Welcome to the 21st Century
Publishing Update newsletter. Published about twice a month it is
your source for news and trends in the changing publishing world.
Issue 10 (26 Oct 2001)
In This Issue:
-JD Writes
-New This Week
-Print On-Demand Pt. V - What's In A Publishing
Agreement?
- Author's Q & A
- News & Updates
- Resources
-New Last Time (in case you missed it)
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JD WRITES
Hi,
Well, I've had a fun couple of weeks: a visit from the family AND I got to talk at a writer's
conference on Friday and Saturday.
I was talking at the Infinity Publishing Express Yourself conference in Valley Forge, PA. I was
impressed to find out I was the keynote speaker on Friday night, considering the other speakers
included Melanie Rigney, editor of Writer's Digest,John Kremer, author of 1001 Ways To Market Your
Book, and Dan Poynter, author of the The Self-Publishing Manual - now in its 13th edition.
I was struck by how generous these experts were with
their time, chatting with authors, listening to questions they must have heard a million times
before... I sat with Melanie Rigney and John Kremer at dinner as well as conference director
John Harnish, marketing guru Marcia Yudkin and some of the attending authors. Everyone was
Involved in the conversation, which ranged from practical promotional matters to discussions of
the future of publishing. Turns out I was the only one at the table who had read (and enjoyed
reading)a novel in electronic format.
So, on the whole I'd have to thoroughly recommend getting out there and going to a writer's
conference. The exchange of ideas is fun and you never know what connections you'll make and where
they will lead you.
Spring and summer are the busiest conference seasons
but you can start planning now, by taking a look at the
Shaw Guides.
Hope you enjoy this issue, which contains the fifth part of my POD series, and lots of news
and updates from the publishing world.
Best wishes (and keep writing!)
Julie
NEW THIS WEEK
ARTICLES
POD
Pt. V - What's In A Publishing Agreement?
by
Julie Duffy
When publishing with a POD company you should look
beyond the marketing materials and read the Author Agreement/Publishing
Contract, to find out what exactly the deal is. While some companies,
like Booklocker, have managed to keep the language simple and direct...
...most companies have let their lawyers go to town on
the agreement:
Having had to revise one of these a couple of
times, to try to make it more user friendly, I thought I'd share my the
fruits of my translation effort with you.
<disclaimer>
Please remember I am not a lawyer and that this article is
intended to educate you but not replace the advice of a legal
professional.
<end disclaimer>
A publishing agreement from a POD firm normally
contains information on four or five things:
This is important because if Simon & Schuster
comes knocking, looking to pick up your book and you still have a year
left on your contract with the POD firm, you might have to share the
money with the POD company, or risk the publisher getting bored and
moving on to the next project.
Pricing and
Royalties
Probably dearest to your heart of any matters in the
publishing agreement is the question of money - how much will they pay
you?
The agreement should spell this out clearly. Now
'clearly' doesn't mean 'simply' because royalties are a complicated
topic, but it should be there.
Firstly, you should be able to see how much they are
going to charge for your book, whether or not you have any say in that
pricing, and whether or not they have to ask your permission before
changing the prices. Because POD books are supposed to stay in print
forever, and because there are so many authors to deal with, many
agreements will reserve the right to change the price as production
costs and other factors change.
This isn't outrageous when you consider that your book
should still be available long after you've shuffled off, as Shakespeare
put it. Industry standard prices and the costs of production are bound
to change over time and the company doesn't want to have to poll each of
it's 10,000 authors every time they adjust the prices to meet current
standards.
If they offer you the chance to set your own price, be
sure you understand their minimums and how your decision to raise or
lower the price will affect your receipts.
Ah yes, the receipts.
Some POD companies offer a percentage of the list
price. This is nice and easy, because you always know what the list
price is and you can know exactly how much you will make on any sale,
regardless of bookstore discounts or production costs. The problem with
expressing it this way is that the percentage sounds lower than if the
company offered a percentage of net receipts, or purchase price.
If a company offers a percentage of list price, that
percentage is probably in the region of 25-40%. (Remember that
traditional publishing royalties are around 6-10% of list price). If
they offer a percentage of the net-receipts or the purchase price, that
figure could be anywhere from 40-70%. As exciting as that sounds, it is
important to remember that this means you get 40-70% of the POD
company's receipts, after they've given the bookstore their 40%
discount. A sale of a $12 book could result in a $2.88 royalty even if
the agreement says '40%', which seems like it should come out to a lot
more. This is because you get 40% of the profit the POD company
receives, not 40% of the price of the book.
Services
There should be some description of the services you
are buying - either as part of the contract or as an attached
document/schedule. Make sure you read these carefully to know what
exactly you are and aren't getting.
Warranties
& Indemnities
Possibly the most brain-frying portions of any
agreement, these sections tell you what you are responsible for
(everything) and what the company will take responsibility for
(nothing). Language like "Author represents and warrants the
following..." is usually followed by any number of clauses saying
you promise that you are the real author, you own the copyright, that
you haven't promised anyone else an exclusive license to the work; that
you haven't included anything illegal, defamatory or that would infringe
someone else's copyright or trademark.
If you an honest operator, this section contains
nothing very scary. However it does mean that if you accidentally defame
someone and they take you and the POD company to court, the POD company
can hold up its hands and say 'not our fault, the author promised it was
OK'.
Likewise the indemnity portion is full of clauses
saying you won't hold the company responsible for anything: basically,
if you get sued for any reason, you're on your own.
Knowing this, you may wish to purchase publisher's
liability insurance from a third party if you are writing about real
people or events.
Termination
The agreement should give the terms under which you or
the company can end your relationship. It should include timelines, if
appropriate; the procedure for notifying each other and, ideally, some
indication of what they will do with any extra copies of your book that
they may happen to have lying around.
Usually, if you don't give up any rights, you can
terminate the agreement at any time. If you're giving up rights and want
to break the agreement, the company will probably retain the right to
produce and distribute the book for some time after you notify them.
Conclusion
POD contracts tend to be a lot more generous in terms
of rights and royalties than traditional publishing contracts ... but
that's just how it should be, since the POD company makes non of the
investments made by a traditional publisher.
If your agreement seems too legalistic for you to
understand, take it to an intellectual property lawyer for their advice.
It is important to know exactly what you are getting into. There is no
one model for POD, there is not, as yet, any gold standard.
AUTHOR'S
Q&A
This
week Dorice writes:
Hi there,
Hi there,
I've just gone through your POD articles and have
found them very useful. Will you be publishing a list of places to go for POD in the US and
Canada?
Dorice
http://www.DoriceNelson.com
THE GUNN OF KILLEARNAN-10/01
"In a tale of treachery & danger, they were slaves to their passions... "
FREE short story at: http://www.novelbooksinc.com
http://www.kripgansbooks.com (German)
…………………………………
Hi Dorice,
I'm glad the articles helped.
I have a list of POD companies with my
comments.
If I don't mention a country, it usually means it
is a US operation.
This is not a full list but contains most of the
biggies and a few smaller operations. I will be adding to it as fast as I can, but in the
meantime you can find other lists at:
Piers Anthony's
site:
This mixed e-publishers and POD companies, so read the descriptions.
John Kremer's Book Marketing
site:
This mixes printers who deal only with publishers and POD companies who deal directly with authors.
RBANWRTR's POD
list:
a site by an enthusiast and POD author.
GLB Publishers' Digital Printers
list:
This site lists only printers, not publishing services.
Hope this helps!
Julie
NEWS
& UPDATES
POD
introduces bookstore returns scheme
25 October 2001
SuperiorBooks.com, a selective POD company, has
introduced a scheme intended to make bookstores more willing to take a
chance on books printed on-demand.
Bookstores agree to order at least six different
titles from SuperiorBooks.com and in return they are given a 60%
introductory discount and allowed to return copies if they do not sell.
Superior hopes these initial copies will help generate special order
sales that can be placed through their normal distributor (Baker &
Taylor) and at their normal discount (45%).
In their explanation of the scheme, targeted at
independent booksellers SuperiorBooks stresses the advantages of the POD
system for book selling - no inventory, no waste.
more:
SuperiorBooks Announcement
SuperiorBooks.com
Brill's Content
& Inside.com follow Contentville
24 October 2001
Shortly after announcing the closure of Contentville,
its sister companies Inside.com and print magazine Brill's Content
have been closed. Inside.com, a portal for entertainment news, has been
acquired by part-owner Primedia company, and will now be a fee-based
service, distributing Primedia content.
more:
Writer's Write article
Inside.com
24 Oct 2001
'NSync star Justin Timberlake's publisher announced that his novel
has been shelved because he doesn't have time to do a separate
promotional tour.
(editorial rant: Justin Timberlake had a novel contract? Justin.
Timberlake.
So much for all those people who criticise self-publishing as 'vanity'
and say 'at least the traditional publishing industry forms some kind of
filter, some kind of guarantee of quality.' Not that I've read any of Mr
Timberlake's writings, but I'm quite sure they're no better than most of
the books currently languishing in slush piles... rant over. Sorry!)
UK POD
company
joins PMA
20 October 2001
Author.co.uk has joined forces with Publisher's Marketing Association, the powerhouse advocate
for self-publishers and small presses, based in the US.
more:
PMA website
Author.co.uk website
iUniverse
bags Venture Capital
15 October 2001
POD publisher iUniverse announced an $18m investment from Warburg
Pincus. Industry insiders speculate that this might lead to iUniverse
concentrating on the lucrative business-to-business marketing, rather
than on individual authors.
RESOURCES
New
this week:
new!Ivan
Hoffman, Intellectual Property Law
Ivan Hoffman is well-known in writers' news groups,
for offering advice about contracts and other legal issues writers are
likely to come across - contracts, copyright, distribution deals. This
site is packed with useful articles - and I bet he'd even let you hire
him, if you wanted.
new!MyFonts.com
Looking for a cool, unusual font for your marketing,
website or book cover? Don't want to pay hundreds of dollars? Take a
trip to myfonts.com, where you can view and buy hundreds of unusual
fonts. The site is very user friendly and the prices reasonable.
Particularly touching: a font to benefit the American Red Cross, called September
11, and made up entirely of question marks...
new!Superior
Books
Billing itself as the first truly selective internet
publisher (although I'm not sure they were really the first, since
they've only been around for 13 months - small niggle) Superior books
offers electronic publishing and Print On-Demand, but does operate on a
traditional publishing model. If you sell your book to a publisher, they
get a 20% commission. They tell me they do try to attract the attention
of trad publishers, to earn that commission. Royalties
are 50% on electronic books and 50% of gross profits (net receipts) on
print books. These royalties are as good a deal as any other POD.
NEW LAST TIME
The Nitty-Gritty Guide to
Signature Files - everyone says you should have one, but what
exactly should it say?
AUTHOR'S Q & A
This author's question focuses on ISBNs and the Library of Congress.
NEWS & UPDATES
Contentville closes its doors
e-Penguin is launched
ABOUT JDWRITE
JDWrite is the online home of writer, journalist and former Xlibris Director of Author Services, Julie McCarroll Duffy.
Julie has expert knowledge of the new world of publishing: Print On-Demand, self-publishing, online publishing, eBooks, the
evolving publishing industry and more. Her role at Xlibris was
to work with authors to help them understand these developments, to listen to authors' needs and communicate those to the
company. She has been a speaker at writers' conferences around the US and seeks to continue to educate authors to understand
their ever-increasing opportunities in the publishing world. After following her husband's career from their native Scotland
to the US, Julie is working on a book about Trailing Spouse Syndrome,
and a book about Print On-Demand Publishing.
All content copyright 2001 Julie Duffy.
For permission to reprint articles, contact the editor at
jd@jdwrite.com.
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