Authors and Writers VPS - Independent Publishing on Offshore Servers

A self-hosted e-book store captures 95%+ of revenue vs 30-70% through Amazon KDP. Options: - **WooCommerce + WooCommerce Digital Downloads**: Sell EPUBs and PDFs directly. Customer downloads after payment. 100% of sale minus payment processor fee (Stripe: 2.9%+30c, or crypto: effectively 0% processor fee). - **Payhip alternative**: Gumroad charges 10% commission. Self-hosted WooCommerce: 0% commission. - **Ghost memberships**: Ghost's built-in membership system handles paid access to chapters, subscriber newsletters, and exclusive content. For authors with international audiences: Monero and Bitcoin payment options remove payment geographic restrictions. Readers in countries where credit card access to international platforms is restricted can pay with crypto. DRM: Digital rights management (DRM) is controversial - DRM breaks easily and inconveniences legitimate readers without deterring piracy. Most indie authors sell DRM-free EPUB files. Your VPS, your policy.

Authors writing collaboratively or working with editors need secure document sharing without sending manuscripts to Google Drive or Dropbox. Cryptpad on Iceland VPS: encrypted collaborative document editing. Author and editor both see changes in real-time. Document encrypted before storage - server cannot read manuscript. More secure than Google Docs while providing similar functionality. For the paranoid author: air-gapped manuscript writing (never connected to internet) + Veracrypt-encrypted USB for transport + decryption only on offline machine. Overkill for most, appropriate for journalists writing books about intelligence services. Version control for manuscripts: Git works for plain text (markdown). Track every edit, revert to any version, branch for experimental plot directions. Gitea on your VPS stores your manuscript history privately.