The decision to self-publish

Like a lot of aspiring writers, I had hoped that my book would be snapped up by a major publishing company, who would then bring their massive marketing budget to bear behind the book. Then I woke up. Like most people I'd read the stories of books languishing in publishers' slush piles - the name doesn't fill you with confidence, does it? And how much attention was my book - any book - going to get? I participated in various writers' websites, most notably the site www.authonomy.com, which is run by HarperCollins. The site was in beta starting in May 2008, and became public in September 2008. I was one of the authors who submitted my book, and I got a lot of valuable feedback.
I was even contacted by two people at HarperCollins. One was a person who worked in their marketing department, and who wanted to include my book, along with eleven others on the site, as an example of what Authonomy had to offer. I was happy to agree, reasoning that if HarperCollins were going to publish it, they wouldn't be telling other publishers about it. However, other publishers might have had a different view.
The second person was a senior editor, who gave some helpful advice, and some advice that I found difficult to accept. She wanted the book to be exclusively about the achievements and recognitions of those above a certain age. I felt that if I did that, it wouldn't be my book any more; it would be a different book.
In early 2009, HarperCollins announced that they would be publishing three books from Authonomy, and mine wasn't one of them. Well, I knew the statistics weren't in my favour. But two people from HarperCollins had looked at it, and even contacted me. but it didn't look like the were going to publish it.
So on the principle that if you want something doing, do it yourself, that's what I'm going to do.