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Publishing Scams
Yesterday I was chatting with a colleague about the success of one of my patients in not only overcoming her drug dependency, but of re-establishing her career as an author, with two short stories and a poem about to be published in anthologies. My colleague then shared that one of the members of her Art Therapy class had also had a piece of poetry accepted for publication, and showed me the poem.
It was hardly an Great Work, and when I learned that it was to be published as a winner in a poetry contest, the alarm bells really started to ring. “Was this contest run by Noble House or The International Library of Poetry, by any chance?”... It was! The International Library of Poetry and Noble House Publishing are scams, and so is the International Library of Photography. Two things they have in common: they aren't libraries and they aren’t noble. They are the dark side of Vanity Publishing.
There is nothing wrong with vanity publishing as such, however, you should think of them not as publishers, but printers. Whoever pays for the production and distribution of a book is the publisher, so if the author supplies the money, the author is the publisher. Vanity publishers will generally agree to print and bind anything if the author is willing to pay for the service; these fees typically form a vanity press's profits since the author is their only market. Commercial publishers derive their profit from sales of the book, so they have to be cautious and deliberate, choosing only material that will sell. Their investment in each book is quite high, and includes advance payment and royalties to the author, editorial guidance, promotion, advertising and marketing. Publishers tend to try to cultivate a reputation for high-quality work which would be undermined by publishing sub-standard material, and lose the patronage of authors who do not want their names associated with “pay to be published” outfits. If you have submitted poetry to the International Library of Poetry (ILP), (also known as the National Library of Poetry, Poetry.com, the International Society of Poets, the International Poetry Hall of Fame, the International Library of Photography and Watermark Press) you have joined a very large club. None of these is a commercial publisher, but they are not simply vanity publishers either. They attempt to deceive authors by presenting themselves as "traditional" or "small press" publishers, soliciting submissions through fake competitions and by contacting people whose work appears on photo sharing sites. They don’t reveal their fees until late in the submission process or shift the cost to some aspect of the book production process other than printing and binding (promotion for instance). Most pressure you to buy the book to see your work in print. No purchase, no print. Now I don’t want to claim these activities are illegal (they have a habit of threatening legal action). I have no hesitation however in advising writers and photographers to stay well away from them. Go to any legitimate publishing network(utmostchristianwriters.com/resources/noble .php or betterpho.com for example) and you will find a disturbing number of e-mails from people who have paid Noble House and the others for books and not received them. Google any of the names in this Intel and you will pull up warnings from victims. Every one has an international reputation for preying upon poets and photographers who wish for nothing more than recognition and the chance to see their work in print. You will also see examples of snail mail and e-mail sent from Noble House (claiming to be a publisher with offices in London, Paris and New York) to poets, sent out any time from the 1990s to today; they are virtually identical - a notification that you have won or are a finalist. The letter states that there is no obligation to purchase the book and that your poem was chosen on its unique talent and artistic visions. They tell you that you are one of the few chosen. Truth is everyone is chosen. In 1998 a TV documentary submitted poems written by second graders to the online arm of INL, poetry.com. They all won!. Why are they not illegal? Because the authors agree to their conditions (often unwittingly) and they will eventually publish the work. If you have chosen not to purchase the book, your poem is just ‘postponed’ until the next anthology. And of course, many people are so thrilled and proud when they receive their books (sometimes years after they pay their money) that the scam just goes on. There is a legitimate publisher called Noble House; it is the hardbound book division and imprint of American Literary Press, is NOT affiliated with poetry.com, International Library of Poetry, Noble House Publishing, or the International Society of Poets (ISP) or with Watermark Press, International Library of Poetry, or Noble House Publishers in the United Kingdom.
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I was a victim of ISP. Was aghast that some - not even poems - were published in a collective book of poetry! My nickname back then in the book was , KAT.
CONTRIBUTOR'S REPLY
I'm sorry you had a bad experience. I hope your next publisher is more reputable.
The copyright for this content entitled "Publishing Scams" has been specified by the contributor as:
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This content may not be copied, distributed or adapted by anyone under any circumstances.
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This intel was contributed by David Rich
David Rich
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May, 2012
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