Writer Beware

Latest Posts

Fake Jared And His Friends: Author Solutions’ Misleading PR Strategies

AUG 30, 2012June 18, 202210 COMMENTS

In my recent blog post on Pearson's acquisition of self-publishing giant Author Solutions Inc., I posed several questions that I hope Pearson will consider as it integrates ASI with Penguin Group. One of these was whether ASI will start being more transparent in its advertising and PR. I'd like to go a little bit more into detail on what I mean.

Take ASI's affiliate programs, which pay a $100 referral fee for each individual the affiliate sends ASI's way. There are innumerable such programs online (some of them amounting to little more than pyramid schemes) so ASI is not unique in this regard. Still, these programs are an open invitation to deceptive use by others (as, for instance, may have happened in this case).

Then there are the two so-called whitepapers ASI has issued to further its misleading claim that it is an "independent publisher" at the forefront of a publishing revolution. These documents are filled with inaccuracies about the publishing industry, and paint an unrealistically rosy picture of the benefits of ASI's business model. I won't debunk them here because I've already done so, in previous blog posts.

SELF-PUBLISHING

Self-Publishing vs. Traditional Publishing: The War of Words

AUG 24, 2012December 27, 202222 COMMENTS

In the war of words that rages between advocates of self-publishing and proponents of traditional publishing, one of the long-standing weapons is the term “vanity publishing.” It’s often leveled, dismissively and contemptuously, at self-published authors, especially if they’ve paid for one of the POD-centric self-publishing services such as those provided by Author Solutions. Understandably, self-publishedRead More

PLAGIARISM AND INFRINGEMENT

LendInk, Author Activism, and the Need for Critical Thinking

AUG 17, 2012February 1, 202458 COMMENTS

The Dark Side of Author Activism If you’ve been living under a social media rock and haven’t heard of the LendInk incident, here’s a brief rundown. LendInk was a website that facilitated Kindle ebook lending, matching would-be ebook borrowers with ebook owners. All of this was perfectly legal, involving legitimately purchased ebooks, lending options providedRead More

GUEST POSTS

Guest Blog Post: The Red Flags of Writing Contests

AUG 13, 2012January 31, 202422 COMMENTS

Among the most frequent questions Writer Beware receives are those involving writing contests. Is it legit? Is it prestigious? Is it worth it? How can I tell? Today’s guest blog post from author and editor C. Hope Clark–who evaluates contests regularly for inclusion in her FundsForWriters newsletter–provides a helpful overview of some of the warningRead More

PUBLISHERS AND PUBLISHING

Ebooks Outsell Print! Putting Headlines in Context

AUG 8, 2012January 1, 202311 COMMENTS

Widely-discussed book news this week: Amazon UK’s report that ebook sales have outstripped the sales of all print formats combined. According to unaudited figures released by [Amazon UK] on Monday, since the start of 2012, for every 100 hardback and paperback book sold on its site, customers downloaded 114 ebooks. This generated many headlines announcingRead More

LITERARY AGENT SCAMS

Literary Agent Scams: Still Around, But On the Wane

AUG 3, 2012December 28, 202229 COMMENTS

The other day, on one of the online writers' discussion groups I frequent, someone asked a couple of questions about the list that I thought it would be instructive to answer here: why do we include agencies on the list if they're not currently active? And why don't we regularly add new agencies to the list?

We leave non-active agencies on the list because they often start up again, or start up under different names. Cris Robins of The Robins Agency, for instance, isn't operating just now as far as we know, but she has closed and re-started her business several times over the years, and we wouldn't be surprised to learn that she's back at it.

The numerous name changes and aliases of many of the agencies on the list also attest to their survival instinct. For instance, the agency currently calling itself Best Selling Book Rights Agency has been in continuous operation since 2001, but has had more than six name changes during that time.