Came across this one today. Someone in the Lulu.com forum was asking for publishing advice. A "stealth spam" was posted to the thread as follows:
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... Lulu is essential just a print on demand service (much different that other "online" publishers like xlibris or iuniverse). They simply provide printing and way for people to buy your books through their site. I think perhaps, more of the answers you are looking for pertain to what is involved in true self-publishing (the type not for the lazy or faint of heart). I work in the publishing industry and if you would like to tell me about your book, I would be more than happy to provide you with some information about your publishing options. If you are interested, send me an email atNAME DELETED@savyon-publishing.com
I work for a small publisher, but in my free time, I like to provide advice and direction for first time authors because after many years in publishing, I know better than most how frustrating it can be when exploring your options. Take care and I hope to hear from you.
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When you google Sayyon Publishing, all that comes up is a MySpace page and a handful of spam posts like the one above. On the Myspace page, it says:
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Savyon does not charge excessive fees for publishing, but we do ask that our author's are willing to invest in their books by absorbing a percentage of the total production costs. Savyon absorbs the remaining cost, which makes each book we publish a joint-venture for author and publisher. We do not profit from the fees paid to us by the author. They go directly toward book production costs. Thus, Savyon only profits from producing, marketing, and selling a quality book. Also, because the author invests, the royalty rates are significantly higher than those offered by commercial publishers.
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Ok, boys and girls, repeat after me. MONEY FLOWS TOWARD THE WRITER. Subsidy presses are merely vanity presses that pretend to be real publishers. Most are known to inflate their costs, so that the "small percentage" you pay is actually the bulk of the printing costs.
ANY FEE charged by a publisher is excessive. An author should never pay one dime toward his or her own book contract.
Just another warning brought to you by your friendly neighborhood witch.
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Comments: 9
Maybe Myspace should be made aware of this deceptive "stealth spam" attempts.
Again, Thank You!!!
I would like to respond to your post about my company. Now, to be fair, I posted the ad on Lulu under the section designated for services and Savyon does offer editing and design services. Second, in no way did I mean to pressure anyone into using Savyon as their publisher, I just feel that it's important for all writers to explore their options. I feel there is no harm in directing people to our website so that they can form their own opinion about us. It's perfectly acceptable for you not to be interested in my company, but please accurately represent us if you choose to post about us.
We are not a vanity publisher. We offer what is known as true subsidy publishing, but I prefer the term co-publishing. And the practices of other subsidy presses as you highlighted in your post, such as inflating costs and charging the authors excessively, is not at all what we do. I understand that there is no way for you to know this for sure, but unless you have spoken with one of our authors or someone who has done business with us, I would simply appreciate if you didn't group us with the publishers whose reputations we have been fighting against since we began. We are very open with our authors and they are told everything about the budget we have for their book if it is accepted (which is devised for each and every individual book). We are also very selective. We are a co-publisher at this stage because we are a new company and we are hoping to expand soon and become a traditional publisher. At this time, we only ask for the small investment from our authors so that we can really put our resources into making the book a success (not so that we can take money out of their pockets and put in into our own).
We are a small company and very new and as I said, growing. We have 4 book projects in the works and these will be the first 4 we produce. I simply posted on Lulu to drum up some interest in our company and increase the amount of submissions because we'd really like to find a few more great books. And as it says on the myspace site, I am always more than happy to answer publishing questions free of charge. I spend many hours a day doing this, simply because I like the industry and I like to share my knowledge. I would also like to say, that I never pressure anyone into the type of publishing we provide. Actually, very often I provide advice on how to get published by large publishers, etc, and the best routes to take.
We are an honest company and we acknowledge that the type of publishing we do isn't for everyone. And in addition we only accept books that we can feel we can successfully market.
Last, I didn't feel that my message was stealth spamming. I left one message for a person who I felt might be interested. And I hope you take my response into consideration. I'm trying to run an honest company and everything written on my site is true. We even consider publishing books without author contributions when we receive books that are worth it.
I feel that I'm a goodhearted person and I'm trying to be successful with Savyon. Please consider this before lumping us with other companies who are not so honest. The dishonest practices of companies similar to mine is what made me open my own company (believe me, I worked for a pretty dishonest one for a while and I couldn't sleep at night).
Thank you for taking the time to read my response. Please direct any further questions or comments to my email address: ksawitz@savyon-publishing.com
Best,
Kim Sawitz
Savyon Publishing, LLC
Last, I would like to note that again, our costs are a very small percentage of the budget we set out for our books--usually about 10%, which goes directly into the production of that particular book. It just allows us to do more for each book because we are a small company and just starting out. We also feel that it's pretty reasonable for authors to invest a bit in their books. After all, we invest a lot in the projects that we strongly believe in and only take on books that we feel have an extraordinary amount of merit.
Again, thanks for taking the time to read this information.
It doesn't matter what you call it. The second you ask for money, you are a vanity press. Traditional publishers do not under any circumstances ask for money. Period. End of story. If you cannot afford to be a publisher, don't publish. Do not ask authors to foot part of the bill.
I am a small publisher. I use Lulu for much of my printing. But I don't ask for one dime from my authors. I pay for editing. I pay for design. I pay for cover art. I pay for marketing. I pay for promotions and review copies. I PAY. Not the author.
It is not reasonable to ask the author to pay one dime. The author's job is to write the book. It is the publisher's job to determine if the book will be profitable enough to publish it. Anyone who has worked professionally in the industry knows this, and your belief that this is OK reflects a lack of understanding of how the industry is suppose to work.