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Old 09-02-2007, 02:15 PM   #1
ktinkel
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Default Self-publishing info

I had the bright idea of looking into alternatives for those who want to self-publish books. It turns out to be an amazing tangle of an issue, with many traps for the unwary.

Conventional publishing
It is clear that if you want to get your books into conventional bookstores — the ones people walk into, where the majority of books are sold even today — you need a conventional publisher. The others have neither the clout nor the motive to push their authors’ books through the distribution channels.

Self-publishing
However, there can be occasions for self-publishing. Then you merely (hah!) need to decide how.

One option is to use an offset book printing company, such as Whitehall Publishing (which my client used and I worked with for a dozen years, with few complaints). Thomson Shore is another established company, though one I have never dealt with. And there are others; search for book manufacturers if book printers doesn’t seem to yield useful results.

Even if you think you want to use a print-on-demand (POD) print service, it is a good idea to look into offset printing. If nothing else, the web sites provide good information about standards, practices, and other details, and you will be able to see a wide range of possibilities (size, paper, covers, binding, etc.) You will probably have to send an e-mail to get a quote, but it does not incur any obligation.

POD publishing
Another option is to look into the dozens (hundreds?) of POD “publishers” (who usually refer to themselves as “vanity” or “subsidy” publishers) who have sprung up on the web, including Lulu, iUniverse, and many, many more. If what you want is to sell books to those who are already primed to ask to buy a copy, these services can work out well — nothing is printed before it is sold. The manual for FontLab software is produced by one of these companies, and it is easy to see that a limited-demand publication like that would be suited to this process.

But if you want to self-publish and expect to have the marketing and distribution effect of having published with a conventional publisher, you may be disappointed with many (even most) of these companies.

Resources
Anyway, so far I have found some resources with additional information. If there is enough interest, we can gather more, and even find some of the better suppliers.

The print book Writer’s Market from Writer’s Digest Books was the bible of my writing days (it is now in its 80th year), and I am glad to see it is still available at Amazon. The publisher also sells several online subscriptions, including a monthly one, at its web site. Unless it has changed focus recently, it emphasizes conventional publishing but probably has occasional articles on POD publishing.

Another place with a focus on conventional publishing: Absolute Write, a vBulletin forum with many sections of information for writers looking to be published, including a couple of interest to self-publishers: “Bewares and Background Check” and “POD Self-Publishing and E-Publishing.” Jenna Glatzman’s article on “How Real Publishing Works” is an excellent run-down, and good background information no matter how you intend to publish your book.

A blog, Writer Beware on the perils of writing today, including comments on agents and publishers who they believe are bad choices for a new writer. Scroll down on the right to read the blog’s “thumbs down” list of literary agencies or publishers. The latter is on subsidy or vanity publishers who have received many complaints at this site. It includes a very useful list of “abusive practices” which could be considered for any publisher you might consider. The bloggers list 13 companies that follow two or more of the practices in that list.

Another blog, POD-dy Mouth, covers uses for POD/vanity publishing.

So: Any interest in this topic?

   
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Old 09-02-2007, 10:26 PM   #2
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Kathleen

There is, certainly, from me. As a self-employed person, I don't have a lot of free time to research these by myself and I am getting a few enquiries these days from authors who want to self-publish.

So far, nothing has come of any of them, but I would like to be able to offer good advice, at least, on those enquiries I do get. It might lead to work :-)

   
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Old 09-02-2007, 11:33 PM   #3
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Or you could do what someone I know does - buys his own SRA2 paper, trims it down to an oversize A4, prints 4 page signatures on a Xerox mono laser printer, runs the pages through a folding machine, gathers the pages, glues to some webbing; then runs bookbinding cloth through an Epson inkjet, adds boards, makes a case, prints endpapers and finishes the book with ribbon and head and tail bands!

Yours, in the post in 20 mins.
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Old 09-03-2007, 04:49 AM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ktinkel View Post

Thomsen Shore is another established company, though one I have never dealt with. ... So, any interest in this topic?

Obviously, I had to look up Thomsen-Shore, but actually it is Thomson-Shore. <g>

You might also give us some links to the organizational fundraising cookbook publishers. Our civic association did two of them, back in the 1980's, with successful fundraising, but it was a lot of work.
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Old 09-03-2007, 06:36 AM   #5
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Oops — I think I must have gotten used to your spelling. I will fix the typo. Thanks.

Are these specialty places, like the ones that produce high school annuals?

I suspect that business has changed a lot in the past decade; some of the POD printers mention cookbook publishing, in fact.

The real problem now seems to be that it is difficult for customers to sort out whether a self-identified publisher is actually a POD printer or a true publisher. If only a printer, there may be few or none of the crucial publishing services — especially promotion, but also including some quality control. In the worst cases, the “publisher” may attempt to highjack copyrights and reprint rights by supplying their own ISBNs.

   
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Old 09-03-2007, 06:43 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DTP Guy View Post
There is, certainly, from me. As a self-employed person, I don't have a lot of free time to research these by myself and I am getting a few enquiries these days from authors who want to self-publish.
The advantage to these POD places is that the author does not have to buy more books than needed. The disadvantage is (at least sometimes) poor quality (ink almost always trumps toner) and cost: the per-book cost is usually cheaper with conventional printing, assuming you can buy 1,000 copies or more.

   
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Old 09-03-2007, 11:02 AM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ktinkel View Post
The disadvantage is (at least sometimes) poor quality (ink almost always trumps toner) and cost.
Not just the ink - POD paper is sometimes white gloss for text! Ugg.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ktinkel View Post
the per-book cost is usually cheaper with conventional printing, assuming you can store 1,000 copies or more.
There, fixed that for you.
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Old 09-03-2007, 11:32 AM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Benwiggy View Post
Not just the ink - POD paper is sometimes white gloss for text! Ugg.
Used to be so, but most of the ones I checked before my eyes started to cross offered a variety of papers. However, if you are printing color, you may be locked into gloss with the most primitive of them. B&W usually has a couple of options, both uncoated, of course.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Benwiggy
There, fixed that for you.
Well, first you need to be willing or able to invest in the 1,000 copies, but then, yep, storing them can be an issue.

The problem with going the conventional route, of course, is that you must sell those books yourself. You will not be able to get them into conventional bookstores, except by a miracle or tons of effort, and that it is a one-by-one kind of deal.

As for on-line selling, although Amazon says it will list self-published books, I don’t quite see how it works in real life. Suspect it is like buying from a used book from a third party via Amazon. Better than nothing (you don’t need to set up a merchant credit card account, for example; or have to ask buyers to use PayPal), and I think your book would turn up in an Amazon search on related topics, which is pretty useful.

It would be easy to say that self-publishers with dreams of reviews and sales through the major bookstores would still need to submit to the traditional process, but even that may not be enough these days. Publishers want blockbusters, for the most part, and a more normal author may not get a lot of promotion.

There was an article in yesterday’s paper about how new authors were being sent on promotional blog trips (staying right at home, in other words) — which is less useful than talking to people, however briefly, face-to-face.

   
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Old 09-03-2007, 03:19 PM   #9
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KT:

Quote:
assuming you can buy 1,000 copies or more
A lot of academics' books don't get anything like reaching a thousand copies distributed, even though many have been sent to fellow-academics. Most copies finish up in being saved from the pulping machine by being take by the specialist firms for remaindered books

   
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