I'm in, since this is basically the path I'm planning on taking with the work I've posted on here. My sense is that having even a hundred dedicated readers to a book at the outset, especially for an unknown author, is a better marketing method than trying to go with a professional mode of publishing.

Really, independent publishing on Kobo/Smashwords/Kindle isn't any different from normal publishing. You need a solid cover, a strong blurb, a target audience, professional quality editing, passable writing, and a fan base of some sort. Most books are sold by word of mouth or by name recognition, and if you're pushing the first book under an author's name, that means you need to go with fan base.

But, all of these things are now achievable! Editing software like prowritingaid can clean up your writing style to a phenomenal degree, there are plenty of highly skilled graphic designers for all kinds of book covers, layout for an ebook is more simple than a basic webpage, and layout for a print book is literally just an extra week of work once you understand how the design software works (hint: it's stupid easy).

Now, the way I'm publishing my Kor book, at least this first one, is first on instagram, and then collating all the pieces at the end of the week on here. Hope that doesn't put me out of the tag's scope!