Mustard production of the "One Million Dollars Paid" Joyk Aroun
For fun: Got this stupid (and real) email from PA today gushing that they were nearing their "one million dollars paid" mark. Pretty embarrassing since they have over 12,000 titles since 1999. It maths out to about $83 per book. After the email I added a fictional drama using the real owners and staff. Hope you like it.
Dear author,
We have another milestone in our crosshairs: PublishAmerica is about to cross the "One Million Dollars Paid In Royalties" line.
Stop and imagine it for a moment: one million dollars that are finding their way to authors because others have decided to buy and read their books.
How rewarding this is. It truly underscores what we have been saying all along: PublishAmerica is treating its authors the old-fashioned way -- we pay them, thanks to your legions of book buying readers. We do not charge our authors a penny, ever. Instead, we pay them. A million dollars collectively! That's what good old traditional publishing is all about. PublishAmerica is a young company, we have barely entered our seventh year. And already our royalties paid over our young lifetime are amounting to this!
Book sales have been going through the roof lately, possibly in part as a result of our decision last year to make our titles returnable. Bookstore orders have doubled in the past few months, even in the famously slow first half of January, with bookstores ordering a PublishAmerica book every three minutes, day and night, seven days a week.
More than anything else, this is your success. You and your fellow PublishAmerica authors have written these books that others have purchased for their education or entertainment. It is the quality of your writing, above all else, that has caused our royalty payments to add up to this astonishing amount.
In the last week of next month we will be putting new royalty statements and checks in the mail. To celebrate the million-dollar milestone, we are making a rare exception by presenting an unusual offer to those who, under Pars. 5 and 10 of their contract, volunteer to order copies of their own book in the last week of January.
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FADE IN:
INT: PUBLISHAMERICA CONF. RM. L. CLOPPER RUSHES IN TEN MINUTES LATE.
THE 70’s CLASSIC “REMINISCING” BY THE LITTLE RIVER BAND OVER INTERCOM.
“Okay guys, sorry I’m late. Been giddy about the e-mail. So let’s have it. What’s been the response to the million dollar e-mail?”
“Loretta’s team won, Clopper killers lost. Lost big.”
“Wooow. Yikes.” Larry bugged his eyes and twisted his neck and looked at the table. “Okay, well.” All were quiet. “Sonya, after Reminiscing, can you switch to the other Mellow Gold CD? Thanks Beb.”
“Don’t even congratulate anyone Larry.” Loretta said. “This is really bad.”
“On a good note, “Willem said, trying to make the most of it. “Most of the negatives are from POD1, 2 and 3 writers. ROBOTS are steady as expected. No strong variance noted on email, telephone and submission monitors.”
“Sir, I’m Bill Jerrace, IT. Sir, I’m here with feedback stats as they occurred immediately after and as they tapered off. Sir, within four seconds of releasing the email I received the first of similar emails. The emails were cynical. Not hostile but cynical, like they were hearing more of the same and deleting.”
“I don’t remember signing the requisition for a freaking crystal ball! Just read the damn thing.”
“Pumblestilskin, your webpage says PA controls 12,000 books. One million divided by 12,000 works out to 83 dollars per book if the one mil was for this year. Oh, but I know how to read a PA email and that cool mil was paid over six years; Barely enough to pay Copyright fees.” One million..ooohhh. Too bad a milestone is an abstract. Take me off your email list” Bill read using proper dramatic flair.
“Everyone in the room except Larry giggled into their knuckle but stopped as he scanned the room.”
“Sir, it gets worse” Bill continued, “many have read between the lines and understand that your words specifically mean that you have paid over 1,000,000 over the life of the company that started six years ago. If POD2 gets to the other PODs the word will get out that PA barely paid enough to pay for their Copyright fees.”
“What else, ‘Bill from IT?’”
“Well, an elderly couple from POD1 went so far as to describe that if PublishAmerica were now advertising their payouts, then they should advertise the real numbers and further publish their business costs like any public company.”
“You know what,” Larry began to argue, “That’s crap. We aren’t publicly held. Publicly held means that I’ve issued stock and nobody in their right mind would buy stock from me.” He looked around for the laugh. There was none. “So you laugh at the stupid email but my stock joke gets nothing? Hello, is this mic on?”
“I was born just blocks from where Anne Frank hid, where she was betrayed and arrested, and from where she was deported to die in a Nazi death camp…”
“Willem. “Clopper looked like he would throw something if he didn’t have to drag his fat *** out of his chair to get something. “You weren’t even born then. I’m going to take that story off the website if you ever bring it up here again. Are we understood? Good!”
“Clopper, nobody laughed about the stocks because it was true, “Loretta was putting her perspective on things, “I’m happy with the paycheck but I’d more likely bet on a resurgence of the mood ring or the pet rock than buy stock in Publish America. Sam Walton said to ‘Exceed your customer’s expectations.’ Our customer is the writer, no matter how we might think the customer is, and we let them down regularly. The ROBOTS, as they have so affectionately become known will outlive their usefulness and our mistakes and reputation will drown us.”
“You know Loretta, last time I checked, Sam Walton was dead.” Clopper said smugly.
‘”Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush, two Presidents and several world leaders and a load of celebrities at his funeral. Figure your funeral will turn out like that, Chief? Hell as it stands we can hold the thing right here in the conference room and still have room for a small putting green.”
“You know f you don’t like it,” Loretta,” You’re welcome to leave.” The room had heard the tired threat before but they also knew that the place would shut down without Loretta.
“Oh I know that. And I know that I could come back anytime I wanted. You need me more than I need you Larry, but you need not worry. I can’t get a job in Baltimore or D.C. unless I’m a criminal or a cop…and I can’t get a job as a cop unless somebody gets killed. If I want a criminal job it would be a lateral move. Her eyes lit up. “Dig the irony in that.”
Many in the room erupted in laughter.
“What’s Irony?” Clopper demanded, “Some publisher word, or a writer term. Why don’t you take some time off Loretta? It would put us back a bit but you haven’t taken any time off in a while.”
“Yeah Larry, Maybe I’ll spend some time in England; Maybe check in on our British offices at Milton Keynes.”
“Sweetheart, would you please give that a break?”
“Well why did you do it? That was the most pubescent thing I’ve ever imagined from a professional publishing house. I mean for God’s sake, advertising one the front page of the website and on newsletters that PublishAmerica has reached, ‘yet another milestone,’ Loretta waved her hands dramatically, ‘a British headquarters!’ You didn’t even consider that someone might actually drop by with their book? I’m going to remind you of the stupidity of it until I am no longer receiving telephone calls from people in England because there is no PA office in Milton Keynes, midway between Birmingham and London.”
“Well, PODs 4-6 are incubated in any event and monitoring shows a strong bond with the company; many birthing at least one but many birthing several books.
How is POD3 coming along?
“Satisfactory.”
“I think enough time has passed that we can put the Jamie Farr book back on the website front page. The sheep love that freakin’ Klinger. Hell, I love Klinger. I wish we could get Radar to write a book. Hey, somebody get Miranda Prather to get in contact with him. I bet we could do a ghostwriter thing with him. Has anybody seen her lately? Fancy apartment, $80,000 car, boy toy, and she thinks she doesn’t have to come to work anymore.”
“She doesn’t Larry. She owns a third of this ogre.”
“Okay, back to the meeting. Marketing your turn, what do you have?”
“Birthday party!”
“Clopper’s face was lying on his inner elbow with his mouth open.”
“A freaking birthday party.”
“Listen Larry, we’re talking POD6 Birthday party. Show the other PODs that we give a ****. Hell, we might even convince a POD6 that we give **** enough for him to pledge a book right there at the damn party in front of the cameras. Listen, we’ll combine it with an actual PA party. Lots of photos, celebs that need the gig (we can get the people from Dancing with the Stars, Skating with the Stars, Surreal Life; you know, those guys; hell $80 a day.) We have to get Klinger and freakin’ Radar O’Reilly. What if we got Gary Coleman
Clopper popped up—“Whatchu talkin’ ‘bout Willis! Genius, freaking genius! I want him to wear that security guard uniform, do you hear me. I mean it. “Clopper smiles contentedly as he sees the photograph of Gary Coleman on the hood of his car. Heck this email fiasco would blow over, all his goof-ups do.
