[Note: This post has been updated (1) as of 7:33 AM Eastern on 12 Oct. See below.]
The thing began innocently enough. I'd just purchased a copy of Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007 ($125 from Amazon) mainly to get a copy of Word at the lowest possible price. I've been using Word as my word processor since it's inception and this 2007 incarnation is the first major redesign of the product in almost a decade, and all the changes looked just spectacular and the right way to go. Now all I needed was a project that would allow me to put it through all its paces, but had none in the works that would permit that.
Shortly thereafter, I was doing some small research on Berg's Lulu, and by mistake entered into Google the keywords, lulu opera book, instead of entering the correct keywords, lulu berg opera book. And the very first item on the list that came up was, Browse Books - Lulu.com. Aha! A site devoted exclusively to books on Lulu. Perfect! And so I clicked over.
Needless to say, Lulu.com is nothing of the sort, but is instead a Print On Demand (POD) publisher. I'd of course heard of POD publishing, but only in a very general way, and I didn't pay a lot of attention to it as it seemed to be something of interest mainly to book publishers and sellers for the most part. But Lulu is not set up for book publishers and sellers. Quite the contrary. It's set up for authors themselves as a way to self-publish, but not to be confused with that justly vilified self-publishing entity, the so-called vanity presses, most of which are largely scams, and hugely expensive ones at that.
Well, this seemed to offer a perfect way for me to wring out my new toy. I'd take an old ms typescript and massively reformat it as a POD paperback in my new Office Word 2007.
But on first investigation, Lulu simply looked far too good a deal, which of course made me instantly suspicious: No fees involved, up-front or otherwise, except as a small commission on your sales; the offering of valuable distribution and marketing packages the purchase of which are entirely voluntary and at prices that are almost too reasonable; and an online physical publishing process that's so fast and simple even a trained chimp could manage it (well, not quite, but you get my meaning, I'm sure).
After the matter of fees, the very next thing I thought suspect was the quality of the physical product that would be produced by this amazingly simple online publishing process. No way could this process produce a physical book that could pass as the same product from a major publishing house. I mean, c'mon!, give me a break.
And so I took that old ms, reformatted the typescript in my new toy, saved it as a PDF file (a technical requirement of this publishing process), and "published" it. It took me all of two hours to reformat the thing (Word performed like the champion application it's always been, only easier to navigate and operate than with former incarnations), and exactly nine minutes to "publish" it as a 6x9 trade paperback (for the cover art, I simply used a standard Lulu template as I have neither the software nor the expertise necessary to do my own cover art).
Oh yeah. This is going to work. When pigs fly, maybe.
I then ordered a copy of the 178pp book (cost: $8) to see what I and Lulu had wrought.
I received the book a week later (shipped UPS). When I opened the Amazon-style package, I simply couldn't believe what I was looking at. The physical book was absolutely, and in every way, indistinguishable from any trade paperback put out by any of the best major houses in the country.
Astonishing.
I'm now investigating more deeply this whole POD self-publishing phenomenon to see whether it can possibly overcome the justified stigma attached to vanity publishing (which POD self-publishing can be, but is not necessarily), and actually make real money for authors. If it can do both, it's a whole new publishing world out there, and one I want to be a part of.
Update (7:33 AM Eastern on 12 Oct): Part 2 of this saga can be read here.
It's The Music, Stupid!
Peggy
