If you’ve ever even dabbled in finances, you surely know Warren Buffet’s name. He’s built an empire worth billions by utilizing ideas that tend to fly in the face of conventional financial wisdom.

His most recent annual letter to investors talks–for three pages out of nearly 30–about the value of newspapers. A few years back, he said he wouldn’t pay anything for any newspaper. Now he’s buying them up at a rapid clip.

What has changed? In our globally connected world, the one thing that is missing is the community connection. Newspapers that are tightly tied to a specific region are the ones he’s most interested in.

This is something publishers have been doing for years. Find your niche. A niche market doesn’t have to be big…it just has to be tightly knit. That means readers who want what you have to offer.

Will you sell over a hundred thousand copies or make a million off each book in a niche market? Probably not. But those aren’t the only markers of success. Providing dedicated fans with a satisfying read…now, that’s something to be proud of.

Ever wonders what happens to books that are no longer in the forefront of readers’ minds yet don’t go out of print? They’re on the publisher’s backlist. Usually anything more than a year old (and sometimes things less than 12 months old) are backlisted.

Think of it as a backwater where the already scant marketing assistance is even more rare. Yet if you want to get your hands on the rights so you can self-publish it and market it yourself, you’ll often meet opposition.

Here’s an interesting take on a trend to buy up backlists and redistribute them with fresh vigor.