Stop PublishAmerica

Sheryl Nantus

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I am sure that my 13 blogs and publishing on twitter has not hurt PA any at all, does that make some of you feel any better ??

Here's some free advice.

Don't Be A Smart-Ass.

There are people here who have suffered from signing with PA a LOT more than just having their book locked up for years. They've spent money trying to break their contracts and spent money buying their own books and/or publicity before they broke free.

There are people on this board who have WAY more experience in the publishing world than you or I will ever have. Dump your blogs and spend some time READING and LEARNING from them before you rush off into another publishing deal.

Save the snark for your drinking buddies. You'll learn more here than you'll ever figure out writing anti-PA screeds on your thirteen blogs or nattering on Twitter.

Good luck.
 

Stonecold2338

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The way I see it we have already accomplished more than anyone at PA. It doesn't take much to do that.
 

FOTSGreg

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Stonecold2338, I'm not entirely certain that anyone has mentioned this, but your campaign against PA could, potentially, place both yourself and AW at some legal risk. First, you have stated that you have 13 blogs where you rail against PA and are, basically, doing everything you can to defame them in general.

AW has exactly one forum, with multiple voices admittedly, warning against PA, but few here are actually railing against them or actively seeking to defame them in the same manner as you appear to be. Warning against using someone's, ahem, services, is not defamation.

However, using a substantial electronic platform or platforms to shout to anyone who will listen in an active effort to actually defame and cause harm to a business could be considered grounds for legal action. As I recall, PA has attempted to bring suit against numerous detractors in the past including AW, Predators & Editirs, Author Beware, and more.

With 13 blogs, you are setting yourself up as one big honking target.

Back things down a few notches, dude, before you get yourself into really deep legal trouble.
 

Stonecold2338

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I have already started to cut back on my blogs and to keep AW out of a law-suit I will not post anything else.
But I would like for some of you to check-out my new book by going to e-book Jake and Jo and read the small peace out of my book and come back and tell me if you think I should stop writing or finish the book.
I am 74 years old and I have been writing for two years. If you tell me I should stop writing then I will.
 

PorterStarrByrd

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We'd probably be more effective if we all started the process .. making them us their resources .. ask LOTS of questions .. for as long as we can draw the process out. Last thing is to drop out of the picture short of signing up for anything.
 

JulieB

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I have already started to cut back on my blogs and to keep AW out of a law-suit I will not post anything else.
But I would like for some of you to check-out my new book by going to e-book Jake and Jo and read the small peace out of my book and come back and tell me if you think I should stop writing or finish the book.
I am 74 years old and I have been writing for two years. If you tell me I should stop writing then I will.

Never stop writing.

I do hope your new ebook is not just a rewrite of the book you now have at PA. You may be opening yourself up to other legal trouble.

Unless your contract states otherwise, you should be able to use the same characters and create a different story. (A prequel, a sequel, other adventures, you get the idea.) Also check your contract to make sure PA doesn't have first right of refusal on your next manuscript. I don't think they've had that for quite some time, but it's worth double-checking, just to be safe.
 

Stonecold2338

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The reason I am post this is because I don't like to leave good people hanging.
First: Isn't it true that if you tell the truth about PA, then you are defaming them ? They have links all over the internet try to suck people in for the scam, and it is wrong for someone to have 13 blogs telling the truth about them ?

Next: Thank you for saying I should keep writing my book, no it's not a rewrite of the first and I have checked my contract and I do not see anything that says PA can get this book. It is a new and better book.

I want to thank all of you.
 

Momento Mori

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Stonecold2338:
it is wrong for someone to have 13 blogs telling the truth about them ?

If you're going to blog about PA, then it's more effective to have 1 blog than 13 because you can build traffic to it. Having 13 different blogs just means having 13 sites to maintain and it diffuses attention. In the event that someone does Google PA then you'd want your blog to be on the first page.

In any event (and as your own experience shows) many people don't bother to Google PA or they have friends who Google but don't look to see what other people say about the company. In that case, whether you have 1 blog or a million isn't going to make any difference to that person's decision because they won't know or care to look for it.

Like other people have said, the best thing you can do is write a new, different book, get it commercially published and then when you do blog interviews or interviews for your local paper, you can mention that yes, you got taken by soul sucking vanity publisher hucksters trading as Publish America, but you moved past it and were successful. That's the best way to get revenge and it's the best way to get the message out there to anyone else who might be looking at PA.

MM
 

Stonecold2338

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If you're going to blog about PA, then it's more effective to have 1 blog than 13 because you can build traffic to it. Having 13 different blogs just means having 13 sites to maintain and it diffuses attention. In the event that someone does Google PA then you'd want your blog to be on the first page.

In any event (and as your own experience shows) many people don't bother to Google PA or they have friends who Google but don't look to see what other people say about the company. In that case, whether you have 1 blog or a million isn't going to make any difference to that person's decision because they won't know or care to look for it.

Like other people have said, the best thing you can do is write a new, different book, get it commercially published and then when you do blog interviews or interviews for your local paper, you can mention that yes, you got taken by soul sucking vanity publisher hucksters trading as Publish America, but you moved past it and were successful. That's the best way to get revenge and it's the best way to get the message out there to anyone else who might be looking at PA.

MM

It is hard to cut back on my blogs when every day I have people from all over the world come to my blogs and read the truth about PA.

If you had 10 cows that gave you 2 gals. of milk per cow per day would you get rid of 9 of those cows, knowing that 1 cow isn't going to give you 20 gals. of milk a day ?

If you ask me what cows has to do with PA.

Then I will ask you, what does cows do after they eat?
 
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Momento Mori

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Stonecold2338:
It is hard to cut back on my blogs when every day I have people from all over the world come to my blogs and read the truth about PA.

No one can make you do what you don't want to do and if you're completely determined to not listen to or take any of the advice being given to you here, then that's entirely your perogative.

However I don't see what's so difficult about picking one of those blogs as your main one and then putting in links to it on your other blogs so that they all redirect traffic to your main one. Then after 6 months or so you can delete the other blogs as you'll have one blog with a high hit count already up and running.

Stonecold2338:
If you had 10 cows that gave you 2 gals. of milk per cow per day would you get rid of 9 of those cows, knowing that 1 cow isn't going to give you 20 gals. of milk a day ?

Blogs aren't cows. If anything, blogs are the anti-cow. The more blogs you run, the more you dilute your internet presence and the more you dilute the message you're trying to get across. People don't have a lot of patience if they're Googling something. They tend to go with whatever's on the front page of results. You therefore need to develop your internet strategy so that you appear on that front page and preferably as near to the top as possible. That means you need to tailor your internet presence so that it's concentrated to specific pages associated with you or the message you're trying to get across.

MM
 

Marian Perera

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If you had 10 cows that gave you 2 gals. of milk per cow per day would you get rid of 9 of those cows, knowing that 1 cow isn't going to give you 20 gals. of milk a day ?

By that reasoning, I wonder why you don't have 100 cows giving you 2 gallons of milk per cow per day. You could have a monopoly on the dairy industry.

Of course, you won't be writing, but I get the impression writing isn't a priority for you.
 

Stonecold2338

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By that reasoning, I wonder why you don't have 100 cows giving you 2 gallons of milk per cow per day. You could have a monopoly on the dairy industry.

Of course, you won't be writing, but I get the impression writing isn't a priority for you.

After I post my blogs I have the rest of the day to write.
 

quicklime

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if you really like cows, a better analogy to blogs is having one cow in both cases, but one, or thirteen buckets.



in any case, PA thrives on ignorance, and you really aren't gonna change that. you MAY manage to get yourself sued when your passions roam into hyperbole, which several people here have already mentioned, and you ARE spending a half hour each day ranting that could be spent writing, but we all have free will. I would choose to spend my time writing, you clearly aren't going to be satisfied with that.
 

Stacia Kane

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Okay, guys, let's remember we are dealing with a man of greater years than us--I would say "gentleman of greater years," but frankly, I save that term for men who have actually behaved like gentlemen, which unfortunately, sir, you have not--who may not be as familiar as we are with how Google rankings etc. work.

Stonecold2338, read what Momento Mori says below. She's telling you the truth and offering sound advice. If you want your blog to be something people see on one of the first pages of a Google search--which is important, because most people don't search beyond the first few pages--you'll do much better to focus on a single blog. Post links from the other twelve blogs to that one (and may I ask what system you're using to count your hits? I ask because there are things called "bots," which regularly scan every page on the internet. They come from all countries all over the world, and can artificially inflate your hit counts because they're not "real" hits, i.e. real genuine people reading your blog. They're just machines trawling the net). I'm not saying this is what your hits are, just that it's a possibility.

If people are interested in your content, they'll follow the link(s). And what will happen then is that more people visiting that single page will drive up the page's Google rank (or its rank in other search engines) and so when people enter "PublishAmerica" into a search bar, your page will come up sooner in the list.

For example, this site has a very high Google ranking. If you Google "PublishAmerica," this site comes up on the very first page. That's because it's one site that thousands of people visit. That's what you want; you want to maximize your visitors on one blog/website/page.

I've quoted MM's post, and bolded the relevant parts:


No one can make you do what you don't want to do and if you're completely determined to not listen to or take any of the advice being given to you here, then that's entirely your perogative.

However I don't see what's so difficult about picking one of those blogs as your main one and then putting in links to it on your other blogs so that they all redirect traffic to your main one. Then after 6 months or so you can delete the other blogs as you'll have one blog with a high hit count already up and running.



Blogs aren't cows. If anything, blogs are the anti-cow. The more blogs you run, the more you dilute your internet presence and the more you dilute the message you're trying to get across. People don't have a lot of patience if they're Googling something. They tend to go with whatever's on the front page of results. You therefore need to develop your internet strategy so that you appear on that front page and preferably as near to the top as possible. That means you need to tailor your internet presence so that it's concentrated to specific pages associated with you or the message you're trying to get across.

MM

I know you said you don't want our help, but we're all in this together as far as wanting to spread the message about PA. All we're trying to do is give you advice to aid that goal; we want your site to come up earlier in a search, because we want people to see your message. (We also don't want to see you get sued, which is why we advise you to watch your wording.)

I hope that helps.
 

Cathy C

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Isn't it true that if you tell the truth about PA, then you are defaming them

The devil is in the details, Stonecold. "Truth" is a relative thing. It all depends on what you wanted out the relationship with PA. The contract is plainly written to the layman, but the terminology is skewed for the industry. Is that a scam? Hmm... Sort of, but "buyer beware" is the law of the land. That's why there are attorneys who look at contracts.

For those people who are only looking for someone to print their book--if they have no expectation that it will ever appear in bookstores across the land (and yes, there are those who expect just that) then PA isn't a scam. It's a bad deal, of course. But not an outright scam.

Is it a scam to have a 7 year term? No. Plenty of NY pubs have contract terms for the life of the copyright (70+ years).

So, be careful what you print. I assure you that PA is more than happy to dive into the legal pool to punish those who stopped drinking the Kool-Aid. It would be a bad thing to have to defend with your pension.

Do as the others say, write your next book and leave them in the dust. :)
 

LLauren

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My dear sir, please take this in the kindly spirit in which I say it:

You likely have more years behind you than ahead of you. You care deeply about your writing. You say you are working on another book. I am so pleased for you, so I hope you will use your years to focus on yourself and your future books. Look ahead, not behind. Don't worry so much about hurting those who hurt you in the past, but concentrate on what you can and will do in your future.

It's not with a book, but in one important way I am in the same situation. I have been unfairly treated at work. I am dealing with it but in doing so I am, hard as it is, choosing to look at the future rather than the pain of what has already happened and is now in the past, a time I cannot change. It's hard. It's very hard not to want to see punished those who used and abused me. But if I am going to get out of this hole I must. And I am doing that. I will be fine even though it doesn't feel like it at the moment.

I strongly recommend that you do the same. Try to gulp down your anger and let it pass. Don't worry about telling others about PA. Absolute Write has the best forums for that, and they are the best warning sign out there. For yourself, look forward. Recognize that continuing to harp on and on about PA on blogs is not effective; more importantly, it saps your attention, your energy, your time, your creative energy (even at 15 minutes a day), all assets you have that can be turned into your current and future writing. You have so much to give yourself; don't let PA take more than it has. They have that old book, but you have lots of books.

All authors have trunk novels, those that they wrote before they were published with their "first" novel. Sue Grafton once told me she had eight novels in her "trunk" before her alphabet series attracted a publisher. So maybe the one PA has is, for you, a trunk novel, a great exercise in writing but one not meant to be published.

Go forward! Drop all the blogs, hang out here and post your experiences if you want but do it to help others, not to hurt PA. Look at Merri; she has my utmost admiration for what she has accomplished, and she did that with courage and determination, not anger. She took what likely had been anger and disappointment and turned it into a plethora of books. I admire her more than I can say. And I would like some day to be able to say the same about you.

Find the way to dispel the anger you carry. People here understand that, and they understand the reasons why. But circling around and around in your ring of anger only hurts you--and you deserve better. Begin to make it better for yourself. Consider that PA book your first trunk novel. Utilize AW's writing resources to learn to make your writing publishable. It may take several novels to get there, but if you have the talent and if you are willing to put in the hard work you can get there. Do it, sir. Hand me that shovel in your hand and take AW's extended hand. Everyone here will help you move on. But you have to make the decision to stop digging first.
 

James D. Macdonald

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Plenty of NY pubs have contract terms for the life of the copyright (70+ years).

That's a yes...but sort of situation. They can keep printing the book but only as long as they can keep selling it--use it or lose it. The reversion clause will spell out in painful detail exactly how many books they have to sell per year at a minimum in order to keep the right to publish that work. If the publisher fails to make their sales goals the author gets the rights back, free and clear.
 

Stonecold2338

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My dear sir, please take this in the kindly spirit in which I say it:

You likely have more years behind you than ahead of you. You care deeply about your writing. You say you are working on another book. I am so pleased for you, so I hope you will use your years to focus on yourself and your future books. Look ahead, not behind. Don't worry so much about hurting those who hurt you in the past, but concentrate on what you can and will do in your future.

It's not with a book, but in one important way I am in the same situation. I have been unfairly treated at work. I am dealing with it but in doing so I am, hard as it is, choosing to look at the future rather than the pain of what has already happened and is now in the past, a time I cannot change. It's hard. It's very hard not to want to see punished those who used and abused me. But if I am going to get out of this hole I must. And I am doing that. I will be fine even though it doesn't feel like it at the moment.

I strongly recommend that you do the same. Try to gulp down your anger and let it pass. Don't worry about telling others about PA. Absolute Write has the best forums for that, and they are the best warning sign out there. For yourself, look forward. Recognize that continuing to harp on and on about PA on blogs is not effective; more importantly, it saps your attention, your energy, your time, your creative energy (even at 15 minutes a day), all assets you have that can be turned into your current and future writing. You have so much to give yourself; don't let PA take more than it has. They have that old book, but you have lots of books.

All authors have trunk novels, those that they wrote before they were published with their "first" novel. Sue Grafton once told me she had eight novels in her "trunk" before her alphabet series attracted a publisher. So maybe the one PA has is, for you, a trunk novel, a great exercise in writing but one not meant to be published.

Go forward! Drop all the blogs, hang out here and post your experiences if you want but do it to help others, not to hurt PA. Look at Merri; she has my utmost admiration for what she has accomplished, and she did that with courage and determination, not anger. She took what likely had been anger and disappointment and turned it into a plethora of books. I admire her more than I can say. And I would like some day to be able to say the same about you.

Find the way to dispel the anger you carry. People here understand that, and they understand the reasons why. But circling around and around in your ring of anger only hurts you--and you deserve better. Begin to make it better for yourself. Consider that PA book your first trunk novel. Utilize AW's writing resources to learn to make your writing publishable. It may take several novels to get there, but if you have the talent and if you are willing to put in the hard work you can get there. Do it, sir. Hand me that shovel in your hand and take AW's extended hand. Everyone here will help you move on. But you have to make the decision to stop digging first.

You sure know how to talk to people and I like that, Thank you for spending so much time on me.

I have one blog about my new book that I am writing now and the others I will let fade away, and sooner or later I will forget about PA !

I got a e-mail from PA this morning saying they didn't sell any of my books, that made me happy, because if I didn't make any money on my book then they didn't make any money on my book.

I want to thank you again.