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First One Publishing / Karen Hunter Publishing

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It's open to legal residents of the USA. So you could be a citizen of, say, Australia or France, working for a year in the USA, and you'd be eligible to enter and would be an "international" author. If you're an American citizen residing in Australia, however, you're not eligible to enter.
 

jennontheisland

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She said to Janet Reid that she was launching on February 11th, so perhaps she was confused on one of those occasions.
The publisher has launched. The contest launches on Feb 11.

Things being launched all over the place.

I wonder what's going to explode first.
 

cryaegm

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Wait, am I missing something? I thought she said that First One wasn't an offshoot of Karen Hunter Publishing in this thread. Did I misread or something? *Goes back and looks.*

Edit: Oh, she said it's not an ebook arm of Karen Hunter Publishing. This is going to sound really dumb, but what's the different between an ebook "arm" of and "offshoot" of Karen Hunter Publishing?
 
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ctripp

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Right from the start, when Karen responded with >$149 to enter a contest is cheaper then self publishing< I was confused. What did one have to do with the other? Did this publisher expect a lot of submissions by Authors that do self publish?

It all becomes clear however, once one see's the contest is only open to writers that have not been published. Certainly there are many writers holding a manuscript in one hand, a file folder full of rejections in the other who, rather then moving on and writing another, are considering self publishing. It's these rejected stories and rejected writers the contest is designed to appeal to. I do think the publisher knows what they are doing with this contest, someone in the industry this long is not that naive.
There are no substantial costs involved in putting out an ebook for a publisher and I will assume the contest fees will be used to pay the winners and what little it does amount to in setting up the ebook. A portion of the entry fee's may well too be used, as Karen says, to pay the judges (though I personally feel judges should NEVER be paid, an honorarium after the fact might be fine)

I would feel much better if this were open to ALL Authors/Writers published or not and, after all, doesn't a real publisher want the BEST submissions possible no matter whom they come from?
 

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Wait, am I missing something? I thought she said that First One wasn't an offshoot of Karen Hunter Publishing in this thread. Did I misread or something? *Goes back and looks.*

Edit: Oh, she said it's not an ebook arm of Karen Hunter Publishing. This is going to sound really dumb, but what's the different between an ebook "arm" of and "offshoot" of Karen Hunter Publishing?
As much difference as "terrestrial" means "print". :cool:
 

Jessianodel

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what's the different between an ebook "arm" of and "offshoot" of Karen Hunter Publishing?

Um, maybe ebook arm refers to more of a different division within the same company? And offshoot is a completely different company altogether?

The contest was a big enough red flag just with the copyright/"legal information". But I don't see how someone with eight novels under her belt and twenty years in the biz could make all these mistakes.
 

IceCreamEmpress

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The contest was a big enough red flag just with the copyright/"legal information". But I don't see how someone with eight novels under her belt and twenty years in the biz could make all these mistakes.

She was on the content production and content development side, not the business side. At the larger houses, there isn't necessarily a lot of overlap--I know some people who make it their business to know all about how the business end works (and vice versa, I know some people from the business side who are really interested in what goes between the covers), but one can also do one's job with a lot of isolation from the other side.

Of course, there is also the possibility that she is aware of how seriously she is misrepresenting things, but that she doesn't think other people will be able to tell.
 

IceCreamEmpress

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Huh. To me, she sounds/feels more like editorial than production. I wonder what she was doing?

Sorry, by "content production" I meant "writing and editing" (I had my internet writer's hat on there).

I believe that her job with S&S was to reach out to the community of African American and other black writers, to sign established writers and identify and develop new talents.
 

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I assume that Karen has a literary agent (a quick Google search pops up the info of her being represented by Ian Kleinert of LGI and the BJ Robbins Agency -- not sure which is current). Perhaps she's really had no dealings with the business side of publishing at all. So I'd like her to ask her agent these questions:

1. Agent, would you ever pay a $149 fee to submit one of my works to a publisher or contest?

2. Agent, would you ever submit one of my works to a publisher if the act of submitting the work gave the publisher all rights to my work in perpetuity for no recompense?

3. Agent, if you would not ever do these things for moi, an author you represent, why should any other author submit to my publishing company under those conditions?
 

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So it has. There's still a link to and webpage for the contest call for submissions, but the link to and webpage for the contest rules have gone.

Hopefully a phoenix will rise out of the ashes!
 

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if it's an indication that she's reworking the rules, that's a good thing.
Scalzi talks about it on his blog here.
Has it been taken down because First One Publishing is retooling the content of the page so the rules aren’t so ridiculous? Or has it been taken down to shield the publisher from further ridicule?

Will be interesting to see how this plays.
 

jennontheisland

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You know, I think if anything is going to change publishing, it's going to be threads like this one.

Assuming, of course, that the contest is now removed/revamped based on discussion here.
 

Stew21

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and in his comments section when someone praised him for "keeping people honest" he said this: "It wasn’t just me, I assure you. Absolute Write, Janet Reid and Smart Bitches, Trashy Books probably deserve more credit, and today’s post from Writer Beware almost certainly helped as well."

Well done, peeps.
 

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Exactly, y'all. I cannot believe it's coincidental that the contest page has been removed (whether for revamping or for erasing the whole idea) and that so many writers groups have pointed out the Bad Idea-ness of the contest. There's got to be a causal link there. And that in turn validates AW's effectiveness.