ParaDon Books Publishing / Amazon Book Clubs

[James D. Macdonald]

I'm really leery of posting phone numbers on the web, even if we're just copying what someone else posted elsewhere.

 

[aliceshortcake]

Uncle Jim, when the Montana Office of Consumer Protection rang that number two days ago they discovered that it "wasn't yet in service". We know that Mr Abayomi's reading this thread, so I think it's reasonable to assume that it won't be going into service anytime soon.

 

[aliceshortcake]

Another little gem from Mr Abayomi, and since it appears to have been posted in January 2011 it even pre-dates ParaDon. The exciting business opportunity you're about to discover involves the CreateSpace edition of Shebang!:

Autogrphed copy of Shebang!

by Korede Abayomi
(U.S.A)


Hello. I am the author of Shebang!
You have to check this book out. It's everything you need to know about the modern world. As of last week, Shebang! was auctioned tobe made into a movie by the True Fiction filmz, LLC. But in order for the for the production to move ahead, the producer (darren VanCleave) need Shebang! to generate at least another 100,000 fans in a period of the next six months, that way he will be comfortable enough to start with the pre-production (site-screening and film-directing) out of his own pocket.
Faced with this dilemna, i came about a brilliant idea on how to increase sales of the book, by autographing all the remaining first-edition copies of Shebang!, and paying out the readers (you) a rate of $3.00 everytime you refer somebody else to get their own autographed copy of Shebang!, BEFORE IT'S MADE INTO A MOVIE.
Imagine holding a great piece of work in your hand, one that came directly from the creator's hand (signature). To get a copy, or simply read through the sample chapters, go to this personalized page; http://wix.com/koredeabayomi/koredeabayomi
Find out how you can get $3.00 every time you buy or sell a copy of Shebang!. To become an affiliate apply here; http://www.trafficwave.net/lcp/koredeabayomi/MatrixBusters

I hope to you hear from you. Take care.

- Korede Abayomi
http://www.internet-work-marketing.com/autogrphed-copy-of-shebang.html

This appears to be a pyramid scheme involving copies of the first edition of a book that, being PoD, didn't have a first edition.

Sadly, nothing came of this brilliant idea and Darren VanCleave had to live with the disappointment of not having Shebang! on his CV. Personally I think Mr Abayomi made a big mistake by not offering Shebang! directly to Quentin Tarantino.

Oh, and if there was any doubt about who's behind the Amazon Book Clubs:

Korede Abayomi
Hello. I am the administrator of Amazon Book Clubs.
http://www.networkedblogs.com/user/100000999095091

 

[Eltondiva]

Love you guys!

aliceshortcake among other members here, I for one really appreciate what you all do for us here. I am a newbie, I don't say much on the boards but I DO read many useful and informative materials. Please keep up the good work I am following this thread with interest.

Best wishes, Merry Christmas and A Happy Year to all.

 

[chopper]

i love the fact that the wix.com site has had a mahoosive 196 visitors (most likely half of which appeared last night....).

wan't Darren VanCleave the singer in Dollar???

 

[aliceshortcake]

Darren VanCleave is a real person:

Darren VanCleave's True Fiction Filmz, a film production and distribution powerhouse is partnered with Hand Picked Films to focus on feature films with budgets under $10 million with the assistance of Hand Picked Films. Hand Picked Films focuses on large budget films. True Fiction principle Darren VanCleave and Hand Picked Films principle Michel Shane, have established themselves as two of the motion picture industry's premier independent producers. In the last few years, they have worked with the likes of Stephen Spielberg, Leonardo Di Caprio, Tom Hanks, Will Smith, Chevy Chase, Burt Reynolds, and others.
http://uk.imdb.com/name/nm2168166/bio

I'm sure he'd be astonished to hear about Shebang! The Movie. Although at the rate we're going I think we'll soon be able to sell this thread to a major Hollywood producer - I can already picture Daniel Day Lewis as Richard Egland, tough newspaper mogul with a heart of gold, and Halle Berry as gutsy-yet-vulnerable columnist Celina Marka.

 

[aliceshortcake]

I knew this sounded familiar:

Amazon Book Clubs Affiliate Program

Amazon Book Clubs seeks to add Digital Media Specialists to our Marketing and Public Relations Team to coordinate social media presence online, with video and mobile marketing. This position will help develop, design, and implement public relations marketing and sales strategies that will influence public opinion and promote our Companies' image. Thereby increasing your profit - via the promo code your customers used to purchase from us....

This is a virtual job, and payments will be based on successful leads (your promo code commissions).
http://www.emailmeform.com/builder/form/0cbF6fdreR

Great minds think alike!

ParaDon Books Publishing seeks to add Digital Media Specialists to our Marketing and Public Relations Team to coordinate social media presence, online, video and mobile marketing; design, prepare, and deliver publications, graphics, promotional materials and sales literature in a variety of formats to include digital (web-based, video, social media) and audio. This position will help develop, design and implement public relations, marketing and sales strategies that will influence public opinion and promote our Companies' image.

This is a virtual job, and payments will be based on successful leads (commissions).
http://www.paradonbooks.com/Internship.html

 

[G. Applejack]

That makes me angry. It is so hard to make a living if you work in commissioned sales. If they can't bother to create their own ad to get skilled help, what kind of employer will they be? Probably one that won't pay. I wouldn't want these people as a publisher OR boss.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

I think that writers have enough information now to decide whether to submit their works to ParaDon.

 

[Gravity]

Yep. To paraphrase Kipling: "Though we've beaten you and flayed you, by the living God that made you, you're still the last choice I'd consider, ParaDon."

PS: all your base are still belong to us

 

[DMcCunney]

"Amazon Book Clubs", in the person of "Celina M." just popped up on LinkedIn. They claim they've reached the magic number of 1,000,000 readers/viewers, and are offering services the exact nature of which aren't mentioned. But they claim they have such a volume of folks signing up that they want you to pay a "refundable" $20 fee to schedule an appointment to discuss hiring them to perform these unspecified services.

I think I'll I post a link to this thread as a comment to the post.
______
Dennis

 

[aliceshortcake]

$20, eh? Well, at least that's $5 less than Paradon's old 'reading fee'! I see the old Paradon Books Publishing site has now been disabled, although there's a remarkable photo on the Amazon Book Clubs site:



Yes - it's the imposing glass frontage of a business that had no physical existence in Great Falls or anywhere else. A Google Images search is instructive...

Perhaps one of our lovely mods could add 'Amazon Book Clubs' to the title of this thread?

 

[DreamWeaver]

Who knew it only cost $5 to get a photo of your business name on a generic "imposing building"? Plus I now have a new skill of pasting photos into Google image search to find similar/identical images. I learn so many things here!

 

[James D. Macdonald]

Google image search is great. I also recommend TinEye.

 

[DMcCunney]

Google image search is great. I also recommend TinEye.

If you run Firefox, there's a TinEye add-on that adds a right-click context menu item to do a TinExe search on a selected image: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tineye-reverse-image-search/
______
Dennis
img.imageResizerActiveClass{cursor:nw-resize !important;outline:1px dashed black !important;} img.imageResizerChangedClass{z-index:300 !important;max-width:none !important;max-height:none !important;} img.imageResizerBoxClass{margin:auto; z-index:99999 !important; position:fixed; top:0; left:0; right:0; bottom:0; border:1px solid white; outline:1px solid black;}

 

[aliceshortcake]

I've spent many happy hours playing with Google Image Search and TinEye. I'm not sure if that's a tribute to my developing computer skills or just desperately, desperately sad.

Anyway, back on topic. The ABC website now reads:

AMAZON BOOK CLUBS IS NOT ASSOCIATED WITH AMAZON.COM.
http://www.amazonbookclubs.com/

...which I suppose is a step in the right direction. But I'm mystified by the lengths ABC has gone to in order to protect its trademark:

Amazon Book Clubs is a registered trademark protected under the Governing Laws of Montana States, U.S.A.
Copyright © 2013

'Governing Laws of Montana States'...isn't the United States Patent and Trademark Office the body responsible for this sort of thing? I searched their database and found no trace of the ABC trademark. And you can't copyright a trademark.

Also, are we meant to assume that 'Judd Miller' is the designer of that trademark? Because it's identical to a free download by Christine Vogensen available here:
http://christinevogensen.com/social-media.
There's also a promotional video in which someone draws a copy of that same image.

I wonder if these dubious 'author promotion' schemes from Amazon Book Clubs are the ones Celina M is referring to on LinkedIn:

Because of our growing affiliation with book store owners and online reviewers, we have extend our services to include Book-Signing Events; meaning that we can now schedule writers for a one-on-one (hot author-on-reader action!) appearance with their local fans / buyers at their nearest bookstores and libraries. Leave it to us to handle all the advertisement online (AmazonLocal, Groupon, Uniiverse, Craiglist etc) as well as offline (Hastings, Barnes&Noble, Powell's etc). The cost for this service is $350, and the writer must grant us the permission to promote and market the proposed AUTOGRAPHED copy of their book title. We will fulfill orders, sort out customers by their residencies, and have the writer (YOU) sign the books either at the Book-Signing event or at your own pace.
We work on a First Come First Serve Bases.
Your book title(s) will also be announce throughout all of our social media networks, featured on this website, introduced to hundreds of book clubs, book reviewers, book store owners, literary agents, editors, publishers, expert bloggers, and permanently added to our book categories.

We have integrated Supermarket Advertising Solutions to our services. Advertise where it counts. Do you want your book in front of 400,000+ viewers? Do you want your book cover to be advertise throughout the United States major supermarkets like ALBERTSONS, FOOD-4-LESS, KMART, RANCHO SAN MIGUEL AIRPORT, SHOP-RITE, ACME MARKET, etc?
THIS IS NOT A JOKE. We will design color coupons that will be printed directly on the back of the register receipt paper running in the supermarket cash registers that we choose is the closest to your location. The coupon, which will handed to payed consumers in the supermarket, will include your book title(s) and your upcoming book-signing events closest to the area, thereby putting you directly into the hands of your potential customers.
We will print 100,000 coupons per month for each title, for a total duration of six months; that's less than $10 per one thousand exposures. Engage interesting readers, and let them brag about you before buying your book (I certainly wouldn't want to have boring readers bragging about me).
We will also include all of our other services with this order. meaning that we will schedule for a book-signing, draw readers to you, get you featured everywhere, and make you a best-selling writer, for a total of $4,500.
http://www.amazonbookclubs.com/

Still working on a First Come First Serve Bases, I see. And thank goodness they made it clear that the inspired 'your book on the back of a supermarket receipt' scheme IS NOT A JOKE.

I really, REALLY hope no-one has paid these idiots $4,500 for such worthless services. I also wonder if anyone has seen Korede Abayomi and Celina Marka together.

 

[DMcCunney]

Anyway, back on topic. The ABC website now reads:

<...>

...which I suppose is a step in the right direction. But I'm mystified by the lengths ABC has gone to in order to protect its trademark:

'Governing Laws of Montana States'?!

Since trademark operates at the Federal level, it appears our scammers are ignorant of trademark law. No surprise.

Are we meant to assume that 'Judd Miller' is the designer of that trademark? Because it's identical to a free download by Christine Vogensen available here:
http://christinevogensen.com/social-media.
There's also a promotional video in which someone draws a copy of that same image.

I just assume it's a contact address. Whether there is an actual "Judd Miller" who will get the mail is another matter.

I wonder if these dubious 'author promotion' schemes from from Amazon Book Clubs are the ones Celina M is referring to on LinkedIn:

I'd say that's likely.

Still working on a First Come, First Serve Bases, I see. And thank goodness they made it clear that the inspired 'your book on the back of a supermarket receipt' scheme IS NOT A JOKE.

I really, REALLY hope no-one has paid these idiots $4,500 for such worthless services.

One can hope not, but I'm out of patience with fools. If anyone has, all I can say is "That's what you get for being stupid. A quick Google before shelling out should have given you more than enough 'run away!'" cues. If you ignored them, or worse, didn't search first, serves you right."

I also wonder if anyone has seen Korede Abayomi and Celina Marka together.

Possibly. A Google Image search returns a cached image from ParaDon's disabled site of someone who is theoretically Celina Marka.
______
Dennis
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[John Olexa]

WOW! After reading this thread (most of it) and other threads in this forum I didn't know the writing world could get so crazy!! As someone who is writing their first book I am glad I'm here though!
I am a many times published photographer, never a problem. I send slides (now CD's) to a publisher and if they liked them they buy them, if not, they just return them.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

I send slides (now CD's) to a publisher and if they liked them they buy them, if not, they just return them.

That's pretty much the way it is in real publishing too: You send material to a real publisher. If they like it they buy it, if they don't they return it.

It's only where the clueless and the scammers intersect that things get weird.

 

[aliceshortcake]

A Google Image search returns a cached image from ParaDon's disabled site of someone who is theoretically Celina Marka.

Yes, I remember that photo. But I couldn't find any trace of her on the internet other than her connection to ParaDon, whilst Korede Abayomi is all over the place.

Would you mind quoting the relevant bit from Celina M's LinkedIn entry? I only have the free version so I can't see it.

 

[John Olexa]

That's pretty much the way it is in real publishing too: You send material to a real publisher. If they like it they buy it, if they don't they return it.

It's only where the clueless and the scammers intersect that things get weird.

Ok, glad to read this. I was beginning to wonder! This fourm Bewares, Recommendations & Background Check
seems to be full of threads like this one.

 

[DreamWeaver]

It's the good news/bad news conundrum. Good news just doesn't require that much space, and no one feels a need to warn others about a good publisher .

Good publishers don't get pages of discussion because there's not that much to talk about. "I submitted, good luck, I'm waiting, how long is the usual wait, I got accepted, congratulations, I got a rejection, oh I'm sorry to hear that" are about the sum total of the conversations on the good publishers.

The bad ones...well, the drama never ends. And it seems most of them come up with a unique, or at least personalized, twist on "bad" .

What was it Tolstoy said? Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

 

[aliceshortcake]

My mind's still reeling from that $4,500 your-book-on-a-supermarket receipt 'service'. How many people will even notice that ad before throwing the receipt away? How many overpriced POD books (I can't believe a commercially-published writer would fall for this) will the author have to sell before they break even? It sounds like something a poor desperate PublishAmerica victim would dream up. What will Amazon Book Clubs suggest next - lollipop trees? Your book on a postage stamp?

 

[Filigree]

Stamps.com, for around $16 a month with a lot of other services thrown in.

We have enough information. Anybody that still falls for his company may possibly deserve it.

 

[James D. Macdonald]

I'm trying to figure out how they'd even get the ads onto the receipts if they wanted to.