Lillibridge Press:
Anyway, what I wanted to mention is that our old contract did recoup the money for the ISBN. However, we've gone back to our lawyer and revised, and so that is no longer the case.
That's good to know and it represents a positive move on your part, given that your previous posts here:
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4770167&postcount=11
http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4772699&postcount=21
indicated that you weren't going to change this policy on the basis of legal advice received.
Lillibridge Press:
I think it's highly unfair for anyone to verbally bash us when they've never worked with us.
Where do you think you've been bashed on this thread? I've seen people asking questions, suggesting potential problem areas and pointing out issues an author should consider. There's been no bashing.
I understand if you don't like some of the comments here, or feel uncomfortable with some of the questions raised, but that's not the same as bashing. IMO characterising the comments here as bashing marks you as being overly defensive.
Lillibridge Press:
HOW you write about any publishing house be it Lillibridge Press or any other, isn't only read by those you’d expect. You never know when another publisher might read your harsh comment, too. We know some of the post's authors here have submitted to us. And we remember. You can bet other publishers remember, too.
Well, it's good to know that what you at Lilibridge Press hold a grudge against any author who raises questions about your company on a public forum.
You can bet that
I'll remember your attitude and make sure I pass on the information to any author I know who might otherwise be considering your company.
Whether your passive aggressive attitude is representative of the publishing industry as a whole though is open to question. Certainly smaller epublishers, with only 1 year's worth of experience and who has previously issued author unfriendly contracts may well share your view. I will be avoiding them as well.
Lillibridge Press:
Would you want to work closely with an author for several months who recently bashed your company?
If an author really bashed my company as in "MM Press sucks and I hate them and they're all evil", then no, I wouldn't want to work with them.
You though seem to consider bashing as constituting "Anyone had experience with MM Pubishing and can tell me anything about them?". In which case, why would an author want to work with
you?
Lillibridge Press:
If we didn't defend ourselves we'd look foolish to some, and when we do we look foolish and hostile to others.
It's not the fact of defending yourself that makes you look foolish, it's how you do it.
You're posts here over the last 24 hours have contained veiled comments suggesting that publishers may blacklist authors for criticising or commenting on their company. That's a ridiculous statement to make and you've been called on it.
If you want to state the facts, you're welcome to do so. If you want to discuss particulars of your business, you're welcome to do so. If you make stupid statements and passive-aggressive threats, be prepared to be called on it. If you want to whinge about the questions/comments/potential issues raised about your company, be prepared to be called on it. If you want to complain that people aren't phrasing statements/issues/questions in the way that
you want them to, be prepared to be mocked for it.
You're running an epublisher, so it's probably a good idea to work out how the internet works.
Lillibridge Press:
I want to thank everyone for their honesty, but sometimes saying things in a polite way often gets better results. The Buddhist have a name for it. Karma.
That karma comment, is an example of whinging. Just so you know.
Lillibridge Press:
People considered once amateurs—Rowling and Tolkien for example, wrote some of the most beloved books in fiction. They were unpublished previously.
Yes, Rowling and Tolkein were once debut, unpublished novelists. Every novelist is an unpublished novelist until they have a novel published.
Rowling and Tolken were also paid advances for their work. Lilibridge Press does not pay its authors an advance.
Lillibridge Press:
I have no problem answering anyone’s questions, especially when someone honestly wants to know and isn’t being somewhat snarky.
This is another example of complaining about people not using the tone that you want them to use.
Lillibridge Press:
Lillibridge Press loves books. We love them! Last year the estimate for published books in the US was somewhere around 190,000, and an extremely large portion of them only sold around one hundred copies.
How may copies on average have books published by you sold since you started?
Lillibridge Press:
Sure, at this time we ask the author to purchase their copyright. Is this wrong? Who can say? Will Lillibridge Press always ask this? Probably not… We want to give our authors as much as possible, and we do negotiate some of our contract, but there are many things that go into our reasons for such changes—like the quality of the story, how well we think it will sell, etc
Who can say that requiring authors to purchase copyright is wrong? How about the previous posts on the first page of this thread where you were told
exactly why it is wrong. It is not industry practice - publishers wanting to be treated as commercial entities bear the cost of copyright registration. It's basic and it's a cost that should be factored into your pricing strategy.
Lillibridge Press:
Lillibridge Press books can be purchased in the US and Europe. We offer our authors 30% from all eBook sales minus the cost to the reseller such as pay pal or any other outlet. LP doesn’t receive any money until after the author gets their cut.
That's a disingenuous statement. Lillibridge books may be available
to order in books across the US and Europe, but this is not the same as actually being present in bookstores. Unless you have negotiated a deal with bookstores for them to physically stock your authors' books, no one is going to be able to walk in a store and pick one from the shelves.
That in itself hamstrings authors, who are instead forced to get the word out there to as many potential buyers as possible. What does Lillibridge do to help them do that?
Lillibridge Press:
Right now, because we are new and want to be in business for a long time, we only do small bits of advertising, as our catalog is still small. You can see one of our ads on GLBT bookshelf or The Hype Factor, and we recently ended a run for one of our titles at The Torch Online. Will this change, of course, when it’s financially feasible for us to do so.
So you're basically not doing a great deal because you can't afford it, which means that authors are going to do a lot of the marketing themselves, which will most likely require their spending money out before getting any back via that 30% royalty structure.
MM