Someone in another forum was asking about self-publishing company Outskirts Press today. I had never heard of them, so I decided to check it out. This is a company that is an example of everything that is wrong with the self-publishing industry, and why the traditional publishing industry sees self-publishers as hacks.
Seems Outskirts Press has their own internal self-published book award. From their website:
Outskirts Press officially nominates less than 5% of its titles each year to participate in this prestigious competition. An Outskirts Press official Evvy Nomination is high recognition of a book's excellence in its own right and is the first step toward winning a coveted EVVY Award. EVVY Nominees and Winners may receive any number of the following opportunities and recognition*:
- Borders Bookstore events
- Exposure in national magazines like Writer's Digest, The Writer, and Poets & Writers magazines
- The CIPA Star honor
- A framed plaque in recognition of your accomplishment
- and more...
Well, you know me. I read between the lines. Some call it a gift. Others consider it a curse. But something sat wrong with me. Sure, only nominating 5% of their titles sounds as if they have a selection process. Believe me, it would be wonderful if there was something to really highlight self-published authors that deserved it. But note the odd use of the word "Officially". Are there "unofficial" nominations? I started to dig, and found out what qualifies for a nomination.
The only books that qualify for nomination are those published under their MOST EXPENSIVE PACKAGE. You can only be nominated for their award if you are willing to spend $999 on their highest price package.
Way to select books for an award!
Tell you what, give me $500 and I'll nominate you for the Bards and Sages Award. Or, not. My ethical backbone won't let me sink to such a level.
Then start digging around for all the "added features" you get with their packages. Like a list of places to submit books for review.
Your author's center has a list of addresses under the "Free Resources" section for publications that review books, including The Wall Street Journal, ForeWord Magazine, and others
Nice, except the Wall Street Journal has a standing policy to NOT review self-published books. And ForeWord Magazine only reviews self-published books if you pay them several hundred dollars. So this is absolutely useless.
Oh, but wait. There's MORE! Yes, when you sign on with Outskirts Press, you get your very own COACH! This brilliant person will share things like:
- How to pitch your book to Oprah (How many self-published books have been pitched on Oprah? I'll give you a hint, the number is less than 1)
- How to submit your book to Google's product database (you can do this yourself)
- How to list your book on Amazon alongside a best-seller (You pay $500-$1000 depending on the title you want to be matched with)
- The addresses of independent bookstores nationwide (available for free with a Google search of "independent bookstores"
Again, USELESS.
Or how about this:
Particularly valuable for professional speakers who have published a book (but a catchy promotional hook for others), the Audio Excerpt option provides the opportunity to record your voice on your free webpage. You can read a 3-minute section of your book, or just explain in your own voice what motivated you to write.
Recording your audio excerpt is as easy as calling a toll-free number and talking into a phone. Your audio excerpt is added to your free author's webpage for others to listen to. This marketing option is free with every Diamond package when selected from the Options Menu during pre-publication and just $99 for our Ruby and Pearl packages.
So basically you call a voicemail, record your message, and then upload it on your site. Guess what? If you already have internet phone service, you can do this yourself FOR FREE. Or if you have a microphone on your computer. It's easy.
Or how about:
If you have published multiple books with Outskirts Press, the back page promotion gives you an opportunity to promote your previous book within the pages of your upcoming one.
The best audience for your previous book is the reader of your current one. Only Outskirts Press offers this promotion opportunity.
This marketing option is free with every Diamond package when selected from the Options Menu during pre-publication and just $99 for our Ruby and Pearl packages.
You can pay $99, OR you can just add an additional page to your manuscript doing this FOR FREE. Every Bards and Sages product has a page that promotes other related books. It takes all of two minutes to add.
I could go on, but do I have to?
This whole thing is just repulsive. Sadly, I'm sure there are hundreds of desperate writers who think the only way they can get published is with scam outfits like this. It makes my stomach churn.
Everyone, repeat after me:
Money flows TOWARD the writer, not away.
If you really feel you must self-publish, use a service that does not require hundreds and thousands of dollars up front. The typical self-published book doesn't sell more than a 100 copies. THAT IS WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT. I don't care what the site tells you, you will NOT make your investment back. Even if you somehow sell a 1000 copies, you will probably just break even.
You can self-publish with lulu.com for free. Now it's a self-service site, so you have to do everything yourself, but if you visit the forums there are plenty of other lulu members happy to swap skills and help. Want to get your book listed on Amazon? If you live in the U.S., a distro package (including ISBN in your name) is only $50. Need to know where you can send review copies? Here is a list I personally created, and personally verified that the reviewers will consider POD titles. And it's free. In short, there is zero reason to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on a self-publishing project when there are already cheaper or free resources available.
rate
email
print
link to this page
Comments: 19
While I've always been a big fan of Writer's Digest MAGAZINE, over the last few years Writer's Digest the WEBSITE has slide into non-writer friendly territory. From charging $100 to enter their writing contests to teaming up with unscrupulous companies like this, the website has lost any credibility with me.
In fact, I think it says a great deal about just how much faith WD puts in its own contests that they go to a self-publishing outfit for "winner" anthologies, but use a traditional publishing route for their own books. Think about it.
In the hope that this doesn't get moderated into an internet black hole, and that the readers of this blog are intelligent enough to form their own opinions rather than believing everything they read, I offer this rebuttal. As the Director of Author Support for Outskirts Press, I have just a wee bit more information about the topic than Julie Ann Dawson.
First I'll address the overall tone of this posting, which seems to imply that all self-publishing service providers are scams because they charge a fee for something you can do yourself with a lot of time, effort, and money. That's somewhat akin to accusing a homebuilder of being a scam. I could build a home if I wanted to but it would probably cost me more in the long-run because I lack the knowledge to do it correctly. Sometimes I prefer to let the professionals do things for me. The fact that I have to pay for their time and experience shouldn't surprise me, nor should I consider it a scam. It's a service and a convenience. I can expend the time and energy learning the ropes, or I can let a company that does it professionally handle the ropes for me. This is a consumer-oriented marketplace, and there are plenty of people who want the details of ISBN, LCCN, PPI, etc. taken care of for them. Yes, I realize that some authors feel they should be the sole owner of the ISBN in order to be recognized as the publisher of record. Authors savvy enough to have that concern need only conduct due diligence in finding a service that is right for them. Postings such as this one by Ms. Dawson paint a bitter, grim picture that is removed from reality (and also about 5 years out of date in the industry). Outskirts Press offers authors the flexibility to provide their own ISBN and publishing imprint name with some of our packages. This is ideal for authors who want to be recognized as the publisher of record but want to take advantage of the behind-the-scenes conveniences we offer (have you ever tried submitting just ONE book to Ingram on your own? Good luck). We are one of the few PODs who allow author-submitted ISBNs and it is one element that differentiates us from the companies Ms. Dawson appears to be confusing us with.
Speaking of specifics, I will now address the false assumptions about Outskirts Press contained in the original posting:
The awards Ms. Dawson refers to are not an internal award. They are held annually by the Colorado Independent Publishers Association – a fact clearly outlined on our website if anyone should care enough to read about it. As a Colorado publisher, our titles are eligible for entry into this contest. Contrary to Ms. Dawson's statements, the titles we nominate for submitting to this contest represent the top 5% of the books we publish annually. Since nearly half our books are Diamonds, there is certainly a selection process (5% is less than 50%). Our "official" nominations are titles we select and present to the EVVY Awards personally. "Unofficial" entries would be those titles that we didn't select that were submitted to the EVVY awards by the authors themselves (since any Colorado author can do that). So, yes, in answer to your question, there are official and non-official entries. Our official entries ARE specifically selected based upon their merit.
It is true that (for the most part) only Diamond and Pearl books qualify to be considered for a nomination. This is for our own sanity is reviewing over 2000 possible books a year, and I say "for the most part" because there are some exemplary Ruby books that deserve recognition in rare cases. We have found (not surprisingly) that authors willing to make an investment in their book are also those authors most likely to have a book worth nominating. In other words, they have probably paid to have it professionally edited. They typically have a "better" cover, too. Diamond and Pearl books simply look and read better and therefore, by narrowing the focus of our selection process to those, we increase the statistical likelihood of reviewing nominate-able books. Does this qualify as a scam? No, it qualifies as common sense. We still review each Diamond and Pearl book on its own merit and only nominate the ones that qualify based upon a subjective set of criteria (its content, its editing, its cover, etc).
The original posting's comment about the Wall St. Journal is mostly accurate, although like anything, contains its exceptions. The success of Harry Potter is an exception. Why limit the possibilities of our authors?
The comment about ForeWord is wrong. ForeWord reviews books without payment. You are confusing their Clarion review service with their magazine reviews. I would suggest familiarizing yourself further with their site and publication and before making general comments like this that decrease your creditability.
I'm curious why proving marketing assistance to an author after publication is useless. It's one of the most popular elements of our company and something that our authors find extremely valuable. As a blogger about self-publishing, the original poster is probably more savvy than many writers. That's okay; it is good to be educated. Perhaps she already knows how to create a listmania list on Amazon and how to find US newspaper addresses on the Internet. Many authors don't, and they like to be spoon-fed that information. If our attempt to provide marketing assistance to our published authors for two years after publication is useless, than consider how useless the other self-publishing companies are who DO NOT provide any level of marketing support.
The comment about the audio excerpt is equally puzzling, since the qualifying statements already disqualify 90% of our authors; they possess neither an internet phone service nor a microphone on their computer. We provide publishing and marketing services for writers, many of who are over the age of 50. They don't text their friends or ping their MySpace page, and the services we provide to them are extremely valuable. A glass of water in the desert is worth a fortune; to writers in suburbia it just may be a glass of water. And some will always think it's half empty, usually those who would rather write about the water instead of drink it.
The comment about the back page promotion is somewhat accurate; it can be accomplished if the author simply adds it herself. Although many authors lack the technical know-how of inserting a high-resolution cover scan image to a print-ready PDF file. So, for those who lack that knowledge and still want to promote their previous book, we offer that option. Is that so different from someone who asks their home builder to paint their walls a different color and pays a little extra? Sure, someone could do it themselves, but it would probably look less professional and would certainly be less convenient than having the professional do it for them.
Saying we are a scam but suggesting Lulu is not solely because they are cheaper is like saying a homebuilder that builds million dollar homes is a scam but US Home is not. Our services are for a different, more sophisticated demographic. There's an old adage I'm sure you are familiar with; it's called: "You get what you pay for." A Lulu book looks like a free book because it is. Hobbyists publish their books for free. Professional authors, on the other hand, make an investment in a book that reflects the time it took them to write it. I also find it amazing that Lulu offers single ISBNs to books under 48 pages in length when the ISBN.org entity strictly dismisses such a tactic. If you are truly concerned about a writer's preservation, don't suggest they use a site that treats their writers like cattle and their books like hamburgers.
We have hundreds of authors who make back their investment. It's true that not all our authors make it back, but the correlation between those who don't and those who refuse to promote their own book, is nearly 1-to-1 (and authors who refuse to promote their own book will be unsuccessful no matter where they publish). We send royalty checks of thousands of dollars to authors every quarter. Are they becoming millionaires? No. Are they getting paid consistently for their published book? Yes.
Kudos to Helen C.D. for questioning the validity of the original post. Which is more likely to be true? That Writer's Digest is a scam? Or that this blog is somewhat misinformed and has its own agenda, rather than your best interest, at heart?
Chris Kline
Director of Author Support
http://outskirtspress.com
I don't get your homebuilding comparison. While if I want to buy a house it is better to buy one built by a professional, if I want to publish my story as an author and get the most for it, it is better to do it for free with a real publisher that knows what they are doing. Your comparison is a straw man.
If your goal as a writer is to just produce a small niche product, or you have a book of regional interest, or a specialty book that would not interest traditional publishers, self-publishing is a viable option...but there are much cheaper services. In the world of fiction, which is the majority of self-published books, self-publishing is rarely a good option.
As far as Lulu treating people like cattle, we use Lulu and Createspace for our printing needs. All of our books have always received positive reviews. All of our customers have always appreciated the quality. Lulu has fee-based services people can use, but there is also a community of publishers there that offer a hand for free. Real people that you can google and actually find out who they are, not an unknown "coach." Guys like Hugo award winner Ron Miller and bestseller Jeremy Robinson.
Your marketing assistance is useless as it is mostly stuff you can do yourself with Google. If you are so non tech savvy that you need someone to do this stuff for you, you should not self-publish to begin with. You should seek a traditional publisher and get paid instead of paying.
I misconstrued the contest, but the wording on your site implies a relationship between the award and you. The inference is that the only way to compete for the award is to get the most expensive package. And if I construed it that way, the less informed writers who happen upon your site must as well.
Your "glass of water" inference is interesting. Yes, if you are DESPERATE then I am sure your service is the shiny oasis. But, writers should not make financial decisions based on desperation.
In regard to the audio...if someone can't figure out how to record a message, then they are probably not going to figure out how to embed said message on a website. Besides, studies have shown that audio is often more of a distraction on a site than a help. This is because the majority of browsing happens when people are at work or school, and therefore have the sound turned off.
As to who has the best interest of who at heart...I'm not the one asking people for a $1000 for the right to see their name on the cover of a book. I pay for proofreading, not my writers. I pay for cover art, not my writers. I pay for production, not my writers. Writers should be writers, and focus on their writing. There are hundreds of small presses and publishers that are interested in publishing new voices. Instead of spending $1000 on a self-publishing service, they should focus on perfecting their craft and researching markets for their work.
http://outskirtspress.com/comparel.php
For example, you have on your site that the Lulu cost for a 200 page book is $11 to the author. This is wrong. The actual price is $8.53. In fact, you can calculate the price for a variety of formats to get the correct information by using the Lulu cost calculator.
http://www.lulu.com/en/includes/calc_book_inc.php
"Real books also need the ISBN printed on the cover of the book and on the copyright page of the interior. The only way to do this is to revise your book with Lulu after uploading the files initially. So you must pay their revision fee, plus whatever you have to pay to your designer to make those changes to your files again."
There is no revision fee. The only way you would pay a revision fee is if you approved your book for distro. You can revise your files a hundred times, for free, so long as you have not selected the final APPROVE option.
Also, Lulu automatically generates the barcode for you on your cover. Unless you designed your own wrap-around cover, you don't have to do anything. And even if you did pay a designer to design a wrap-around cover, they would have had to leave space for the barcode.
"If you do not have the necessary files, you will need to hire a third party vendor to format your interior and cover files for you. Costs and quality vary considerably."
Actually, you can just upload your formatted Word document and Lulu automatically converts your file to a print-ready PDF for free.
And on to your "myths":
Books for true distribution require the ISBN on the book.
1. Lulu's process requires that you upload files for printing before they assign the ISBN to you. If you order one of their distribution services, you must pay to have your book revised so the ISBN can be included.
Wrong. Already discussed above.
2. The ISBN Agency requires that all non-children's book be at least 48 pages in order to receive an ISBN.
Lulu assigns ISBNs to book regardless of length. The majority of books published on Lulu do not meet the definition of a "book" in the publishing industry, nor do they qualify rightfully for ISBN numbers.
Again. Wrong. You don't even get an option to buy an ISBN package if your book does not meet certain requirements. The system automatically prompts you whether or not your book qualifies for distro packages.
3. Copies you order from Lulu are different than copies ordered from Amazon.
Lulu uses a different vendor to produce books purchased by the author. Most Lulu authors are blissfully unaware that their books look different (sometimes considerably so) when ordered from Amazon or other online retail sites.
Lulu uses several printers, and they have never hidden this fact. In fact, it's pretty plastered all over the site. Books published through distro are printed by LSI, the POD arm of Ingram Book Distributors, one of the two largest distributors in the country. Almost all POD services that have a distro plan use LSI. LSI's quality has always been exceptional. The reason for purchasing the proof copy is just that...to proof the work. LSI works with the same files as all the other printers, so you are proofing for typos and formatting issues.
4. Lulu's distribution rights contract gives them the right to cancel your title at anytime.
The exact wording is: "Either party may revoke this license with 30 days notice" but makes no mention of the what happens to the fees you have paid them.
Now you are being ridiculous. You are implying Lulu has a habit of collecting fees then cancelling accounts. That is a standard clause that protects both Lulu and the author. The author can pull their book from Lulu at any time, unlike other POD services that lock you in for years.
Your "Top Secret Report" is, in short, factually wrong...and I would go so far as to say deliberately so.
By comparison, Outskirts Press publishes 7 titles about every other day. Our best-selling one has a current Amazon sales ranking of 516, which means the author is selling about 20 or so a day.
I don't think the boxing commission would endorse such an event. However if you're interested in learning more about all your publishing options, I invite you to get our free publishing guide from our website.
Sincerely,
Chris Kline
Director of Author Support
http://outskirtspress.com
Coincidence?
NO offense, but YOU don't technically publish anything. Your authors publish...since they are the ones footing the bill. You are a vanity press, and your authors are the ones who are publishing. You are just a glorified printer. Woop-di-do, you publish a few dozen new titles a week. Poetry.com publishes more new titles than me as well. Are you implying they are credible?
Well, yes, offense taken...because your backhanded insults reflect your frustration at being proven a fraud. I note that you don't comment on ANY of the points I brought up. Because you can't. I can show documentation that your claims are wrong, and did so in my post. Because you've been called out, instead of addressing the points you decide to engage in deflection by trying to discredit me. The difference between my company and yours is that my authors have never paid a dime to be published. I pay them. Whereas while you claim you have titles with X ranking, you can't ethically take credit for that, because YOU are not the one sending out review copies, YOU are not the one placing ads, YOU are not the one contacting booksellers...the author is doing all of that work. And anything you might do for the author, the author is paying for.
As to Amazon rankings, Amazon rankings are based on a lot of different variables. They don't always go up or down based on your sales. They go up and down based on the millions and millions of sales of all titles. Your sales rank can jump from 2,000,000 to 70,000 with one sale, depending on what is happening with other titles. In fact, your day to day sales rank doesn't even equal your actual "bestselling" status. The Koboldnomicon, the book you referred to as out bestselling, is current ranked 774,000. Foot Ways, which is listed as our 3rd bestselling, is actually ranked at 462,000. Because the daily numbers are a reflection of all sales going on for all of the millions and millions of books listed on Amazon. It is by no means a reflection of actual sales. My authors have yet to complain about their royalty checks. Another strawman arguement (you seem to be good at those).
My "hobby" is not based on paying outfits like yours a thousand dollars. Another deflective argument of yours with no basis in actual fact. Authors and artists don't pay RPG publishers to publish their work, they get paid by the publishers. I don't know of one RPG publisher that charges its authors fees. And I know almost everyone in the industry.
Nancy: I don't find it odd at all. These sort of outfits routinely have to police writer forums. This is a pretty normal behavior. I suspect in the next day or so, we'll see other Gather members jump in to defend Chris and talk about their great sales. But they will also be new members. Chris right now is probably contacting a few of his "go-to" authors to jump in here. I've seen this sort of behavior in other forums from similar services.
At the end of the day, it is a matter of who has what motivation. Outskirt Press is the company whose business is dependent on authors paying them $1,000 a pop to publish. Outskirt Press is the company that has made false statements about their competitors in an effort to confuse authors into paying them $1,000 a pop.
Sure, my comments are not coated in fluff and sugar and telling people what they want to hear. And no, I don't have delusions about publishing a million seller. I'm a tiny micro-press that publishes RPGs and speculative fiction. I am transparent and honest in everything I do. People that know me know I am blunt and to the point. My sole motivation is to encourage writers to not allow desperation to make them part with money they probably don't have to begin with.
In 2005 Outskirts was very nice and accommodating with my $999 package. My second book a lesser package price, didn't go as well. The author rep didn't do anything and months later another rep was assigned to me. I basically did all the work on my first book, cover wise, yet paid a large fee. They did a nice job and were helpful.
The bad part: I don't understand why you need to have a limited amount of money in your account of books sold before you get paid. That tells me the company is making interest money off your sales. Stamps and statements can't cost that much?
I found after my second published book I'm less happy with them.
Has anyone gone into www.booksurge.com, Amazon company. Does anyone know what their reputation is. So far I've ordered two books by them and like the format. But, are they the same as Outskirts?