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To me it's a no-brainer. What can a "real" (dinosaur) publisher do for an author, other than get his books into the few remaining brick and mortar stores? And for that, you accept a fraction of the royalties that Amazon would pay you directly as a self-publisher. And, you virtually surrender your rights to them.

If your first printing does not sell out, you are done, finished, toast, and you will not get a second bite at the apple. The "real" publisher will use creative "Hollywood accounting" to screw you, I could list the ways but it would be a very long list. And after all that, you don't even own the rights to your own book, to reprint it yourself, if they printed too many and some were remaindered. This happens to 90% of first time authors, BTW.

The bad old publishing model was the same as a mother sea turtle: lay 100s of eggs and hope for a few best sellers. The rest die, so what? Tomorrow, another 100 manuscripts will arrive on their desk. 90% of authors who go this route wind up like 90% of the baby sea turtles, and the "real" publishers could not care less.

Amazon freed us from that horrible (for new authors) model.

When a "real" publisher can beat Amazon's 70% royalty, call me.