Comments on: Number Eighteen In A Series of Self-Publishing Posts https://booksquare.com/number-eighteen-in-a-series-of-self-publishing-posts/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&%23038;utm_campaign=number-eighteen-in-a-series-of-self-publishing-posts Dissecting the publishing industry with love and skepticism Tue, 23 Aug 2005 17:35:52 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 By: Booksquare https://booksquare.com/number-eighteen-in-a-series-of-self-publishing-posts/#comment-98184 Tue, 23 Aug 2005 17:35:52 +0000 http://www.booksquare.com/archives/2005/08/22/1526/#comment-98184 Elizabeth, if I may (g), if your contract is decent, then you’re a unique publisher. Sorry…couldn’t resist. And thanks for clarifying reversion of rights as far as your company is concerned. I know that many print publishers tend to use the out-of-print concept as a way of starting the clock. I (personally) think a specific time period is a better gauge. Given the shelf life of most print books, I also believe shorter is to the advantage of the author.

I think education is the key — as long as authors walk into the process with their eyes wide open (which means that authors need to stop pretending that the business isn’t their business), all options are valid. It’s those who make uneducated decisions that worry me…

]]> By: Elizabeth Burton https://booksquare.com/number-eighteen-in-a-series-of-self-publishing-posts/#comment-98183 Tue, 23 Aug 2005 15:52:04 +0000 http://www.booksquare.com/archives/2005/08/22/1526/#comment-98183 Thank you on behalf of the 114 talent writers published–in POD–by Zumaya Publications. We chose POD for reasons economic and environmental, and so far those 114 people are very happy with the way we operate.

As for your question about reversion of rights, we contract only for those we intend to use. The contract term is two years from date of publication. If we don’t hear otherwise, it renews automatically. If we do hear otherwise, all rights are returned to the author. If the author lands a contract with the trads, there’s a kill fee after which their rights also revert, but ONLY if the book is published.

Our contract has been vetted by agents, media attorneys and writers groups and has been pronounced “decent,” which is what we intended.

The media prefers to equate the process with the product, as it gives them a chance to be sarcastic. Rather like giggling over Stephen King’s ebook “failure,” which netted him $600K. I should have such failure.

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