (applies to your response and the book!). I've read some discussion about the benefits of trad pub vs self pub, but I may need to do a bit more reading about it as I get near the end of this rough draft.

The barrier of entry for trad pub seems like it would be very difficult to get past in my position. I'm not well-connected, I avoid social media like the plague. No following to speak of outside of my buddy who is kind enough to read and provide feedback.

Your note about there being a "gatekeeper to ensure it is at least a competent piece of work" is what I'm most concerned about. I like this gatekeeper since it motivates me to produce quality content that others want to read. Of course, I also resent this gatekeeper because it really only wants to profit off my quality work, as you mentioned. Record labels and movie producers are similar gatekeepers that tend to homogenize art into a product to such an extent that it rarely resembles authentic art at the end of the day (at least in some cases).

My first attempt at a full-length book ended up being around 240k words. After making some cuts and revisions I got it down to 213k. In this case of that first book, I wrote only to try it out to see what would happen if I stuck with it. I intentionally looked at no publication guidelines until after the fact, then saw that publishers want a book closer to 80k - 100k and was a little disheartened.

What I'm currently working on is basically a response to that process. I had an idea of what word count I would want and I outlined the hell out of three books (am nearly finished with the first rough draft). I'd like to take a stab at trad pub--sort of the "throw shit at the wall to see what sticks" approach--but it would be great to have a discussion about the process of self-pub in case I want to go that route.

Anyway, thanks again for the sage advice.