Ken, be critical, but frame it either in the form of an obvious opinion, or something you can back up with observable facts.
I think it's shameful that vanity presses have teamed up with Big Five publishers. I know there is supposed to be a clear legal separation between the vanity ops and the commercial publisher, but let's face it: that's probably as effective a divide as the one between American political candidates and their Superpac fund operators.
Even if the Big Five are not forwarding slushpile manuscripts or their authors' contact info to the associated vanity publishers, the latter are most certainly using their business links to the Big Five companies as advertising material.
I was at the Tucson Festival of the Book this last weekend, and both America Star (formerly Publish America) and AuthorHouse had big booths doing brisk outreach.
The vanity publishers are goldmines for parent companies: their target audience is often ignorant of how publishing *should* work, fanatically loyal to the first 'publisher' who gives them the time of day, and willing to pony up thousands of dollars to publish books that may never sell a single copy in the retail market. All for a dream of income as solid as that from most multi-level marketing schemes, or just the bragging rights to say 'I'm published!' (Most people don't know enough to ask 'How were you published?')
Two or three years ago, I was a lot more outraged about this. Now, after a sustained legal battle I can't talk about yet, and meeting too many vanity-published authors who happily defend their decision, I just have to shrug.
The information is out there to help them make informed decisions, from the US government to Consumer Reports on down to forums like this, Writer Beware, and Preditors & Editors. If these authors can't manage basic research, then they might just be precisely where they deserve to be.
Yes. That's harsh and cold. But it's how the world works.
