Someone gets a cookie for that observation. It's automated sounding. Shame is that they could have had a legitimate voice actor do the books on tape. Well I guess they missed that opportunity.
PA from the inside
- Thread starter deepthroat
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Someone gets a cookie for that observation. It's automated sounding. Shame is that they could have had a legitimate voice actor do the books on tape. Well I guess they missed that opportunity.
What's a shame is that an author could probably do the same thing at home for free. Lots of computers already come with a crude text-to-speech tool, and I'm sure they could figure out a way to record it into some easy format. 
Too bad, because I'm betting PA would make them pay some sort of fee for audio book formatting, but like I said, it can probably be done for virtually nothing at all. Big profit that way. That would be so clever but so skeezy.
Too bad, because I'm betting PA would make them pay some sort of fee for audio book formatting, but like I said, it can probably be done for virtually nothing at all. Big profit that way. That would be so clever but so skeezy.
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What's a shame is that an author could probably do the same thing at home for free. Lots of computers already come with a crude text-to-speech tool, and I'm sure they could figure out a way to record it into some easy format.
I think they charge 99 for them to do the audio book.
Much of what PA does an author could do at home--layout, editing, formatting, etc.--with the exception of binding. Shoot, I did a mock-up cover from istockphoto in PowerPoint with about a PA result (no offense intended, deepthroat, but some PA covers are laughable). Print it on photopaper and head off the the local Copy Cat.
Here's a question for DT, if you know: What percentage of authors come back to have their second books done by PA? Is the 50,000 authors actual authors, or is that titles?
Here's a question for DT, if you know: What percentage of authors come back to have their second books done by PA? Is the 50,000 authors actual authors, or is that titles?
At first I naively thought, 99 cents, oh that's decent. But that must be 99 bucks.
That's mostly true, come to think of it. Printing could get pricey and tricky though, I think.
Children's books are more likely to have return authors. If I ballparked I would say it is somewhere between 10-20% come back for more punishment.
Also, I totally concur most of the covers that get churned out are laughable in their total lack of skill. Then again they don't have real graphic designers working. They have people from temp agencies for the most part. Most of the people that they have doing formatting don't understand what the hell to do in the first place. I gave crash courses in Photoshop and inDesign during my tenure to people who had no idea what they were doing. Anyone can work there as long as they have a pulse.
They have a macro they run in WordPerfect called Remcodes. That is what does the formatting.
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No phones policy:
There were no phones on the desks of regular employees.
Some supervisors had access to a phone. All calls were channeled to Author Support.
Then everyone started carrying cell phones.
The silence in the workplace is creepy. You can almost smell the fear.
That was true when they were in the Church Street headquarters.
There were no phones on the desks of regular employees.
Some supervisors had access to a phone. All calls were channeled to Author Support.
Then everyone started carrying cell phones.
The silence in the workplace is creepy. You can almost smell the fear.
How much time and work does it take to make the small corrections in already "published" books, that they are charging the authors upwards of $200 to make?
Have you ever seen what we do? There is no editing allowed...period. We aren't allowed to suggest anything to the authors. All we can do is run a program called "remcodes" it removes formatting that authors do in their word processing programs. "Remcodes" is a macro that runs in WordPerfect. They also give us a list of codes and their replacements to put in the Change/Find in inDesign. It takes all of 15 minutes to do everything. Unless we have to close up space between paragraphs to make things flow between pages. It's maddening and frustrating. We aren't even allowed to run a spell checker. There are so many stories I wish I could have made simple suggestions on to help the flow of their stories.
Depends can be as little as 10 minutes. It can be as long as a days worth of work if you are formatting a big cookbook. For the record cookbooks are PublishAmerica's biggest sellers on average. However that is still under 25 books on average. My running gag is that my books are so good they may sell in the teens.
I was there in Metropolitan Court. We still don't have phones at our desk. We just have our cell phone. We can't call authors, we are only allowed email.
The silence is beyond creepy. It is totally uncomfortable, and people who have been there a long time walk on eggshells around the trilogy of evil.
Not that I'm defending Miranda, but recently she has adopted Secretariat's Granddaughter. She is with foal, and I think that is cool that they saved her from a kill pen. Yeah Miranda is a horse lover, and it is quite obvious because of the amounts of equestrian stuff around the office.
Roughly how many books does an author need to buy for PA to turn a profit? And is it true PA would introduce spelling errors with the goal of charging authors later to correct them?
Aggghhh. That sounds terrible. Personal question a bit but, Do you think you will find a job at a legit agency anytime soon so you can actually help people? Or are you going to avoid the business completely?
I honestly don't know how many books need to be sold to make a profit. Considering they sell everything way to high, it wouldn't take many to get to a profit. However, I have no idea what they would need to sell.
I wouldn't put it past PA to do that, but reading the emails from some of the authors I think the mistakes are honest. However, I don't put anything past them to make them a buck.
I would like to go to work for a legitimate agency. I would also like to open my own publishing house that would do in the neighborhood of 30-50 books a year. I think the investment on some new authors would be awesome. There is a book that came across my desk that I wish had went to a real publisher. It was a great story, and really should have been with a company that would market her novella.
If you know someone who may have an opening, I am open to listening.
I was so hoping you were talking about my novella, but you said "her" and mine went through before you were there anyway
. And although I'm no fan of PA, the "introducing errors" rumor never washed with me. There were some strange ones I can't imagine I missed ("Mary" spelled as "Marry"), and they did correct all the mistakes I caught in the page proofs. I have my guess on how many (or how shockingly few) books PA needs to sell to make a profit, but others would have a more educated guess than I would. Seeing the average is about 25 (or is that just cookbooks?) and that PA has been around a while, my guess wouldn't be too far off.I was so hoping you were talking about my novella, but you said "her" and mine went through before you were there anyway
I would give the title of the novella, but it would give me away. The database program they use is not secure. Anyone can find all the information you hand over to them. Your name, social security number, all credit card info, addresses, email addresses, and anything else you give them is available to all employees. There is no security for your information. It is a gold mine for people who specialize in ID theft. Just keep that in mind your info is not safe with PA.
Does PA have its own in-house printing operation at Metropolitan Court, or has that gone with the wind?
The Water Street print facility across from McCutcheon's has been vacant for quite a while now. That may have been before your time.
The Water Street print facility across from McCutcheon's has been vacant for quite a while now. That may have been before your time.
I know for a fact that is where they print and bind all hardcover books that are ordered. They just restarted printing the hardcover books, dust jackets, and binding in house. They have a couple of young people who do that. The trade PAperbacks are outsourced. They only have one printing press and can only handle small runs for the hardcovers.