Publishing Evolution #82: Print on Demand

Think of the books (like the shown) that we wouldn't have if it weren't for self publishing! All kidding aside, I think self publishing, vanity press, print on demand whatever you want to call it is a great idea. There are so many instances when you want a quality publication but your audience doesn't warrant your publication to be printed by Random House. Genealogy books are the first that come to mind though I am sure there are many types of publications that will benefit from self publishing. As a reader, it would not matter to me if a title went through the traditional route to publication or if it was self-published. I have read plenty of "fluff" published by major houses so it isn't always a guarantee that what they print is worth your time and attention. I would however exercise caution when it comes to reference material.

“Gone are the days,” wrote former Publishers Weekly rights columnist Paul Nathan, “when self-publishing was virtually synonymous with self-defeating.” Best-selling Canadian author Margaret Atwood self-published her first volume of poetry Double Persephone in 1961, the year she graduated from college. The print run was only 200 copies. Atwood has gone on to become a best-selling and award-winning novelist and short story writer. Eragon by Christopher Paolini was originally self-published. The book was later published by Knopf. Other authors who have chosen to self-publish include: L. Frank Baum, William Blake, Ken Blanchard, Robert Bly, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Lord Byron, Willa Cather, Pat Conroy, Stephen Crane, e.e. cummings, W.E.B. DuBois, Alexander Dumas, T.S. Eliot, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Benjamin Franklin, Zane Grey, Thomas Hardy, E. Lynn Harris, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ernest Hemingway, Robinson Jeffers, Spencer Johnson, Stephen King, Rudyard Kipling, Louis L'Amour, D.H. Lawrence, Rod McKuen, Marlo Morgan, John Muir, Anais Nin, Thomas Paine, Tom Peters, Edgar Allen Poe, Alexander Pope, Beatrix Potter, Ezra Pound, Marcel Proust, Irma Rombauer, Carl Sandburg, Robert Service, George Bernard Shaw, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Upton Sinclair, Gertrude Stein, William Strunk, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoi, Mark Twain, Walt Whitman, and Virginia Woolf.

There is a nice article on Lulu in Publishers Weekly magazine March 22, 2010 which can be read using the EBSCO database via HCPL.

I visited each of the websites for this exercise and of all of them, I thought Lulu was the most user friendly. I don't know how to tell what the quality of the acutal book is like as I would have to hold it in my hands and road test it before I could say but again, I have seen some pretty poorly put together books from the major publishing houses. Apparently Lulu sells lots of books not just ones they publish as I saw many books on their site that I have read but were published by Penguin and Little Brown and others. However I did find one called Gulf Coast Gardening with Randy Lemmon which is published by Lulu. Due to it's local nature I would definetly read it and possibly even buy it. Xlibris did not have as easy to use a website. I don't like it when you click on things that open new windows. Createspace was okay since it's a format is one I am very familiar with because it's just like Amazon.