Lillibridge Press:
Anyway, you're right. A block of ten ISBNs is 275.00. However, our lawyer didn't ask us how much ten ISBNs cost. He asked, how much does one cost? Please go here:
http://www.isbn.org/standards/home/i.../secureapp.asp Click on "Application for a Single ISBN."
Wow! One ISBN costs 125.00.
You're being completely disingenuous. The cost to you of one ISBN is $275 divided by 10, i.e. $27.50.
If you're serious about running a publishing company, then you'd be buying your ISBNs in bulk anyway, based on the number of publications you're planning/anticipating to release in the forthcoming year - not buying them on an adhoc basis.
In any event, as other posters have pointed out, it is simply not acceptable to effectively use that clause to deny authors their royalties until they "earn out" the outlay. I've only ever seen earn out language like that where the publisher has actually paid an advance up front to the authors. You don't seem to be doing that.
Lillibridge Press:
Lillibridge Press is a small independent publisher, and we rely on authors like you to get the word out and help us build a wide offering of amazing works.
What do
you do to get word out? What do you do to try and maximise sales? How much experience does your marketing and promotions department have and where did they get that experience?
Lillibridge Press:
Lillibridge Press is not a vanity publisher. We never ask for any money from authors. Ever. And we never will. A vanity press will take your roughest draft and publish it in that state for a fee. We don't do that: it would conflict with our goal to sell the best speculative fiction available anywhere. We pursue this goal by working with authors like you to hone your skill, polishing each word of your manuscript.
That's one definition of a vanity press.
Other definitions include not having a quality threshold in place to select what you accept for publication, requiring authors to purchase copies of their own work for the purposes of on-sale or requiring authors to pay other 'behind the scenes' additional costs as a condition to publication, e.g. paying the ISBN registration fee.
Lillibridge Press:
Our editors are knowledgeable and possess advanced credentials.
Okay. Why aren't those credentials set out on your website? Who did your editors gain their credentials with and in what capacity, e.g. have they worked as editors for commercial publishers?
Lillibridge Press:
I believe all our novels should be available in print-on-demand. I recognize and appreciate the enormous amount of intellectual, emotional, and creative labor that goes into producing a work of fiction and believe novels deserve to be in print.
Why? You bill yourself on your own website as being predominantly an eBook publisher. If you're not getting enough eBook sales to make profit, how do you see your company as making money from a POD operation given the difficulties of getting bulk sales in place via bookstores if the POD model is used?
How do you determine whether an eBook goes through to being published via POD? What happens if you decide not to POD an author's book?
Lillibridge Press:
We also decided on a higher percentage of net instead of a lower percentage of gross. Since Lillibridge Press’ cut comes from the net, it behooves Lillibridge Press to keep the difference between net and gross as small as possible.
How do you calculate net? If you're adding a load of costs to reduce the amount that goes to the author, then that's a lousy deal for the author.
MM