People often ask me what is the difference between self-publishing and traditional publishing, and more importantly, which is to be preferred. Here are some definitions and a chart which will hopefully provide a quick answer:

Traditional/Legacy Publishing

This is where an author writes a book, submits their manuscript to a traditional publisher (e.g. Scholastic, usually through an agent), gets rejected a lot before at last being accepted, does some back-and-forth with an editor, and then...