Orna Ross, founder and director of the Alliance of Independent Authors, discusses the development and purpose of Indie Author Lab, explaining how it was created in response to changes in the indie author community—particularly the rise of AI. An ongoing monthly program designed to help serious authors address their specific challenges, it is based on Orna's Alliance of Independent Authors guidebook, Creative Self-Publishing, and focuses on four measures of success: productivity, platform, profit, and pleasure. With live monthly sessions, a community chat room, and access to resources and tools, the program is flexible enough to work for authors at any stage of their development — and will feature at AuthorNation 2026.

Breaking news: as of July 7, Amazon has extended the upper limit of the 70 percent KDP royalty bracket to $12.99 from $9.99. That allows some books to have a higher ticket price reflecting an author's desire to price within the market, without having to take a hit down to the 35 percent royalty rate. For those in that $10–$12.99 range currently, you may be eligible to switch to 70 percent per the FAQs, but will not automatically be switched.